Globalization at the Crossroads (2012)

The events happening across North Africa and in the Arab world today are the result of many things, but at the top of the list is the fact that the vast majority of the population has been systematically locked out of the system by Byzantine legal procedures and political repression. Globalization at the Crossroads features renowned Peruvian economist and author, Hernando de Soto. His twenty years of research show that economies prosper only in places where widespread personal property ownership exists-coupled with inclusive, efficient, and transparent business and property law. This program demonstrates how the West successfully revolutionized its legal systems, property laws, and developed the modern corporation. Other nations that have instituted private property and business reforms, such as post-WWII Japan and present-day China, have seen their economies take off and their middle classes grow. Globalization is the new civilization. But unless we include the 80% of humanity currently excluded from the system, they will bring civilization down, as they have brought down other civilizations in the past.