In The News

Google Adds 1 Billion Pages to Stay Ahead

February 19, 2004
Google, the popular internet search engine, has added a billion pages to remain competitive. It currently hosts 35% of all internet searches. But Yahoo and MSN are clipping at Google's heels and hope to overtake it as the leading search engine. Part of Google's success lies in its proprietary algorithm that aids and ranks search requests. In a race for superiority, both Yahoo and...

Poppy Barons on the 'Speed' Boat

Larry Jagan February 16, 2004
The notorious Golden Triangle in Southeast Asia has long produced a large portion of the world's illicit drugs. Although authorities in Myanmar (Burma), Thailand, and Laos have had substantial success in ending opium poppy growing, newer technologies are allowing for the production and trafficking of synthetic drugs. Poppy barons have discovered that trafficking in methamphetamines can be...

Jobs Flight? Worry about Industry Flight Instead

Alvin Pang February 12, 2004
Singapore doesn't need to worry about workers leaving, but whole businesses. With a maturing economy based largely on IT, finance, and trade, Singapore no longer attracts budding entrepreneurs looking for the next big thing. And the current outsourcing debacle suggests that no oasis lies on the horizon. To stay competitive, Singapore needs to encourage younger firms to wade into...

'Offshoring' Has Its Trade-Offs

Steven Pearlstein February 11, 2004
The offshoring of US jobs is becoming a hot topic in political and economic debates. Earlier this week, President Bush's top economic advisor, Greg Mankiw, weighed in on the controversy by claiming that the offshoring of service jobs - like software design - to India and other countries can only make US businesses stronger. But that's not necessarily the case, says Steven Pearlstein...

The Strategic Straitjacket of Globalization

Banning Garrett February 11, 2004
Unlike during the Cold war, when competition was only between the US and the Soviet Union, today all globalizing nations are competitors. However, writes Banning Garrett, Director of Asia Programs at the Atlantic Council, these competing nations are also partners in today's globalizing economy, which is growing increasingly interconnected and interdependent. These new conditions of...

The Long Arm of the US Workplace

Patti Waldmeir February 8, 2004
Along with jobs, "is America also exporting its notion of what constitutes fairness in the workplace," asks the author of this Financial Times article. Whereas only a few years ago, sexual harassment litigations were unique to the American workplace, such cases are more and more common in other countries as well. Even American companies operating in countries without sexual harassment...

Voices of Mumbai

Ian Douglas February 6, 2004
Since the World Social Forum (WSF) began four years ago it has sought to address the myriad issues which the World Economic Forum fails to take into account. Concerns encompass the negative effects of globalization, human rights, environmental degradation, international peace, disenfranchisement, and international law. With such a range of issues, a consensus as to what is most pressing is...