Masacupan, Darwin M. 07-18526 Flatness & What I Think of It Ever since the earliest times until the Age of Discovery & Exploration, many thought that the world is flat. But after the voyages of explorers, in which Columbus was a pioneer, we learned that the world is round. Then why does Thomas Friedman, an educated & well-informed 21st – century man, & a journalist at that, wrote a book telling us that the world is flat? Has he gone crazy that he reverted to that old belief that was clearly proven wrong by brave & foolhardy seahawks? The answer is no. He still recognizes the fact that the world is round. The fatness he is talking about is not on a physical level. He uses it to characterize the present conditions of the playing field of working individuals. He explains that while in the past, it was Western countries, businesses & individuals who really had the say in globalization & in the economic system, today, all individuals – even nonWestern at that – are being empowered to compete & collaborate with others globally. Now it’s as if everyone is equal, of course as long as you are educated enough to fit into this diverse puzzle. The book gives a lot of examples which were gleaned from what the author saw & heard for himself by traveling around India, then China, Colorado, & Iraq. He himself was amazed at the fast pace that this was happening, how the world has gone from round to flat. Now what does these all mean to me? Is it really nothing because I was just tasked to do an essay on that chapter? The answer is again a no. Why wouldn’t I want to know about something that’s changing the world that I am living in rapidly? I myself am a witness to these new developments. Specific examples given in the book are outsourcing of accountants, radiologists, news crunchers, call center agents, software developers, executive assistants, airline reservation agents, fast food drive thrus, & tutors. Locally, we have heard of online English tutors, call center agents, medical transcriptionists, software developers, animators, & the like. They seem to be so in demand nowadays that everyone wants to have those jobs. But what exactly is their allure to most, if not al, of the prospective job applicants? It is primarily compensation. The usual starting salary is, by local standards (given the lower cost of living here compared to other countries), fairly decent enough to provide for our everyday needs & still have some to save or splurge on luxury items. Those companies usually provide life insurance, medical insurance for the entire family, & other benefits. Another is the upward mobility it gives to an individual & his family. If he / she could save enough, then they could start their own small sari-sari store, or send himself or his siblings through college. Now who would be stupid enough to pass up a chance like that? The next question is why do multinational corporations outsource those above-mentioned jobs here in our country? I believe that there are 3 reasons to that. The first one is low labor & operational costs. We think that the salaries they give their Filipino workers is high enough, but in reality it’s just bread crumbs to what our Western counterparts (whose ranks are certainly diminishing as more & more companies outsource their labor overseas) receive as compensation. Also, the renting of office space here is much lower compared to that of say, New York City or Boston. And we do know for a fact that companies want lower costs but with the same amount of efficiency & productivity or even higher. Next is our muchballyhooed English proficiency. As a former American colony of about 3 decades, our grasp of English is considerably far better than that of our neighbors. This is really an advantage because English proficiency is needed in most of these jobs. For example, a call center agent here usually gets calls from Americans who have their own set of problems which the company wants to solve for them. Of course this usually happens when he / she trusts the agent, if the agent is perceived to be like him, of his own nationality, if the agent speaks English well, preferably with an American accent. The 3rd one is the unique Filipino spirit, known the world over. Traits like kindness, care, gentleness, hospitality & the like would help in establishing rapport with the customers, which is good for the company’s name. Flatness as seen in the book isn’t limited to jobs alone, but also to news & information. Blogs proliferate nowadays, most of them about their daily affairs, but some dealing with national issues, getting the attention of even the established news networks. They empower individuals because they are free to say anything cyberspace without any fear for their lives & they feel they’re getting attention on their own thoughts. This is good, how individuals are given importance because they are a dynamic force to be reckoned with, which can shape the future through constructive & collaborative efforts. In that process, knowledge is disseminated, connecting the world’s diverse population even more. But we must answer another question: what is in it for our beloved Philippines? The Philippines is not a superpower like the United States, but it is capable of being one through globalization. But we must take a look at the present first. Stable jobs are scarce in the country that many of our countrymen leave in droves everyday. What we have are lots of blue collar jobs, those that require physical strength rather than intellectual capacity. The government tells us that there’s a mismatch between the needs of the market (i.e. available jobs,) & the skills training most of us are taking. Then what does the government do about this in relation to globalization? Forgive me for my pessimism, but I clearly don’t see all of these in a good light. Yes, the multinational companies all came in, looking for cheap Filipino labor. We of course obliged because we would benefit from it. But what I don’t like is what the government is doing about this. It’s as of the government is making a push towards 2 things only: more labor exports & produce specifically - trained labor for the outsourcing companies coming over our shores. Is this just all? Are Filipinos only made to be mere employees of these multinationals? Are we forever going to bank on our good grasp of English to have jobs? What will happen in the future, as our inefficient education system compared to other Asian countries see our lead in English proficiency over them disappear? Can we not establish our own national industries to compete internationally with these multinationals? Are we forever going to be fodder for their economic juggernauts, or we act with urgency right now & use globalization to our best advantage? We see India in the chapter building their own companies to be seen as equals by the Western ones who have previously hired & trained the Indians who pioneered in these ventures. I believe that the Philippines is capable of emulating this, but not under the present conditions imposed by our government. It seems as if the only important thing is that the whole Filipino workforce works & contributes to the delivery of rosy economic statistic every quarter. We should be building up our national industries the absorb the pool of educated workforce instead of seeing them work for others. If that happens, globalization would have achieved its purpose of empowering each & everyone of us. On a larger scale, as the world continues on its way to being really flat, we would see the ascendance of Asian countries in terms of economics & political might, fulfilling the idea of our 21st century as the Asia-Pacific century. We are currently seeing China & India developing into economic powerhouses harnessing their huge population base in the process. In the past, a big part of their populace was illiterate, & therefore with little chance to participate in globalization. But as we see more & more tech colleges popping up from Mumbai to Shenzhen, their population is getting a chance to even the playing field with the West, with whom they were playing catch-up for some centuries. As we see the West struggle with low birth rates & the booming of its elderly population (as Asia’s population remains relatively young due to high birthrates), the center of power will eventually shift to Asia. The sun will finally set in the Occident, as the sun will shine as never before on the Orient. Centuries of Western dominance will become history, as Asian powers rise to the forefront. I see the new dominant Asian superpowers: China (which has all the needed resources for even greater growth), Japan (with their industrious population), South Korea (most likely if it reunites with North Korea which has untapped resources), Vietnam & Malaysia (which have been both displaying good economic growth recently), Singapore (small but already an established business center), & Israel (if it survives the Arabs’ mission of hate & destruction). I really hope that the Philippines would be included in that line-up, & why not? Our people have the potential to be great, but like sheep, we need a trustworthy shepherd, who will guide us on the road to greatness. If ever my predictions of a dominant Asia do come true, we may have seen how the world went back from being flat to round again.
