FOR France, known for both its anti-globalisation sentiments and regular protests against outsourcing, the shoe may now be on the other foot. China - the famous factory to the world that has been accused of siphoning away French jobs - is set to outsource work to, well, France.

Globalisation is coming to the rescue of a country singing the blues with its rapidly rising unemployment. And to add to the historical irony, Chinese workers arriving to jump-start the project will be occupying villas and barracks built for the United States forces during the heyday of French cooperation with Nato.

In 1967, when US forces withdrew from Chateauroux Air Station, the graffiti sprayed on the wall urged 'US go home'. There is no 'Welcome China' bunting in the small town south of Paris, but French negotiators will be arriving in Beijing this month to formalise plans for the Chateauroux Business District. (Abandoning resistance to foreign languages, the special economic zone has been christened in English.)

Under an accord signed last year, 30 to 50 Chinese electronic and light manufacturing companies will set up assembly plants in the district, creating 4,000 jobs - a total of 80 per cent of which will be for French workers.

The Chateauroux region, once a centre for apparel manufacturing, lost it all to China. The planned departure of the 1,100-strong French army unit at the airbase would have dealt a further blow to the area. Against this backdrop, the Chinese government's proposal to set up an industrial park next to the former American airbase was received warmly by grateful town officials.

The Chinese plan to locate final assembly operations of many of its exports to Europe in France follows the tradition established by Japanese firms in the 1970s and 1980s. Facing rising protectionism from Europe and the US, and to benefit from low-cost and efficient supply-chain production, Japanese automakers moved much of their operations abroad. Criticism of Japan soon melted, as rising Japanese investments created jobs.

Unlike Japan, though, the Chinese would not be shifting entire factories to France. Chinese factories in China would still be producing the parts for final assembly in France, where a 'Made in Europe' or 'Made in France' label might be slapped on the products. French commentators have noted that the most important value addition for the Chinese would be the 'Made in Europe' cachet for goods often sneered at as of poor quality.

Moving the assembly and distribution of products closer to where the customers are is likely to help Chinese companies secure a long-term client base. Offering the after-sale services that their France-based operations would allow could be valuable for penetrating the continent. It is perhaps with this long-term perspective in mind that Chinese telecommunications giant Huawei recently set up a research centre in the Paris region.

The Chinese move could also yield a public relations dividend. Although scepticism prevails over the actual number of jobs the Chinese would create, the mere act of establishing a Chinese industrial park could help dampen charges that China is stealing European jobs.

French reactions to the news of this reverse outsourcing have been cautious. Conservative commentaries warn of a 'Chinese Trojan horse' in the heart of Europe. They claim these French-made goods will harm domestic production. Officials struggling with rising unemployment, on the other hand, hope the Chinese will help reverse the trend.

Allowing Chinese companies a beachhead in France would also benefit French aviation and shipping. Chinese state-owned shipping company Cosco already holds a 35-year lease on the container terminals at the port of Athens, Greece, giving China another foothold on Europe's shores.

Some French analysts worry that poor-quality Chinese products, some of which have been recalled in recent years, could damage the continent's reputation. But such worries pale before the immediate gains that China's Chateauroux deal offers. French workers, who have largely seen globalisation as a dark cloud on the horizon, might at last note a silver lining.

The writer is director of publications at the Yale Centre for the Study of Globalisation, and the editor of YaleGlobal Online.

Source - The Straits Times (http://www.straitstimes.com/Review/Others/STIStory_549621.html)

 

 

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I'VE railed often - in these pages and elsewhere - against the corrosive impact of excessive individualism on values: the cult of the hero-chief exec, the fixation on me-first thinking, the obsession with instant gratification, qualities that have all come together to create the economic monster that is American capitalism.

A reader may thus be forgiven for thinking I must be quite anti-American. But that would be wholly incorrect. There is a trend internationally to regard America with disdain, and criticise its many failings. Although there is no doubt that America has in the last 10 years shown some tarnished spots on its slipping crown, there is no doubt in my mind that it is still a great country.

The same individualism that has led to disaster because it was pursued to excess, will also be the source of America's eventual resurgence. Resourcefulness, initiative, innovation are the other side of the coin of individualism.

I wasn't pondering such profound thoughts when my family holidayed in the United States recently. But from the ethnic jungles of San Francisco to the neon canyons of Las Vegas, I found myself recalling that phrase in the Simon and Garfunkel song from my baby-boomer youth: 'I've come to look for America'.

Other songs of the culture - from Woody Guthrie's This Land Is My Land to Bruce Springsteen's Born On The Fourth Of July - conjure emotions that help explain why American nationalism is among the strongest in the developed world.

In such a vast land of accumulated differences, pride in individualism - the respect Americans accord the sanctity of the individual and thus, meritocracy - binds its citizens together.

At its best, American individualism embraces the notion that every person matters. Increasingly, in American cities especially on the coasts, you will find that social categories are less important than individual histories.

People are interested in where others come from, what they have done, where they are going. Personalities - the flipside of which is the cult of the celebrity - are accorded considerably more respect than in other countries. That's probably why, though it is one of the most economically unequal societies in the world, a streak of egalitarianism pervades American culture, enabling the waiter to chat with the wealthy patron, the barman with the billionaire.

As one American said: 'In this country, you can be a gardener and if you tell your friends that you want to be President of the United States, no one's gonna laugh at you. They tell you, 'Good Luck!', and clap you on the back. You can be anything you want to be.'

This perhaps also partly explains a unique aspect of American service culture: it's friendliness rather than its efficiency. Naturally, the tipping culture is a major incentive in improving service attitudes, but service providers chit-chat with customers in a way unimaginable in Singapore, venturing opinions not only on the service product, but on virtually everything else. There is a self-confidence among service providers that allows them not to feel that service is a servile job.

This individualism also translates to an endearingly naive idealism that still clings to the old frontier values of self-reliance and resourcefulness - what I call the DIY (do-it-yourself), Mr Fix-It values. Individualism means you are your own life project; you make endless improvements on your surroundings, your loved ones, yourself.

This is reflected in that uniquely American optimism - a cheery can-do attitude to solving even the most intractable personal problems. This attitude has had interesting results:

First, several times more self-help books are sold in US bookstores than anywhere else in the world. No matter what the problem is, there's always a book or motivational speaker who can help you to help yourself. And second, more items are sold in America's DIY stores than in the largest Wal-Mart.

The American values of DIY struck me when I flipped through the pages of an airline magazine. The in-flight shopping magazines of US airlines are an expedition into the minds of middle America. Magazines of other international airlines feature almost exclusively alcohol, tobacco and branded goods. American airlines' in-flight magazines are chock-a-block with the most practical offerings: devices to save time, to save effort, to make life just that much easier. I found advertisements for special ladders for dogs to climb on to their owners' beds, self-cleaning feeding troughs and an orthopaedically-ideal canine bed.

Revealingly, virtually all of the several hundred items in Sky Mall (United Airline's inflight sales almanac) were designed and manufactured by American SMEs. Here's a random sample of some of the products: The Solar-powered Mole Repeller; the Arthritis Pain Relieving Gloves; the Only Underwater Pogo Stick; the All Season Deer Repellent; the Breathe Fit Anti Snoring Aid.

Americans tend to believe solutions can be found to any problem, so long as one tries earnestly to find or invent a solution. This led a European friend of mine to muse: 'Why can't Americans just be less optimistic and more European... They're so naive!'

But such naivete is at the heart of American inventiveness. If it's broken, fix it. If it ain't broken, improve it. If there's a problem, invent a solution. Any problem, psychic to physical, can be fixed. Life is the ultimate DIY problem.

Whether it is Alexis de Tocqueville, the French observer of American democracy and culture in the 1830s, or the balladeers Simon and Garfunkel, or my own humble musings on Americana, what is common to all observers of this inspiring and infuriating nation is a sense that its greatness has not yet been exhausted, that its destiny, often heavily clouded, is still yet to be manifest.

The writer is chairman of the board of trustees of the Singapore Management University. Think-Tank is a weekly column rotated among eight leading figures from Singapore's tertiary and research institutions.

Source - The Straits Times (http://www.straitstimes.com/Review/Others/STIStory_547414.html)