Asia Society India Centre: Nayan Chanda Book Launch

BOUND TOGETHER:
How Traders, Preachers, Adventurers and Warriors Shaped Globalization
by Nayan Chanda

with a panel discussion on "How on Earth Can We Live Together?" between

Shekhar Gupta, Editor-in-Chief, The Indian Express
Gurcharan Das, writer, columnist and management consultant
Jehangir S. Pocha, Editor, Businessworld
Barkha Dutt, Managing Editor, NDTV (moderator)
and the author

Saturday, 7 July 2007
Jacaranda Hall, India Habitat Centre
Lodhi Road, New Delhi

From left to right: Gurcharan Das, Nayan Chanda, Barkha Dutt, and Shekhar Gupta at the launch of Bound Together in New Delhi on July 7, 2007

What is globalization? How long has it been around?
Is it a relatively new concept or an age-old drive that has been there forever?
Who are the globalizers and how does one explain the global origins of everything that surrounds us?

From the exciting new voice in the globalization arena comes an insightful and unique look at the globalization process and its patterns throughout history

Since humans migrated from Africa and dispersed throughout the world, they have found countless ways and reasons to reconnect with each other. In this insightful and entertaining book, Nayan Chanda follows the exploits of traders, preachers, adventurers, and warriors throughout history as they have shaped and reshaped the world. For Chanda, globalization is a process of ever-growing interconnectedness and interdependence that began thousands of years ago and continues to this day with increasing speed and ease.

In the end, globalization—from the lone adventurer carving out a new trade route to the expanding ambitions of great empires—is the product of myriad aspirations and apprehensions that define just about every aspect of our lives: what we eat, wear, ride, or possess is the product of centuries of human endeavour and suffering across the globe. Chanda reviews and illustrates the economic and technological forces at play in globalization today and concludes with a thought-provoking discussion of how we can and should embrace an inevitably global world.

"Bound Together is a wonderful book that examines the globalization process and its patterns over a long period of time. Using a well-researched narrative with relevant historical facts, the author provides us with a rich and holistic perspective on globalization. The book is a must for every student of globalization"—N. R. Narayana Murthy, Chairman and Chief Mentor, Infosys Technologies Ltd.

"An invaluable, and in my view unique, history of globalization.... A must-read for anyone interested in understanding or teaching this subject"—Thomas L. Friedman, author of The World Is Flat

"A graceful recounting of modern globalization with a panoramic perspective.... Essential reading for anyone who wants to understand how we got where we are today"—Joseph E. Stiglitz, Nobel Laureate in economics, author of Globalization and Its Discontents and Making Globalization Work

"A magnificent and masterly achievement"—Strobe Talbott, President, The Brookings Institution

"[Nayan Chanda] takes a sweeping view of his subject, covering millenniums of global explorations, conquest, trade and communication in lively fashion... The long view, enlivened by savory details and the author's sharp eye for unexpected historical parallels, gives Bound Together its value"—The New York Times

"[Bound Together] is a book filled with fascinating information. And Chanda makes the most of his training as both a journalist and a scholar, bringing to his tale a reporter's eye and sense of pacing as well as an impressive breadth of knowledge"—Newsweek

"Chanda's account of globalization is a breath of fresh air. His treatment of the topic... is comprehensive, informed, and judicious. Along the way, India... becomes as much a focus as Europe in the overall story"—Bruce Mazlish, Emeritus Professor of History, MIT

"An excellent account, both erudite and entertaining, of the globalization of human interaction"—Ernesto Zedillo, Director, Yale Center for the Study of Globalization, and former President of Mexico

"To find a book that is prepared to venture into the lion's den, and actually say something new and interesting about a subject that has been done to death and contaminated by polemics, is a rarity. To find a book that can say this with calm fluency and gentle argument is a pleasure. And to find one that talks about the complexity of the human experience without judging whether it is good or bad, but through an organized presentation of interconnected themes across the span of history, is worth reading. Bound Together by Nayan Chanda does all this, and it does it in a literary style that is largely free of both economic theory and jargon... a good and unusual book"—World Business

"An impressive discussion of the trends in, and details of, the intercourse—material, human and intellectual—that has always taken place between countries and societies, often separated during ancient times by tyrannically long distances"—The Straits Times

Nayan Chanda is director of publications, Yale Center for the Study of Globalization, and editor, YaleGlobal Online. He is former editor of the Far Eastern Economic Review and the Asian Wall Street Journal Weekly.