Walden F. Bello Book order (chronological)

From the acclaimed globalization critic, a far-reaching analysis of America's military, economic, and political vulnerability The empire seems unassailable, but the empire is weak-and precisely because of its imperial ambitions. So argues Walden Bello's provocative new book, which systematically dissects the strategic, economic, and political dilemmas confronting America as a consequence of its quest for global domination. An award-winning development expert, Bello shows how despite the enormity of the U.S. defense budget, American forces are already overextended, a condition bound to intensify as each local "victory" breeds simmering resistance and new confrontation. He points to the empire's looming economic breakdown, the result of its gargantuan military costs, record-breaking deficits, and exploitative trade and investment relations with developing countries. On the political front, he warns of the bitter disillusionment mounting around the world in response to America's failure to champion liberal democracy. Everywhere America goes, crony capitalism, hostile coercion, and gross inequalities in income eat away at expectations of justice and inclusion. A clear and prophetic examination, Dilemmas of Domination reveals a not-too-distant future in which the empire's hidden weaknesses will yield fatal challenges to American supremacy.

Challenging the prevailing wisdom on Asia’s “miracle economies,” Dragons in Distress argues that South Korea, Taiwan, and Singapore are headed for crisis. Writing for a diverse audience, Walden Bello and Stephanie Rosenfeld lead their readers on an exploration of the different dimensions of this environmental degradation, agriculture on the road to extinction, deteriorating labor-management relations, eroding political legitimacy, and deepening structural fissures in the industrial economy.Showing how these problems stem from the dynamics of the model of high speed, export-oriented industrialization, they suggest strategies to surmount the unfolding crisis and open up the path to equitable and ecologically sustainable development. The first comprehensive critique of the “Newly Industrialized Countries” (NICs) paradigm, this book is a very welcome antidote to the usual uncritical celebration of the “dragon” or “tiger” economies.