Amazon.com Summary: This is not a book about the decline of America, but rather about the rise of everyone else.” So begins Fareed Zakaria’s important new work on the era we are now entering. Following on the success of his best-selling The Future of Freedom, Zakaria describes with equal prescience a world in which the United States will no longer dominate the global economy, orchestrate geopolitics, or overwhelm cultures. He sees the “rise of the rest”—the growth of countries like China, India, Brazil, Russia, and many others—as the great story of our time, and one that will reshape the world. The tallest buildings, biggest dams, largest-selling movies, and most advanced cell phones are all being built outside the United States. This economic growth is producing political confidence, national pride, and potentially international problems. How should the United States understand and thrive in this rapidly changing international climate? What does it mean to live in a truly global era? Zakaria answers these questions with his customary lucidity, insight, and imagination.

http://www.amazon.com/Post-American-World-Fareed-Zakaria/dp/0393334805/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1270430221&sr=8-1

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Amazon.com Summary: Yergin and Stanislaw’s global tour d’horizon doesn’t extrapolate from the discrediting of various shades of socialism that free markets are here to stay. The situation varies from country to country. The authors report on the post^-World War II performance of significant national economies and, moreover, on the politicians who, starting with Margaret Thatcher, advocated the disengagement of the state from the economy. This work complements Robert Skidelsky’s Road from Serfdom (1996), a readable analysis of how the predictions of free-market economist F. A. Hayek came true. The authors supplement their research with interviews of influential economists and politicians over the past two decades, such as those who implemented “shock therapies” in ex-communist countries. The authors’ judgments are reasoned and seasoned, far from podium-pounding homilies on the free market; rather, they explain why the welfare state was so appealing after the war, then how it gradually sputtered into 1970s stagflation. Renders wide-ranging acquaintance with the basic ideas of contemporary economics.

http://www.amazon.com/Commanding-Heights-Battle-World-Economy/dp/B00006HAZF/ref=pd_bxgy_b_img_b

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Amazon.com Summary: In a true “flat earth” there are no borders or impediments to importing and exporting knowledge. Such knowledge transfer, if recorded, would more than offset the current US trade deficit and balance of trade figures. The audience for this book is primarily solo or small-practice consultants (and those considering independent consulting) who seek the wealth, experience, and gratification of consulting internationally. Both “on the ground” and remote techniques are addressed, so the peripatetic and the home-anchored can achieve significant new goals, adventures and growth-experiences.

http://www.amazon.com/Global-Consultant-Figures-Across-Borders/dp/0470823860/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1270430049&sr=1-1

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Amazon.com Summary: These short meditations on the world in 50 years are overwhelmingly devoted to developments in human health, climate change and technology, with a disappointing scarcity of speculation about any social or spiritual transformations. Scientists, who make up more than half of the contributors, predict that genetic engineering will be commonplace and AIDS obsolete, although infectious diseases will adapt and prosper. Marriages will be arranged by compatible genotype; the oceans will rise; cats will no longer be kept as pets—they will have been identified (along with hamsters and birds) as transmitters of everything from Parkinson’s to schizophrenia. China and India will be the new superpowers, and the U.S. will finally adopt the metric system. Although many writers note that certain species of plants and animals will be extinct in 50 years, only one laments that several languages will also be dead. This privileging of the scientific viewpoint makes the contributions from immunologist Peter Doherty and writer Michael Shermer all the more welcome as they attempt to focus on humanity rather than technology, imagination more than data. Perhaps it is easier to chart the course of climate change than social change—still the inhabitants of the planet and the future of their governments, beliefs and values deserve as much attention as the planet itself.

http://www.amazon.com/Way-Will-Years-Today-Half-Century/dp/1595553290/ref=sr_1_5?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1270429996&sr=1-5

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Amazon.com Summary: Twice a winner of the Pulitzer Prize, author Barbara Tuchman now tackles the pervasive presence of folly in governments through the ages. Defining folly as the pursuit by governments of policies contrary to their own interersts, despite the availability of feasible alternatives, Tuchman details four decisive turning points in history that illustrate the very heights of folly in government: the Trojan War, the breakup of the Holy See provoked by the Renaissance Popes, the loss of the American colonies by Britain’s George III, and the United States’ persistent folly in Vietnam. THE MARCH OF FOLLY brings the people, places, and events of history magnificently alive for today’s reader.

http://www.amazon.com/March-Folly-Troy-Vietnam/dp/0345308239/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1270429963&sr=1-1

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