"Nation Branding" in the Global Political Economy

♠ Posted by Emmanuel in , at 8/31/2010 12:09:00 AM
Nation branding: The strategic self-presentation of a country with the aim of creating reputational capital through economic, political and social interest promotion at home and abroad (Gyorgy Szondi)It is perhaps inescapable in this day and age that countries keen on promoting tourism embark on "nation branding." As a marketing major from my undergraduate years, I tend to see this world through such a perspective. For instance, the Chinese brand is certainly beating the American one in the global political economy sweepstakes as the former's more easygoing and less hypocritical approach to making friends and influencing...
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Good Tunes: The Political Economy of Philip Glass

♠ Posted by Emmanuel in at 8/31/2010 12:03:00 AM
It shouldn't surprise anybody that I am an avid Philip Glass fan. While I generally disdain low American strip mall, subprime, and SUV culture, his work is of a higher standard. Known almost to all, Glass is arguably the finest living American composer. At a time when popular awareness of classical music is approaching nil, he bravely carries the torch. Of course, it helps his international reputation that Glass bashes widespread American atrocities such as the invasion of Iraq in the name of freedom and growth. (It may sound funny but the artistic reputation of Yanks who enjoy bashing their own is generally higher abroad.)...
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The Reality of US Trade Decline in Southeast Asia

♠ Posted by Emmanuel in , at 8/30/2010 12:02:00 AM
This post is a follow-up to one I made a few weeks ago concerning changing regional predominance in the Asia-Pacific. The bigger they are, the harder they fall: In 2008, the United States was left behind by China as the third-largest trading partner of ASEAN member states--Brunei, Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand, and Vietnam--after Japan and the European Union. Fast-forward to the present and the ASEAN secretariat has revealed an even more remarkable finding: In 2009, China emerged as ASEAN's outright largest trading partner even as worldwide trade fell. The EU maintained...
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ECB's Trichet: No-BS Talk to Yankee Debt Lovers

♠ Posted by Emmanuel in at 8/28/2010 08:39:00 PM
ECB President Jean-Claude Trichet should be most familiar to readers as the anti-Bernanke. Although his institution has certainly taken some unconventional measures to help put out fires in Europe, their magnitude pales in comparison to those taken by the self-described Yankee helicopter pilot. Unsurprisingly, Bernanke has gone on talking about policy options for further easing.A few weeks ago, Trichet wrote an op-ed in the Financial Times that developed economies should stimulate no more. Only yesterday, Trichet attended the central banker jamboree in Jackson Hole, Wyoming, where he took the opportunity to warn his easy money American colleagues about the perils of their actions. While his entire speech is a tour de force that requires close reading, below is an excerpt concerning what the US has most likely in mind. That is, the Yanks think that living with the debt is not particularly harmful. Trichet, however, would like to disagree with this misdiagnosis:What about the option...
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The Knowledge Worker Myth vs Blue Collar Reality

♠ Posted by Emmanuel in ,,,, at 8/27/2010 12:53:00 AM
Never let it be said that there's no art to blogging. Alike in the offline world, there are talented folks who know how to weave a compelling narrative out of a mundane story, and there are those who weave a mundane narrative out of a compelling story. Today, I will of course try for the former--as I always do ;-) IMHO, something that separates a good blogger from a pedestrian one is an eye for something everyone else misses...Once more demonstrating that you don't have to look far for IPE-relevant material, I came across this featured story on Yahoo!'s front page yesterday. There it was staring me in the face: a pretty damning...
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"I've Kent Right!" US vs Singaporean Education

♠ Posted by Emmanuel in ,,, at 8/26/2010 12:09:00 AM
America is the only nation in history which miraculously has gone directly from barbarism to degeneration without the usual interval of civilization - Georges Clemenceau[NOTE: This is the second of two posts on Singapore and the United States.] Blogging is truly rewarding nowadays as the United States is receiving its proper comeuppance for severe indiscipline on a daily basis. It's good to be vindicated. In the end, it doesn't matter who you are; you eventually reap the misery that you sow. Here, though, I would like to focus on the state of education in the United States as it captures a poignant picture of American decay....
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Michael Fay Revisited: World Should Cane America

♠ Posted by Emmanuel in , at 8/26/2010 12:01:00 AM
[NOTE: This is the first of two Singapore and America posts.] Most of you are probably old enough to remember the Michael Fay caning incident of 1994. A typical American wastrel in the Bart Simpson mould named Michael Fay was punished for allegedly spray painting cars in Singapore. Now, that city-state is famed for its cleanliness and orderliness as compared to certain other places. (Like, say, the great American city of Detroit.) For Fay's troubles, the delinquent was thrown in the gaol, and most famously, caned four times. Fay became an American media sensation, with all sorts of wusses appealing for clemency for one of...
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Funding Carry Trade w/ $, Currency of the Doomed

♠ Posted by Emmanuel in , at 8/24/2010 04:46:00 PM
It is common knowledge by now that next to nothing is going right in the US economy. America's various debt orgies have brought it little but additional misery. Deficit lovers thought they could revive this wasteland by borrowing even more humongous amounts to cure ills caused by borrowing too much in the first place. In the end, nobody feels sorry for America--except perhaps Martin Wolf, who's become something of an apologist for Anglo-Saxon orthodoxy as of late. It's justice served: if you act foolishly, you fully deserve what's coming to you.As if we needed even more proof of the descent of this economic wasteland comes...
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Is CSR a Distraction From Solving Social Ills?

♠ Posted by Emmanuel in at 8/24/2010 12:13:00 AM
Here we go again for another round of the endless debate about whether corporations are responsible for performing socially beneficial actions. Milton Friedman famously argued that the social responsibility of business is to increase its profits and nothing more. That is, corporations as artificial persons according to law were not obliged to address "social responsibilities." Rather, it was up to individuals outside of their roles as corporate actors to address social issues:Of course, the corporate executive is also a person in his own right. As a person, he may have many other responsibilities that he rec­ognizes or assumes...
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PRC Labour Costs Too High? SE Asia May Beckon

♠ Posted by Emmanuel in ,, at 8/23/2010 12:02:00 AM
Here's another slant on the familiar story of rising labour costs in China. It may indeed be the case that countries in export competition with China are also experiencing labour unrest over low wages. Again, China often sets the standard others have to benchmark themselves against in the wider East Asia region. So, if wage rise in China, the understandable response of others will be to demand similar rises.Be that as it may, many countries in Southeast Asia are more than competitive with China from the standpoint of wages considered alone. However, labour is but one component in the decision to site manufacturing as you too...
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A Bad Idea? Using Facebook to Catch Tax Cheats

♠ Posted by Emmanuel in , at 8/20/2010 02:02:00 AM
Dear readers, let me begin by saying that I am on Facebook not by choice but by social pressure. In marketing, one of the observed phenomena in the diffusion of innovations is precisely others continually asking you to adopt something. And so it was with Facebook: I just felt sufficiently harassed that I joined Facebook even if I almost never visit it except to reply to queries and friend requests. As a courtesy to others, you will often be made to do things you do not necessarily find necessary.However, there are more sinister or creative ways to use Facebook that I'm now discovering aside from well-documented instances of...
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Long Live the Mighty Euro

♠ Posted by Emmanuel in , at 8/19/2010 05:10:00 PM
In case you haven't caught it yet, do read ECB Executive Board Member Lorenzo Benito Smaghi's piece in Foreign Affairs on why the euro is not only surviving but thriving amidst all the fearmongering about the imminent demise of the Eurozone and other similar folk tales. With the euro well past the $1.30 handle and the yen needing intervention against the dollar to prevent the greenback from falling below 83 yen to the dollar, I guess we all know which currency was, is, and will be on the back foot. Here is the concluding section where Smaghi not only charts the changes that should help ensure no more Greek fiascos, but also...
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The "Great Brain Race" in Global Higher Education

♠ Posted by Emmanuel in at 8/19/2010 12:23:00 AM
Global higher education is a topic of obvious interest to me since I will soon need to find more permanent university employment. However, my personal circumstances aside, there are obvious reasons why higher education should be followed by IPE scholars. First, higher education is a significant industry in itself, especially if countries can attract many full fee-paying foreign students. UK universities, for instance, claims that higher education makes a £59 billion contribution to annual GDP. Second, it is commonly believed that cutting-edge education can increase national competitiveness. For instance, while the UK has slashed...
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Why Mexican, Not Filipino Migrants Were Hit in 09

♠ Posted by Emmanuel in , at 8/18/2010 12:17:00 AM
Among lands sending emigres, perhaps none match the Philippines in terms of the geographical spread and variety of occupations filled by its economic migrants. Yes, it even sends a blogger working at a British university you should know of--yours truly! A few months ago, I touched upon both reasons as to why the Philippines did not really suffer large falls predicted by many in the development community in terms of both demand for migrant workers and remittances sent home. That post also suggests why economists mistakenly assumed the worst for the PR in 2009. Unfortunately, our Mexican counterparts did not have share the same...
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Add to Lexicon of Mathlexia: UK "Deficit Deniers"

♠ Posted by Emmanuel in , at 8/18/2010 12:10:00 AM
I must admit to warming to the UK's new Chancellor of the Exchequer George Osborne. Unlike Tim "Deficits Still Don't Matter" Geithner and other acolytes of Cheneynomics, he doesn't flinch when it comes to administering cuts to the UK budget lest it become as fiscally and morally bankrupt as its erstwhile Anglo-Saxon sparring partner.We are all familiar with global warming deniers, many associated with various conservative think-tanks, that have no truck with science. Now Osborne introduces us to another set of folks who are mathematically instead of scientifically challenged: "Deficits don't matter because our great nation...
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