The fact that the world may experience multiple concurrent failures triggered by Y2K (both known/predictable (but we could not fix), or unknown/unpredictable (that we did not know about or we thought we already fixed), the question is whether these problems can destablize the fragile, just-in-time global supply-chain system of today ?

Consequently, the second question comes seeing the highest exposure saffecting banking, communications, power, airlines, ... which are all pillars of globalization and the new world order, the question is whether (as ary North puts it) the end of globalization and the beginning of a new era of insividualism and isolation giving beith to the anticipated new mutli-pole world order system with US being one power, Europ another, Japan and its allies another, China & India, ...etc ?

Interesting questions that I have no answers for. Can anyone elaborate ?

-- Mohammed Thiab (mvc@firstnet.com.jo), December 02, 1999

Answers

The technology will all still be there. Assuming the crash is not enough to cause chaos and starvation, the economy will rebuild. It may take a decade, but it will happen. So I don't see Y2K failures themselves rearranging the world order.

The reaction is another question. If the US goes isolationist, it will end up considerably poorer. A poorer, isolationist US would presumably pull back from military committments around the world. So we could see a vacuum in world affairs. Other powers could move into that void.

However, China could become chaotic or break up due to its own internal stresses. Even lack of economic growth, let alone a worldwide depression, could cause this. They are running a race between growth and unacceptable unemployment as it is. Turmoil in China will affect the rest of Asia. A severe worldwide recession might also collapse the Japanese budget, which is already under a lot of strain.

Europe is likely to have as many Y2K problems as the US, if not more. Plus people there already have their hands full with economic integration. Hard to see them suddenly getting their act together, coming up with money for a unified defense force, and projecting power around the world.

Africa is already declining in many areas. This will only get worse as foreign aid drops to zero. The Middle East is an interesting question. Will a crash increase Islamic militancy, as the secular governments fail to deliver any prosperity? Will Israel's neighbors take advantage of the withdrawl of the US to attack it? Will oil from the Middle East become more important (due to failures elsewhere), or less (due to their own failures, and drops in demand?)

Interesting times....

-- You Know... (notme@nothere.junk), December 03, 1999.

Assuming severe problems in telecommunications and transportation it would seem likely that multi-national corporations would have a hard time competing with light, local enterprises in terms of making and delivering certain kinds of products. Food production comes to mind.

Naturally it would depend on what the product is. No local company is going to be able to support car production but a national company could and it would probably suffer fewer gliches in producing a car than an international company.

So the new pecking order for business might look like this, local over state, state over country, country over international.

It would seem logical to assume that political and economic concerns would follow a new market orientation so that local political/economic concerns would have precedence over state, state over country, country over international.

It would also seem likely that economic groupings based on region and language would form so that U.S./Canada might be one group, South America another, Germany/Austria,etc.

-- Stanley Lucas (StanleyLucas@WebTv.net), December 03, 1999.