THE MOST IMPRESSIVE and memorable of the author presentations I remember from the 2011 Sunday Times Oxford Literary Festival was by Alex Perry about his book Falling off the Edge: Globalization, World Peace and other Lies (Pan 2010). I bought it at the time and am now finally reading it.

Perry is Africa Bureau Chief for Time magazine, which seems to mean that he files reports from wherever instinct, news and whim take him, usually in places of war and economic meltdown which the rest of us might choose to avoid. There he talks to whoever has an interesting and revealing tale to tell, with a strong bias towards, and expertise in, the human realities of normally faceless economic trends. He writes incredibly well, uses statistics to devastating effect and makes the complex issues implicit in the title of his book at once understandable and engaging.

The phrase ‘falling of the edge’ refers to the idea that while advocates of globalization talk positively of ‘flattening the earth’, making it more equal for all, its critics argue that millions of people are disadvantaged by the process and fall off the edge and out of sight as a result of it. The processes he describes concern economic, military, cultural, political and communication globalization. His dark conclusion is that they tend to work together, they make the rich richer and the poor poorer, they undermine democracy by being accountable to no-one, and very frequently globalization is responsible for causing and sustaining war.

He concludes that effects of globalization are so overtly negative in so many countries, mainly developing ones, that they are at the root of much of the revolution and terrorism that besets the world.

Perry’s examples are all first hand and range from Hong Kong and China to India, South Africa and the Congo to Afghanistan. He talks to prime ministers and their financial advisers on one hand and ordinary people on the other, whose lives give the lie to the politicians’ policies.

Perry’s live presentations break all the rules: little eye contact, rapid speech, few concessions to the less globally literate, brief, non-conciliatory answers if that’s all a question warrants and precious little time wasted on beginnings and endings, which, given the content, clarity of language, challenge of the ideas and breath-taking range of knowledge makes him utterly compelling.

[image error]As for the book, which I’m halfway through, it’s shining a light on conflicts and trends other commentators seem to routinely miss. Perry has a good explanation for this: Why do we get globalization so wrong? One reason has to do with the trouble it takes to get it right…. Foreign correspondence is a very imperfect way of writing the history of the world. We send reporters into countries where they’ve never been, know no-one, and don’t speak the language – and expect them to capture the truth, in a maximum of 800 words, within hours…

When he spoke in 2011 Perry suggested that reporters like him are a dying breed because they don’t make a serious contribution to the bottom line. ie they cost. …a very good reason to read his books, his articles and travel to hear him talk if you get the chance. You’ll find some of Perry’s current reports on global issues here: world.time.com/author/alexjperry