In The News

Global Brands Contend With Appreciation for the Local

Bryant Simon July 6, 2010
Fear of global brands is a powerful, universally recognized phenomenon. Just as powerful and less noticed is the consumer pushback against global brands and search for unique, local products, notes Bryant Simon, author and American Studies professor. “The spread of these branded symbols of globalization raises the value of the local,” he maintains, explaining how Starbucks deliberately set out...

Germany's Export Boom Has Trade Partners Stewing

Armin Mahler, Christian Reiermann, Wolfgang Reuter, Janko Tietz June 30, 2010
Fortunes turn quickly, and the experience of German manufacturers shows that some firms emerge from recession with renewed strength. But global trade partners that rely on deficit spending claim that German prosperity comes at others’ expense, as suggests this Spiegel Online article. Critics complain that a weak euro, German wage stability and failure to stimulate domestic demand decrease the...

African Migrant Workers Find Slim Pickings in Strawberry Fields of Southern Spain

Jean-Jacques Bozonnet June 28, 2010
In Spain, migrant men called “ghosts,” live in hidden plywood shacks adjoining berry fields, and wait for the next season’s harvest. But weather and laws have disrupted the plans of many who travel from Africa and Eastern Europe seeking work on berry farms. In 2008, Spain aimed to reduce immigration by reducing the number of temporary work permits for harvests. The country’s unemployment rate...

Growing Challenges of Energy and Environment – Part I

Susan Froetschel June 22, 2010
Emerging economies have joined developed nations in the wild scramble for energy, all taking greater risks in drilling for oil and gas supplies while largely shrugging about effects on climate, the environment or public health. Nations and corporations go to great lengths to explore and drill, but repairs are not so easy, as seen with a broken well gushing oil into the Gulf of Mexico since April...

Attention Whole Foods Shoppers

Robert Paarlberg June 21, 2010
According to the UN Food and Agriculture Organization, more than a billion people, most living in developing countries were undernourished last year. In turn, the UN World Food Program identifies poor agricultural infrastructure as a root cause of hunger. Because of “buy local” campaigns in the West, interest has fallen among international donors to fund modern agriculture in developing nations...

Nigeria: “World Oil Pollution Capital”

Caroline Duffield June 18, 2010
The Niger Delta has some 300 spills each year. But Nigeria, a major supplier for foreign markets, lacks the technology, researchers or journalists that monitor such spills, reports Caroline Duffield for the BBC. Many spills in Nigeria are the result of sabotage and aging equipment. Nigerians who have lost their livelihoods because of oil spills take note of the outraged response to an April 20...

Globalization of Energy Demand

June 18, 2010
In an interview with Nayan Chanda, Editor of YaleGlobal Online, Daniel Yergin, one of the world’s leading experts on energy, discusses the future of dependence on oil and a push towards efficiency. He also talks about the “globalization of demand”, in which he states that the success of globalization, notably demonstrated by rapidly rising incomes in, for example, China and India, is reflected in...