Re: language query
On Feb 6, 2007, at 8:35 AM, Yoshie Furuhashi wrote:
One way to think about the “North” is to think of it as an exclusive membership club: older members (America and Europe) have seen the values of their memberships appreciate, as newer members (Japan and the Gulf states) and applicants to the club (China) pay big-time to acquire and maintain memberships.
The Gulf states aren’t like the other Northern countries - they have
almost no industry to speak of. They’re oil exporters. That makes for
a domestic social structure and a relation to the global economy
that’s completely different from the rich industrial countries.
Japan has had a rough 15 years of it, but they’re hardly paying “big- time.”
Doug