Journalist
Thomas L. Friedman reports on the phenomenon of globalization. It's written in an anecdotal, accessible way. Friedman
feels about globalization the same way he feels about the dawn--on balance a
good thing, but inevitable even if not. "The Lexus" in his title
represents the drive for prosperity; the "olive tree" represents the need for
community. A central feature of globalization is that it often puts these
two imperatives at cross purposes with one another.Interestingly, Friedman points out that the same technologies that make globalization possible--satellite communications, the Internet, the velocity of electronic transactions, etc.--also make it possible for individuals to have a dramatic impact on the world stage if they know how to exploit those technologies.
Jody Williams received the 1997 Nobel Peace Prize for her work to secure an international ban on the use of land mines. She did so not only without much governmental help, but in the teeth of opposition from the Big Five major powers. Her principal tool? E-mail.
"Osama bin Laden, a Saudi millionaire with his own global network"--Friedman wrote the book in 1999, before bin Laden became a household name--"declared war on the United States in the late 1990s; and the U.S. Air Force had to launch a cruise missile attack on him as if he were another nation-state. We fired cruise missiles at an individual!" (Friedman, 12)
Michael
Hardt and Antonio Negri's Empire is more difficult reading than Friedman,
but more analytical. It's critical of globalization as it currently operates,
but has some compelling ideas about how to make the new economic order work more
fairly.
Like
Chomsky, conservative Patrick Buchanan denounces globalization, mostly because
he thinks a selfish power elite is screwing the rest of us. Just goes to show
you can't conveniently pigeon hole ideas as "left wing" or "right wing."
(Buchanan, incidentally, was a life-long free trader until 1987).
according to his official web site, "provides striking
documentation and historical evidence that powerful figures – including men
behind the spotlights and behind our elected officials– have a definite plan for
changing the world. They have a program for your future and a vision for your
family’s destiny. Are you ready for such a change? Do you know what they really
have in mind? In this astonishing and hard-hitting
book,"--I'm still quoting the web site--"Pat Robertson provides an authoritative
and masterful study of the New World order, exploring the roots and the
realities of this extraordinary vision. In broad and challenging strokes, the
author takes a penetrating look at both historical and modern applications of
world order ideology, its many appearances in government, economics, and law,
and he offers a startling portrait of the humanistic and spiritual dimensions of
this program already at work, changing the face of our world."
Henry
Kissinger is still around, operating from a realpolitik perspective.
Sir
Michael Howard might be called the dean of military historians. In The
Invention of Peace: Reflections on War and International Order, he
echoes a famous mid-nineteenth century statement: "War appears to be as
old as mankind, but peace is a modern invention"--modern in the sense that only
in the past 200 years have philosophers and statesmen seriously imagined an
international order without war. Howard argues that only nation-states are
capable of achieving such an order. Since a tendency of globalization is
to undercut the nation-state in favor of multinational corporations, Howard
implicitly sees difficulties with this development. 
Ronald
J. Sider's Rich Christians in an Age of Hunger--a classic work with more
than 350,000 copies in print. Hans Kung, a prominent German theologian,
has some thoughts of his own.