Are We All Compressed Developers?
Compressed-development influences increasingly flow from developing to developed countries. Reversing our lens to look at the United States and Japan, we observe that the technological and organizational changes that have spurred compressed development in recent developers are also responsible for changes in industry structure, rising inequality, and employment duality in developed economies. A ‘Red Queen’ effect sees developed countries running faster and undertaking parallel socioeconomic changes to stay in the same privileged place. In some ways ‘we are all compressed developers now’. Looking ahead, and returning to our dyadic pairs, the chapter further considers how the ‘digital economy’ may affect developing–developed country interrelations, and whether we are finally entering an age of ‘great convergence’ with the rise of China and a more multipolar economic and geopolitical structure.