From Global to Local

The Making of Things and the End of Globalization

By: Finbarr Livesey

Narrated by: Jonathan Cowley

This brilliantly original book dismantles the underlying assumptions that drive the decisions made by companies and governments throughout the world, to show that our shared narrative of the global economy is deeply flawed. If left unexamined, they will lead corporations and countries astray, with dire consequences for us all.

For the past fifty years or so, the global economy has been run on three big assumptions: that globalization will continue to spread, that trade is the engine of growth and development, and that economic power is moving from the West to the East. More recently, it has also been taken as a given that our interconnectedness—both physical and digital—will increase without limit. But what if all these ideas are wrong? What if everything is about to change? What if it has already begun to change but we just haven't noticed?

Increased automation, the advent of additive manufacturing (3D printing, for example), and changes in shipping and environmental pressures, among other factors, are coming together to create a fast-changing global economic landscape in which the rules are being rewritten—at once a challenge and an opportunity for companies and countries alike.

Critic reviews

"Refreshing . . . The future of globalization may be determined less by a rarified battle of ideas than by something as simple as the 3D printer. Finbarr Livesey's book gives a nod to the idea that protectionist politicians are a threat to world trade, but his focus is very largely on the impersonal progress of technology . . . [He offers] detailed descriptions of individual products and processes he has gleaned through his years of consulting for international companies."
—Alan Beattie, Financial Times

"The great strength of Livesey’s book is to make us look more closely and intelligently at the underlying drivers of globalization. Whether more or less of it, there will surely be a different kind of globalization in the coming years. Livesey’s fine book will help us understand and anticipate the changing dynamics of global economic interdependence."
—Finance & Development

Interesting book

I enjoyed this book, and it gave many great examples of things I wrote down to look into further. However, there were 2 issues I found:

#1 The book tends to look very favorably on 3D printing as a replacement to traditional manufacturing. While I'm not an expert on 3D printing, the general consensus from people I've spoken to at trade fairs and who use 3D printing in their work, as well as that online, is that this process is more complementary than an outright replacement. 3D printing has been around for decades, and the applications are more for complex and customized parts, but not so much in things for mass production. Maybe this will change, but the lack of materials, the slow speed, as well as other issues, make 3D printing not exactly the extreme game-changer that many people tend to herald it to be, such as the author. Cost and speed make traditional methods like injection molds and milling more realistic. However, even the factories using these methods are introducing more automation into those processes, and this is where I still see the forest for the trees with what the author is saying.

#2 I was hoping that the author would use more business numbers in his analysis. This is something that I feel is incredibly lacking in economic discourse. Economic theory tends to look at things like general equilibrium, for example, that can leave out massive factors in forecasting what happens in reality. Theory tends to assume a frictionless environment without barriers to labor mobility, regulation, and a myriad of other things. This just does not work in reality. I feel like economics tends to look at things from a very high-level instead of that which shows direct impact to industry. This book I think does this in terms of its repeated mention of 3D printing, for example.

I still enjoyed this book thoroughly, and I definitely recommend it.

However , However

Very good performance but it lacks punch in the story and how the Author develop his main idea .