The "Foucaulf Bashes Tom Friedman" Extravaganza

[The Mikado]

For Gustaf: Tom Friedman is the leading American voice for neoliberalism.  Friedman believes that the world is divided between nationalistic, ideological states that avoid the global market out of chauvanism and the people that want to further unite the global economic unification, an argument he first put forth in his book The Lexus and the Olive Tree (the Lexus is international capitalism and the Olive Tree is nationalism).  Friedman argues that social turmoil can be understood as societies trying to get from one to the other: in his new language, to get out of the old round world and join the new flat world.  He points to the decline of tensions between India and Pakistan as a great example of what happens when Lexuses replace Olive trees (though recent events make one question that) and feels that the Arab Spring is the people of the Arab world demanding introduction into the economic vitality of the flat world and throwing off the Olive Trees of the old dictators.

[The Mikado]

Also, one of the main criticisms against him is that he overextends metaphors to absurd levels.  See my post.

[The Mikado]

My favorite unintentionally hilarious Friedman piece will always be how he wrote during the Egyptian Revolution this winter that in the 30 years he's been to Cairo, the skyline hasn't changed once.  This is Friedman's heavy-handed metaphor for his own metaphorical unflat, olive tree-loving description of the Mubarak regime.  He said that the skyline showed that Egypt had been asleep, and that its awakening and hopefully flattening will lead to drastic changes in Cairo's skyline.

[The Mikado]

He's the most predictable man on the planet.  Once you've read one of his books (I've read two) you can predict the Tom Friedman article on any subject.  It's not so much that I disagree with him as that I'm amazed at how facile and simplistic his arguments are.