The comment I'm picking this up from is made in an article in left
business review, which quotes a little known bit of the infamous memo -
hence my interest in seeing the fuller version, not the shock-horror bit
everyone loves and knows so well. The link given on the webpage doesn;t
got to the fuller version, and a search doesn't show it up.
I quote here:
"In a neglected passage in his famous 1991 memo, in which he argued that
Africa was "vastly under-polluted," former World Bank chief economist
Lawrence Summers also said this, in commenting on a draft of a Bank
report:
'What's new? Throughout the outline I struggle with the evidence showing
what exactly the proclaimed revolution [in production] has
revolutionized. FDI [foreign direct investment - i.e., multinational
business] has always existed and many of the world's largest firms have
been transnational from birth. The "globalization" of production has
happened sure, but has the telecommunications revolution really had a
major impact? I would guess the invention of relatively simple things,
like steamship transport, did more for world trade than digitalized data
transmission through fiber optic cables. How exactly has the nature of
manufacturing been "fundamentally altered"? Aren't people just
incrementally better at doing things they've always done, like locate
production in the lowest cost location for delivery to markets (now
"globalization of production"), like manage inventories in a least cost
way (now "just-in-time inventory management"), like choose the appropriate
level of vertical integration depending on the production process (now
"critical buyer-seller links"), like match production to demand (now
"short product cycles"). Is a "revolution" really the appropriate metaphor
for these changes? I think the detailed evidence from the US about the
very small impact on productivity from the large investment in information
technology should convince us to hold off on the breathless tone about
technology.'
quoted in Doug Henwood Left Business Review
