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January 8, 2009
THE good news, said Alan Blinder of Princeton University to a crowded hall on the opening day of this year's gathering of the American Economic Association (AEA) in San Francisco, is that the stockmarket rallied yesterday. The bad news, he joked, is that it bounced on hopes that the economy's problems would be solved at the AEA meetings.
No such luck. The prevailing mood at this year's event was one of despair, not hope. The tone of the three-day conference, which ran between January 3rd and 5th, was set on its first morning when Kenneth Rogoff of Harvard University outlined the results of new research conducted with Carmen Reinhart of the University of Maryland. The paper, a sequel to work presented at the 2008 conference, looks at the aftermath of past financial meltdowns to gauge just how bad America's recession might be.
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Start-Up Nation addresses the trillion-dollar question: How is it that Israel—a country of 7.1 million, only sixty years old, surrounded by enemies— produces more start-up companies than large, peaceful, and stable nations like Japan, China, India, Korea, Canada, and the UK? With the insights of geopolitical experts and investors, the authors examine this nation’s adversity-driven culture to answer this question and offer prescriptions for a global economy on the rebound.
In Forces of Fortune, Vali Nasr presents a paradigm-changing revelation that will transform the understanding of the Muslim world at large. He reveals that there is a vital but unseen rising force in the Islamic world—a new business-minded middle class—that is building a vibrant new Muslim world economy and that holds the key to winning the cold war against Iran and extremists.
In Cuba: What Everyone Needs to Know, Julia E. Sweig presents a remarkably accessible portrait of Cuba's unique place on the world stage over the past fifty years, including its internal politics, its often fraught relationship with the United States, and its shifting relationship with the global community.
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