Recommended by Deepak Mohindra, Editor-in-Chief, Apparel Resources
Why to read ‘The Travels of a T-Shirt in the Global Economy’?
The book presents a story of globalization that not only provides insight into a single product on its global journey through many economies, but also brings to light the people who make a living from that journey. By telling the human tales beneath the economics and politics of globalization, the author offers a timely, compelling and relevant story. Business Professor, Pietra Rivoli explores the politics and the human element behind the globalization debate by tracking the life story of her US $ 6 T-shirt.
Starting in a West Texas cotton field, her T-shirt is brought to life in a Chinese factory; negotiated in Washington, DC; sold in a Walgreen’s drugstore in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, and eventually makes its way to a used clothing market in Africa. Through the story of her T-shirt, Rivoli shows how the advocates and critics of globalization often oversimplify the issues behind international trade.
Excerpts: Part travelogue, part history, and part economics, ‘The Travels of a T–Shirt in the Global Economy’ is all storytelling in a grand style. Globalization critics who read this book will understand why it is impossible to lift countries out of poverty without the power of free markets, while policymakers will learn the equally bracing lesson that economic progress for the wealthiest of nations means nothing without the democratic political institutions that uplift the poorest of nations. It’s a ‘must-read’!