Top critical review
3.0 out of 5 starsIt seems to be heavily biased and light on the practical principles
Reviewed in Canada 🇨🇦 on January 1, 2022
I bought this book because I admire Ray's views in his book Principles.
I read Changing World Order twice, analyzing and thinking over many passages and charts.
Here is my short opinion:
a) the first part of the book "How the world works", I thought, gives an excellent overview of the history of the world, and the dynamics between world powers
b) the 2nd and the 3rd part of the book appears to show Ray's heavy admiration towards China with hand-picked evidence to support his case.
Here is why I think so:
a) In dozens of passages, Ray appears to focus on some negative dynamics in the US and not discuss similar negative dynamics in China.
In other words, Ray doesn't seem to compare apples to apples in the narrative.
b) When looking at the charts, Ray appears vague about the data on which some charts were built.
I couldn't judge the validity of the chart because I didn't see what went into the compound data shown in the chart.
There are so many examples of this in each chapter that it made me doubt the validity of 2/3 of the content I'm reading, let alone the conclusions Ray is drawing. A bit disappointed. I felt that I gained more from reading Changing Fortunes, which describes the history and dynamic between US and Japan economic relationships back in the '80s.
