About this Book

Whats the truth about globalization and whats just globaloney? Michael Veseth believes that much of what people say and write about globalization is really globaloney - rhetoric built on a few vivid images and exceptional cases that distort more than they reveal about the world around us. Globaloney separates rhetoric from reality by taking close-ups of the classic globalization images and comparing them with unexpected alternative visions. Do Michael Jordan and Nike really define globalization? Why not David Beckham and World Cup soccer? Is globalization McDonalds and McWorld? Why isnt the global wine market a better metaphor? And what can we learn about how globalization works at the grassroots by comparing the elitist, publicity-hungry Slow Food movement with the massive but usually unseen international trade in worn and wrinkled second-hand clothes? By the end of Globaloney, Veseth has explained how globalization reflects its terroir-its local color, why the French so love to hate it, and that, as the title of one chapter proclaims, You can blame it all on Adam Smith. through its wealth of examples, demonstrates that globalization is not one big thing but many different yet related, particular things. Globaloney is an irreverent but important look at how globalization really works.