Journal on Policy & Complex Systems Volume 4, Number 1, Spring 2018 | Page 160

Keynes , Hayek , and the Roots of Complexity Theory in Economics
future in an article that appeared in Foreign Affairs ( 2016 ). They explain that a byproduct of globalization , the fulfillment of global consumer preferences , is leading to “ increasingly overlapping areas of commonality ” and causing a “ fusion of civilizations ” that ensures “ the progressive direction of human history .” This has made the past three decades “ the best in history ” and will continue to lift “ the human condition to heights never seen before .” Global middle-class culture has already converged in cuisine , where global influences have thoroughly penetrated Western kitchens ,” remark Mahbubani and Summers ( 2016 ), “ and something similar should happen across cultural sectors .” Other examples they note are the 36 million Chinese studying the piano , the 50 million learning to play the violin , and the 15 new opera houses that have opened . The satellite branches of Western colleges and universities in place around the world enable the spread of “ best practices and good ideas from the West to the rest and increasingly from the rest back to the West .”
Mahbubani and Summers ( 2016 ) maintain that the progressive direction of human history , which has lifted the human condition to unprecedented heights , is set to continue just as Keynes envisioned , with the emergence of a large , well-educated , global middle class . ( They project this class to increase , from 1.8 billion in 2009 to 3.2 billion in 2020 , and 4.9 billion in 2030 ). Yet even if this were to happen , there are reasons to be skeptical that consumerism and the growth of the middle class will produce

a unified global value system .

Here is the paradox given as a Chinese adage : “ Same bed , different dreams .”
Although the examples they provide of this progressive trend are mostly cultural , Mahbubani and Summers ( 2016 ) disregard a greater cultural truth . In a globalizing world with many overlapping areas of commonality households with the same aspirations

for physical well-being may also seek to attain those goals according to ethical codes based on very different ideas about the meaning of life , gender , the role of the individual , and the separation of church and state .

Mahbubani and Summers ( 2016 ) argue that it is the general public that is suffering disillusionment with globalism , as the concept is defined and dramatically disparaged by Western populist demagogues who exploit the plight of refugees or play on anti-austerity sentiments . There are , the authors concede , three reasonable sources of pessimism : turmoil in the Middle East , China ’ s economic slowdown , and stagnation of the world ’ s economies . They dismiss each of these scenarios as transitory and manageable , and certainly no cause for a dim prognoses of globalization prospects .
Yet , during the past two decades , while incomes in the developing world grew at rates that far exceeded anything previously recorded and the size of the middle classes increased spectacularly , global democracy indicators receded and the most frequently used indexes to track it downgraded the democratic status of many emerging nations . Autocracies have become more autocratic ,
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