The Cognitive Age

New York Times By DAVID BROOKS
Published: May 2, 2008
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/05/02/opinion/02brooks.html?ex=1367467200&en=cc3f18b330bcead4&ei=5124&partner=facebook&exprod=facebook

Brooks argue that we need look beyond the globalization paradigm Although most agree that globalization is the chief process driving our age and that our lives are being transformed by the increasing movement of goods, people and capital across borders.

The changing of historical narratives shows that what used to determining boundaries are blurred where capital flows freely and technology levelling the playing field allowing for fiercer global competition.

Yet the globalization paradigm has evolved and is no longer the central force driving economic change. "Pankaj Ghemawat of the Harvard Business School has observed, 90 percent of fixed investment around the world is domestic. Companies open plants overseas, but that’s mainly so their production facilities can be close to local markets."

Brooks identified that the chief force reshaping manufacturing is technological change. "Thanks to innovation, manufacturing productivity has doubled over two decades. Employers now require fewer but more highly skilled workers. Technological change affects China just as it does the America."

The central process driving that is changing the ecomomy landscape is no longer globalization but a skills revolution - a more demanding cognitive age.

"In order to thrive, people are compelled to become better at absorbing, processing and combining information. But the most important part of information’s journey is the last few inches — the space between a person’s eyes or ears and the various regions of the brain. Does the individual have the capacity to understand the information? Does he or she have the training to exploit it? Are there cultural assumptions that distort the way it is perceived? .....

But the cognitive age paradigm emphasizes psychology, culture and pedagogy — the specific processes that foster learning. "