The World is Flat.
Miha Lee
1. What does Friedman mean by flat or small world?
He means that due to the breakthroughs in communication technologies, hierarchies are
being challenged from below or transforming themselves from top-down structures into more
horizontal and collaborative ones. He said, “The global competitive playing field is leveled
because of the degree to which it is now possible for companies and individuals to source work
anywhere with lower speed and greater speed.”
People from all around the world work together and compete with each other, no matter
how far they live from each other. For instance, in Bangalore, India, America designers could be
on the screen speaking with their Indian software writers and their Asian manufacturers all at once.
Specifically, remote countries such as India and China can have more power to compete or
collaborate with well-developed countries using access to the Web and their people with low
labor cost. What’s more, it could be about American people who are getting more opportunities
to compete or collaborate with big companies or rich people no matter where they live or no
matter how much they have. In sum, he explained that the advancement of technology made
more possible outsourcing and homesourcing leading to the globalization of the world economy
system.
2. What are the forces flattening the world? (give several examples)
The forces flattening the world are what is called flat-world platform. The platform is the
product of convergence of the personal computer (which allowed every individual suddenly to
become the author of his or her own content in digital form) with fiber-optic cable (which
suddenly allowed all those individuals to access more and more digital content around the world
for next to nothing) with the rise of work flow software (which enabled individuals all over the
world to collaborate on that same digital content from anywhere, regardless of the distances
between them).
The breakthroughs of communication technology include

Optical engineering that makes possible broadband connectivity

Explosion of software – email, search engines like Google, and propriety software that can
chop up any piece of work and send it to anywhere in the world

Diffusion of PC with Internet access in wired cities

Cheap portable telecommunication tools such as MP3 and digital camera cell phones.
3. What types of tasks can be outsourced?
It could be anything from low end work to R & D that can be digitized and decompose
the value chains, and move the work around. To put another way, it is the work that can be
disaggregated, delivered, distributed, produced, and put back together again via the Internet.
Usually, the tasks are low-value-added such as

Number crunching such as Tax preparation, collecting data from Internet, and investment
research

Radiologists’ work such as reading and interpreting digital images of CAT, X-ray, and MRI

Writing software that perform relatively easy but customized work

Providing personal remote executive assistant

Converting hand drawn plans into digital ones

Preparing new bulletins including charts, tables and Power-point slides

Data-entry work.
4. What can be done at a call center in India?
The people at a call center can do anything that is performed by American operators in a
company. Outbound operators are selling everything; inbound operators are providing customer
services. They are doing the following things.

World-wide telemarketing that sells credit cards, goods, and services

taking reservations for air-lines and restaurant table

solving computer problems for confused customers

tracing lost luggage of an airline

On-line tutoring to a different world

Taking orders for fast food restaurant (not yet but for the future)
5. Is globalization bad or good for the US?
Globalization is the word we came up with to describe the changing relationships
between governments and big businesses. It is the emergence of completely new social, political,
and business model that impact some of the deepest, most ingrained aspects of society right
down to the nature of the social contract. Globalization helps people and capital free up to do
different, more sophisticated work and gives an opportunity to produce the end product more
cheaply, benefiting customers even as well as corporations. Therefore, I don’t think globalization is
good or bad for a country, even though the country is either the U.S. or South Korea. It could be
both excitement and dread depending on where you are in the middle of globalization. It is a
matter of readiness to adapt to the change. In my opinion, the middle class, no matter what
country it belongs, has the most serious problems with adaptation. The low class can have more
opportunities to sell their labor to the world market with relatively good price, and they enjoy
commodities with the cheapest prices imported from other countries. The high class who has a
lot of capital or information can have more opportunities to invest its money and knowledge
throughout the world market to make more profit. However, average people who have been
protected by the government-centered economy system have to compete with other countries’
people who have the same knowledge and skill but are paid less on account of the difference in
the currency system or the low status of their countries’ economy. They are losing their jobs, so
cannot afford to buy the commodity with high quality than they did before. So, they have to
transform themselves to adapt the change in the world. However, it is not easy. It takes time and
enormous efforts to embrace and benefit from the change.
The U.S. is a country which has capitals, social infra, and knowledge. Thus, the U.S. is
finding a way to take advantage of the globalization. I worry about my country Korea which has
nothing but skilled, educated people with higher labor cost than China. It’s like we are the middle
class in the world. But I’m sure we will survive with the improvement of our education.