| |
Globalization (globalisation) in its literal sense is the process of transformation of local or regional phenomena into global ones. It can be described as a process by which the people of the world are unified into a single society and function together.
This process is a combination of economic, technological, sociocultural and political forces.
Discussion
Ask a question about 'Globalization' Start a new discussion about 'Globalization' Answer questions from other users |
Recent Posts
Quotations
Globalization must be met with a counter-globalization, Empire with a counter-Empire.
Simplifying a great deal, one could argue that postmodernist discourses appeal primarily to the winners in the processes of globalization and fundamentalist discourses to the losers.
Encyclopedia
Globalization (globalisation) in its literal sense is the process of transformation of local or regional phenomena into global ones. It can be described as a process by which the people of the world are unified into a single society and function together.
This process is a combination of economic, technological, sociocultural and political forces. Globalization is often used to refer to economic globalization, that is, integration of national economies into the international economy through trade, foreign direct investment, capital flows, migration, and the spread of technology.
The United Nations ESCWA has written that globalization "is a widely-used term that can be defined in a number of different ways. When used in an economic context, it refers to the reduction and removal of barriers between national borders in order to facilitate the flow of goods, capital, services and labour...although considerable barriers remain to the flow of labour...Globalization is not a new phenomenon. It began in the late nineteenth century, but its spread slowed during the period from the start of the First World War until the third quarter of the twentieth century. This slowdown can be attributed to the inwardlooking policies pursued by a number of countries in order to protect their respective industries...The pace of globalization picked up rapidly during the fourth quarter of the twentieth century..."
Tom G. Palmer of the Cato Institute defines globalization as "the diminution or elimination of state-enforced restrictions on exchanges across borders and the increasingly integrated and complex global system of production and exchange that has emerged as a result."
Thomas L. Friedman "examines the impact of the 'flattening' of the globe", and argues that globalized trade, outsourcing, supply-chaining, and political forces have changed the world permanently, for both better and worse. He also argues that the pace of globalization is quickening and will continue to have a growing impact on business organization and practice.
Noam Chomsky argues that the word globalization is also used, in a doctrinal sense, to describe the neoliberal form of economic globalization.
Herman E. Daly argues that sometimes the terms internationalization and globalization are used interchangeably but there is a slight formal difference. The term "internationalization" refers to the importance of international trade, relations, treaties etc. International means between or among nations.
History
The term "globalization" has been used by economists since the 1980s although it was used in social sciences in the 1960s; however, its concepts did not become popular until the latter half of the 1980s and 1990s. The earliest written theoretical concepts of globalization were penned by an American entrepreneur-turned-minister Charles Taze Russell who coined the term 'corporate giants' in 1897.
Globalization is viewed as a centuries long process, tracking the expansion of human population and the growth of civilization, that has accelerated dramatically in the past 50 years. Early forms of globalization existed during the Roman Empire, the Parthian empire, and the Han Dynasty, when the Silk Road started in China, reached the boundaries of the Parthian empire, and continued onwards towards Rome.
The Islamic Golden Age is also an example, when Muslim traders and explorers established an early global economy across the Old World resulting in a globalization of crops, trade, knowledge and technology; and later during the Mongol Empire, when there was greater integration along the Silk Road. Globalization in a wider context began shortly before the turn of the 16th century, with two Kingdoms of the Iberian Peninsula - the Kingdom of Portugal and the Kingdom of Castile.
Portugal's global explorations in the 16th century, especially, linked continents, economies and cultures to a massive extent. Portugal's exploration and trade with most of the coast of Africa, Eastern South America, and Southern and Eastern Asia, was the first major trade based form of globalization. A wave of global trade, colonization, and enculturation reached all corners of the world.
Global integration continued through the expansion of European trade in the 16th and 17th centuries, when the Portuguese and Spanish Empires colonized the Americas, followed eventually by France and England. Globalization has had a tremendous impact on cultures, particularly indigenous cultures, around the world. In the 15th century, Portugal's Company of Guinea was one of the first chartered commercial companies established by Europeans in other continent during the Age of Discovery, whose task was to deal with the spices and to fix the prices of the goods.
In the 17th century, globalization became a business phenomenon when the British East India Company (founded in 1600), which is often described as the first multinational corporation, was established, as well as the Dutch East India Company (founded in 1602) and the Portuguese East India Company (founded in 1628). Because of the high risks involved with international trade, the British East India Company became the first company in the world to share risk and enable joint ownership of companies through the issuance of shares of stock: an important driver for globalization.
Globalization was achieved by the British Empire (the largest empire in history) due to its sheer size and power. British ideals and culture were imposed on other nations during this period.
The 19th century is sometimes called "The First Era of Globalization." It was a period characterized by rapid growth in international trade and investment between the European imperial powers, their colonies, and, later, the United States.
It was in this period that areas of sub-saharan Africa and the Island Pacific were incorporated into the world system. The "First Era of Globalization" began to break down at the beginning of the 20th century with the first World War. Said John Maynard Keynes,
The "First Era of Globalization" later collapsed during the gold standard crisis in the late 1920s and early 1930s.
Modern globalization
Globalization, since World War II, is largely the result of planning by politicians to breakdown borders hampering trade to increase prosperity and interdependence thereby decreasing the chance of future war. Their work led to the Bretton Woods conference, an agreement by the world's leading politicians to lay down the framework for international commerce and finance, and the founding of several international institutions intended to oversee the processes of globalization.
These institutions include the International Bank for Reconstruction and Development (the World Bank), and the International Monetary Fund. Globalization has been facilitated by advances in technology which have reduced the costs of trade, and trade negotiation rounds, originally under the auspices of the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT), which led to a series of agreements to remove restrictions on free trade.
Since World War II, barriers to international trade have been considerably lowered through international agreements - GATT. Particular initiatives carried out as a result of GATT and the World Trade Organization (WTO), for which GATT is the foundation, have included:
- Promotion of free trade:
- Reduction or elimination of tariffs; creation of free trade zones with small or no tariffs
- Reduced transportation costs, especially resulting from development of containerization for ocean shipping.
- Reduction or elimination of capital controls
- Reduction, elimination, or harmonization of subsidies for local businesses
- Creation of subsidies for global corporations
- Harmonization of intellectual property laws across the majority of states, with more restrictions.
- Supranational recognition of intellectual property restrictions (e.g. patents granted by China would be recognized in the United States)
Cultural globalization, driven by communication technology and the worldwide marketing of Western cultural industries, was understood at first as a process of homogenization, as the global domination of American culture at the expense of traditional diversity. However, a contrasting trend soon became evident in the emergence of movements protesting against globalization and giving new momentum to the defense of local uniqueness, individuality, and identity, but largely without success.
The Uruguay Round (1986 to 1994) led to a treaty to create the WTO to mediate trade disputes and set up a uniform platform of trading. Other bilateral and multilateral trade agreements, including sections of Europe's Maastricht Treaty and the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) have also been signed in pursuit of the goal of reducing tariffs and barriers to trade.
Global conflicts, such as the 9/11 terrorist attacks on the United States of America, is interrelated with globalization because it was primary source of the "war on terror", which had started the steady increase of the prices of oil and gas, due to the fact that most OPEC member countries were in the Arabian Peninsula.
World exports rose from 8.5% of gross world product in 1970 to 16.1% of gross world product in 2001.
Measuring globalization
Looking specifically at economic globalization, demonstrates that it can be measured in different ways. These center around the four main economic flows that characterize globalization:
- Goods and services, e.g. exports plus imports as a proportion of national income or per capita of population
- Labor/people, e.g. net migration rates; inward or outward migration flows, weighted by population
- Capital, e.g. inward or outward direct investment as a proportion of national income or per head of population
- Technology, e.g. international research & development flows; proportion of populations (and rates of change thereof) using particular inventions (especially 'factor-neutral' technological advances such as the telephone, motorcar, broadband)
As globalization is not only an economic phenomenon, a multivariate approach to measuring globalization is the recent index calculated by the Swiss think tank KOF. The index measures the three main dimensions of globalization: economic, social, and political. In addition to three indices measuring these dimensions, an overall index of globalization and sub-indices referring to actual economic flows, economic restrictions, data on personal contact, data on information flows, and data on cultural proximity is calculated. Data is available on a yearly basis for 122 countries, as detailed in Dreher, Gaston and Martens (2008). According to the index, the world's most globalized country is Belgium, followed by Austria, Sweden, the United Kingdom and the Netherlands. The least globalized countries according to the KOF-index are Haiti, Myanmar the Central African Republic and Burundi.
A.T. Kearney and Foreign Policy Magazine jointly publish another Globalization Index. According to the 2006 index, Singapore, Ireland, Switzerland, the U.S., the Netherlands, Canada and Denmark are the most globalized, while Indonesia, India and Iran are the least globalized among countries listed.
Effects of globalization
Globalization has various aspects which affect the world in several different ways such as:
- Industrial - emergence of worldwide production markets and broader access to a range of foreign products for consumers and companies. Particularly movement of material and goods between and within national boundaries.
- Financial - emergence of worldwide financial markets and better access to external financing for borrowers. As these worldwide structures grew more quickly than any transnational regulatory regime, the instability of the global financial infrastructure dramatically increased, as evidenced by the financial crises of late 2008.
- Economic - realization of a global common market, based on the freedom of exchange of goods and capital. The interconnectedness of these markets, however meant that an economic collapse in any one given country could not be contained.
- Political - some use "globalization" to mean the creation of a world government, or cartels of governments (e.g. WTO, World Bank, and IMF) which regulate the relationships among governments and guarantees the rights arising from social and economic globalization. Politically, the United States has enjoyed a position of power among the world powers; in part because of its strong and wealthy economy. With the influence of globalization and with the help of The United States’ own economy, the People's Republic of China has experienced some tremendous growth within the past decade. If China continues to grow at the rate projected by the trends, then it is very likely that in the next twenty years, there will be a major reallocation of power among the world leaders. China will have enough wealth, industry, and technology to rival the United States for the position of leading world power. .
- Informational - increase in information flows between geographically remote locations. Arguably this is a technological change with the advent of fibre optic communications, satellites, and increased availability of telephone and Internet.
- Language - the most popular language is English.
- About 75% of the world's mail, telexes, and cables are in English.
- Approximately 60% of the world's radio programs are in English.
- About 90% of all Internet traffic uses English.
- Competition - Survival in the new global business market calls for improved productivity and increased competition. Due to the market becoming worldwide, companies in various industries have to upgrade their products and use technology skillfully in order to face increased competition.
- Ecological - the advent of global environmental challenges that might be solved with international cooperation, such as climate change, cross-boundary water and air pollution, over-fishing of the ocean, and the spread of invasive species. Since many factories are built in developing countries with less environmental regulation, globalism and free trade may increase pollution. On the other hand, economic development historically required a "dirty" industrial stage, and it is argued that developing countries should not, via regulation, be prohibited from increasing their standard of living.
- Cultural - growth of cross-cultural contacts; advent of new categories of consciousness and identities which embodies cultural diffusion, the desire to increase one's standard of living and enjoy foreign products and ideas, adopt new technology and practices, and participate in a "world culture". Some bemoan the resulting consumerism and loss of languages. Also see Transformation of culture.
- Spreading of multiculturalism, and better individual access to cultural diversity (e.g. through the export of Hollywood and Bollywood movies). Some consider such "imported" culture a danger, since it may supplant the local culture, causing reduction in diversity or even assimilation. Others consider multiculturalism to promote peace and understanding between peoples.
- Greater international travel and tourism
- Greater immigration, including illegal immigration
- Spread of local consumer products (e.g. food) to other countries (often adapted to their culture).
- Worldwide fads and pop culture such as Pokémon, Sudoku, Numa Numa, Origami, Idol series, YouTube, Orkut, Facebook, and MySpace. Accessible to those who have Internet or Television, leaving out a substantial segment of the Earth's population.
- Worldwide sporting events such as FIFA World Cup and the Olympic Games.
- Incorporation of multinational corporations in to new media. As the sponsors of the All-Blacks rugby team, Adidas had created a parallel website with a downloadable interactive rugby game for its fans to play and compete.
- Social - development of the system of non-governmental organisations as main agents of global public policy, including humanitarian aid and developmental efforts.
- Technical
- Development of a global telecommunications infrastructure and greater transborder data flow, using such technologies as the Internet, communication satellites, submarine fiber optic cable, and wireless telephones
- Increase in the number of standards applied globally; e.g. copyright laws, patents and world trade agreements.
- Legal/Ethical
Whilst it is all too easy to look at the positive aspects of Globalization and the great benefits that are apparent everywhere, there are also several negative occurrences that can only be the result of or major motivating factors that inspire some corporations to globalize.
Globalization – the growing integration of economies and societies around the world – has been one of the most hotly-debated topics in international economics over the past few years. Rapid growth and poverty reduction in China, India, and other countries that were poor 20 years ago, has been a positive aspect of globalization. But globalization has also generated significant international opposition over concerns that it has increased inequality and environmental degradation
Business
Collapse of commodities market was the outcome of poor economic policies of 1980, which ultimately resulted in debt crisis, as LDCs had tried to expand commodity production and economic growth and had borrowed large sums of money. Banks then insisted on readjustment of interest rates on new and existing loans and LDCs agreed. At that moment, globalization compelled them to decline commodity prices. Commodities were the main source of income for LDCs, so it became more and more difficult for them to reduce or pay their debts, which ultimately caused unemployment in many commodity sectors.
In order to repay their debts, LDC tried to adopt IMF’s Structural Adjustment Program (SAP) to obtain funds from IMF. The strategy behind SAP program was to export more than import and produce hard cash to pay for the imports and direct the surplus towards debts. Although SAP was imposed for the betterment of economic condition of LDCs, but it did not work as it was planned. SAP created de-industrialization in LDCs and compelled them to again rely on export of their commodities. Selling of public assets to foreign investors also created unemployment.
Globalization has had extensive impact on the world of business. In a business environment marked by globalization, the world seems to shrink, and other businesses halfway around the world can exert as great an impact on a business as one right down the street. Internet access and e-commerce have brought small-scale coops in Third World nations into the same arena as thriving businesses in the industrialized world, and visions of low-income workers handweaving rugs on primitive looms that compete with rug dealers in major cities are not totally far-fetched.
Globalization has affected workforce demographics, as well. Today's workforces are characterized by greater diversity in terms of age, gender, ethnic and racial background, and a variety of other demographic factors. In fact, management of diversity has become one of the primary issues of 21st-century business.
Trends such as outsourcing and offshoring are a direct offshoot of globalization and have created a work environment in which cultural diversity can be problematic. A U.S. company where punctuality is important and meetings always start on time faces adjustments if it opens an office in South America or France, where being 10 to 15 minutes late to a meeting is considered acceptable: being on time is called 'British Time'
Sweatshops
It can be said that globalization is the door that opens up an otherwise resource poor country to the international market. Where a country or nation has little material or physical product harvested or mined from its own soil, an opportunity is seen by large corporations to take advantage of the “export poverty” of such a nation. Where the majority of the earliest occurrences of economic globalization are recorded as being the expansion of businesses and corporate growth, in many poorer nations globalization is actually the result of the foreign businesses investing in the country to take advantage of the lower wage rate: even though investing, by increasing the Capital Stock of the country, increases their wage rate.
One example used by anti-globalization protestors is the use of “Sweatshops” by manufacturers. According to Global Exchange these “Sweat Shops” are widely used by sports shoe manufacturers and mentions one company in particular – Nike. There are factories set up in the poor countries where employees agree to work for low wages. Then if labour laws alter in those countries and stricter rules govern the manufacturing process the factories are closed down and relocated to other nations with more liberal economic policies.
There are several agencies that have been set up worldwide specifically designed to focus on anti-sweatshop campaigns and education of such. “The Decent Working Conditions and Fair Competition Act” is a legislation passed by the National Labor Committee in the USA. The legislation now suggests that companies are legally obligated to respect human and worker rights by prohibiting the import, sale, or export of sweatshop goods .There are very strict standards set out by the International Labor Organization and any violations shall be banned from the US market.
Specifically, these core standards include no child labor, no forced labor, freedom of association, right to organize and bargain collectively, as well as the right to decent working conditions.
Tiziana Terranova has stated that globalization has brought a culture of "free labour". In a digital sense, it is where the individuals (contributing capital) exploits and eventually "exhausts the means through which labour can sustain itself". For example, in the area of digital media (animations, hosting chat rooms, designing games), where it is often less glamourous than it may sound. In the gaming industry, a Chinese Gold Market has been established.
Culture
One powerful source has blown down cultural boundaries around the entire world. What is this influential tool? It is the Internet and its endless margin of discovery. With the Internet people can easily access someone half way across the world. They could converse with someone living a completely different lifestyle yet still have something in common, the Internet. If language is a barrier then a website like Flickr, a photo sharing site, lets people from Singapore and Germany alike communicate without words. The Internet in essence makes the world a smaller place.
Someone in America can be eating Japanese noodles for lunch while someone in Sydney Australia is eating classic Italian meatballs. One classic culture aspect is food. India is known for their curry and exotic spices. Paris is known for its smelly cheeses. America is known for its burgers and fries. McDonalds was once an American favorite with its cheery mascot, Ronald, red and yellow theme, and greasy fast food. Now it is a global enterprise with 31,000 locations worldwide with locations in Kuwait, Egypt, and Malta. This restaurant is just one example of food going big on the global scale.
Meditation has been a sacred practice for centuries in Indian culture. It calms the body and helps one connect to their inner being while shying away from their conditioned self. Before globalization Americans did not meditate or crunch their bodies into knots on a yoga mat. After globalization this is a common practice, it is even considered a chic way to keep your body in shape. Some people are even traveling to India to get the full experience themselves. Another common practice brought about by globalization would be Chinese symbol tattoos. These specific tattoos are a huge hit with today’s younger generation and are quickly becoming the norm. With the melding of cultures using another countries language in ones body art is now considered normal.
Culture is defined as patterns of human activity and the symbols that give these activities significance. Culture is what people eat, how they dress, beliefs they hold, and activities they practice. Globalization has joined different cultures and made it into something different. As Erla Zwingle, from the National Geographic article titled “Globalization” states, “When cultures receive outside influences, they ignore some and adopt others, and then almost immediately start to transform them.”
Pro-globalization (globalism)
Supporters of free trade claim that it increases economic prosperity as well as opportunity, especially among developing nations, enhances civil liberties and leads to a more efficient allocation of resources. Economic theories of comparative advantage suggest that free trade leads to a more efficient allocation of resources, with all countries involved in the trade benefiting. In general, this leads to lower prices, more employment, higher output and a higher standard of living for those in developing countries.
Proponents of laissez-faire capitalism, and some Libertarians, say that higher degrees of political and economic freedom in the form of democracy and capitalism in the developed world are ends in themselves and also produce higher levels of material wealth. They see globalization as the beneficial spread of liberty and capitalism.
Supporters of democratic globalization are sometimes called pro-globalists. They believe that the first phase of globalization, which was market-oriented, should be followed by a phase of building global political institutions representing the will of world citizens. The difference from other globalists is that they do not define in advance any ideology to orient this will, but would leave it to the free choice of those citizens via a democratic process .
Some, such as former Canadian Senator Douglas Roche, O.C., simply view globalization as inevitable and advocate creating institutions such as a directly-elected United Nations Parliamentary Assembly to exercise oversight over unelected international bodies.
Supporters of globalization argue that the anti-globalization movement uses anecdotal evidence to support their protectionist view, whereas worldwide statistics strongly support globalization:
- From 1981 to 2001, according to World Bank figures, the number of people living on $1 a day or less declined from 1.5 billion to 1.1 billion in absolute terms. At the same time, the world population increased, so in percentage terms the number of such people in developing nations declined from 40% to 20% of the population. with the greatest improvements occurring in economies rapidly reducing barriers to trade and investment; yet, some critics argue that more detailed variables measuring poverty should be studied instead .
- The percentage of people living on less than $2 a day has decreased greatly in areas affected by globalization, whereas poverty rates in other areas have remained largely stagnant. In East-Asia, including China, the percentage has decreased by 50.1% compared to a 2.2% increase in Sub-Saharan Africa.
| Area | Demographic | 1981 | 1984 | 1987 | 1990 | 1993 | 1996 | 1999 | 2002 | Percentage Change 1981-2002 |
|---|
| East Asia and Pacific | Less than $1 a day | 57.7% | 38.9% | 28.0% | 29.6% | 24.9% | 16.6% | 15.7% | 11.1% | -80.76% | | Less than $2 a day | 84.8% | 76.6% | 67.7% | 69.9% | 64.8% | 53.3% | 50.3% | 40.7% | -52.00% | | Latin America | Less than $1 a day | 9.7% | 11.8% | 10.9% | 11.3% | 11.3% | 10.7% | 10.5% | 8.9% | -8.25% | | Less than $2 a day | 29.6% | 30.4% | 27.8% | 28.4% | 29.5% | 24.1% | 25.1% | 23.4% | -29.94% | | Sub-Saharan Africa | Less than $1 a day | 41.6% | 46.3% | 46.8% | 44.6% | 44.0% | 45.6% | 45.7% | 44.0% | +5.77% | | Less than $2 a day | 73.3% | 76.1% | 76.1% | 75.0% | 74.6% | 75.1% | 76.1% | 74.9% | +2.18% |
'SOURCE: World Bank, Poverty Estimates, 2002
- Income inequality for the world as a whole is diminishing. Due to definitional issues and data availability, there is disagreement with regards to the pace of the decline in extreme poverty. As noted below, there are others disputing this. The economist Xavier Sala-i-Martin in a 2007 analysis argues that this is incorrect, income inequality for the world as a whole has diminished. . Regardless of who is right about the past trend in income inequality, it has been argued that improving absolute poverty is more important than relative inequality.
- Life expectancy has almost doubled in the developing world since World War II and is starting to close the gap between itself and the developed world where the improvement has been smaller. Even in Sub-Saharan Africa, the least developed region, life expectancy increased from 30 years before World War II to about a peak of about 50 years before the AIDS pandemic and other diseases started to force it down to the current level of 47 years. Infant mortality has decreased in every developing region of the world.
- Democracy has increased dramatically from there being almost no nations with universal suffrage in 1900 to 62.5% of all nations having it in 2000.
- Feminism has made advances in areas such as Bangladesh through providing women with jobs and economic safety.
- The proportion of the world's population living in countries where per-capita food supplies are less than 2,200 calories (9,200 kilojoules) per day decreased from 56% in the mid-1960s to below 10% by the 1990s.
- Between 1950 and 1999, global literacy increased from 52% to 81% of the world. Women made up much of the gap: female literacy as a percentage of male literacy has increased from 59% in 1970 to 80% in 2000.
- The percentage of children in the labor force has fallen from 24% in 1960 to 10% in 2000.
- There are increasing trends in the use of electric power, cars, radios, and telephones per capita, as well as a growing proportion of the population with access to clean water.
- The book The Improving State of the World also finds evidence for that these, and other, measures of human well-being has improved and that globalization is part of the explanation. It also responds to arguments that environmental impact will limit the progress.
Although critics of globalization complain of Westernization, a 2005 UNESCO report showed that cultural exchange is becoming mutual. In 2002, China was the third largest exporter of cultural goods, after the UK and US. Between 1994 and 2002, both North America's and the European Union's shares of cultural exports declined, while Asia's cultural exports grew to surpass North America.
Anti-globalization
Anti-globalization is a term used to describe the political stance of people and groups who oppose the neoliberal version of globalization.
"Anti-globalization" may also involve the process or actions taken by a state in order to demonstrate its sovereignty and practice democratic decision-making. Anti-globalization may occur in order to maintain barriers to the international transfer of people, goods and beliefs, particularly free market degregulation, encouraged by organizations such as the IMF or the WTO. Moreover, as Naomi Klein argues in her book No Logo anti-globalism can denote either a single social movement or an umbrella term that encompasses a number of separate social movements such as Nationalists and socialists. In either case, participants stand in opposition to the unregulated political power of large, multi-national corporations, as the corporations exercise power through leveraging trade agreements which in some instances damage the democratic rights of citizens, the environment particularly air quality index and rain forests, as well as national government's sovereignty to determine labor rights, including the right to form a union, and health and safety legislation, or laws as they may otherwise infringe on cultural practices and traditions of developing countries.
Some people who are labeled "anti-globalist" or "sceptics" (Hirst and Thompson)consider the term to be too vague and inaccurate .
Podobnik states that "the vast majority of groups that participate in these protests draw on international networks of support, and they generally call for forms of globalization that enhance democratic
representation, human rights, and egalitarianism."
Joseph Stiglitz and Andrew Charlton write: Some members aligned with this viewpoint prefer instead to describe themselves as the Global Justice Movement, the Anti-Corporate-Globalization Movement, the Movement of Movements (a popular term in Italy), the "Alter-globalization" movement (popular in France), the "Counter-Globalization" movement, and a number of other terms.
Critiques of the current wave of economic globalization typically look at both the damage to the planet, in terms of the perceived unsustainable harm done to the biosphere, as well as the perceived human costs, such as poverty, inequality, miscegenation, injustice and the erosion of traditional culture which, the critics contend, all occur as a result of the economic transformations related to globalization. They challenge directly the metrics, such as GDP, used to measure progress promulgated by institutions such as the World Bank, and look to other measures, such as the Happy Planet Index, created by the New Economics Foundation. They point to a "multitude of interconnected fatal consequences--social disintegration, a breakdown of democracy, more rapid and extensive deterioration of the environment, the spread of new diseases, increasing poverty and alienation" which they claim are the unintended but very real consequences of globalization.
The terms globalization and anti-globalization are used in various ways. Noam Chomsky believes that
Critics argue that:
Poorer countries are sometimes at disadvantage: While it is true that globalization encourages free trade among countries, there are also negative consequences because some countries try to save their national markets. The main export of poorer countries is usually agricultural goods. Larger countries often subsidise their farmers (like the EU Common Agricultural Policy, which lowers the market price for the poor farmer's crops compared to what it would be under free trade. Exploitation of foreign impoverished workers: The deterioration of protections for weaker nations by stronger industrialized powers has resulted in the exploitation of the people in those nations to become cheap labor. Due to the lack of protections, companies from powerful industrialized nations are able to offer workers enough salary to entice them to endure extremely long hours and unsafe working conditions, though economists question if consenting workers in a competitive employers' market can be decried as "exploitated". The abundance of cheap labor is giving the countries in power incentive not to rectify the inequality between nations. If these nations developed into industrialized nations, the army of cheap labor would slowly disappear alongside development. It is true that the workers are free to leave their jobs, but in many poorer countries, this would mean starvation for the worker, and possible even his/her family if their previous jobs were unavailable. The shift to outsourcing: The low cost of offshore workers have enticed corporations to move production to foreign countries. The laid off manufacturing sector workers are forced into the service sector where wages and benefits are low, but turnover is high . This has contributed to the deterioration of the middle class which is a major factor in the increasing economic inequality in the United States . Families that were once part of the middle class are forced into lower positions by massive layoffs and outsourcing to another country. This also means that people in the lower class have a much harder time climbing out of poverty because of the absence of the middle class as a stepping stone. Weak labor unions: The surplus in cheap labor coupled with an ever growing number of companies in transition has caused a weakening of labor unions in the United States. Unions lose their effectiveness when their membership begins to decline. As a result unions hold less power over corporations that are able to easily replace workers, often for lower wages, and have the option to not offer unionized jobs anymore.
In December 2007, World Bank economist Branko Milanovic has called much previous empirical research on global poverty and inequality into question because, according to him, improved estimates of purchasing power parity indicate that developing countries are worse off than previously believed. Milanovic remarks that "literally hundreds of scholarly papers on convergence or divergence of countries’ incomes have been published in the last decade based on what we know now were faulty numbers." With the new data, possibly economists will revise calculations, and he also believed that there are considerable implications estimates of global inequality and poverty levels. Global inequality was estimated at around 65 Gini points, whereas the new numbers indicate global inequality to be at 70 on the Gini scale. It is unsurprising that the level of international inequality is so high, as larger sample spaces almost always give a higher level of inequality.
The critics of globalization typically emphasize that globalization is a process that is mediated according to corporate interests, and typically raise the possibility of alternative global institutions and policies, which they believe address the moral claims of poor and working classes throughout the globe, as well as environmental concerns in a more equitable way.
The movement is very broad, including church groups, national liberation factions, peasant unionists, intellectuals, artists, protectionists, anarchists, those in support of relocalization and others. Some are reformist, (arguing for a more moderate form of capitalism) while others are more revolutionary (arguing for what they believe is a more humane system than capitalism) and others are reactionary, believing globalization destroys national industry and jobs.
One of the key points made by critics of recent economic globalization is that income inequality, both between and within nations, is increasing as a result of these processes. One article from 2001 found that significantly, in 7 out of 8 metrics, income inequality has increased in the twenty years ending 2001. Also, "incomes in the lower deciles of world income distribution have probably fallen absolutely since the 1980s". Furthermore, the World Bank's figures on absolute poverty were challenged. The article was skeptical of the World Bank's claim that the number of people living on less than $1 a day has held steady at 1.2 billion from 1987 to 1998, because of biased methodology.
A chart that gave the inequality a very visible and comprehensible form, the so-called 'champagne glass' effect,
was contained in the 1992 United Nations Development Program Report, which showed the distribution of global income to be very uneven, with the richest 20% of the world's population controlling 82.7% of the world's income.
| + Distribution of world GDP, 1989 | | Quintile of Population | Income |
|---|
| Richest 20% | 82.7% | | Second 20% | 11.7% | | Third 20% | 2.3% | | Fourth 20% | 1.4% | | Poorest 20% | 1.2% |
Source: United Nations Development Program. 1992 Human Development Report
Economic arguments by fair trade theorists claim that unrestricted free trade benefits those with more financial leverage (i.e. the rich) at the expense of the poor.
Americanization related to a period of high political American clout and of significant growth of America's shops, markets and object being brought into other countries. So globalization, a much more diversified phenomenon, relates to a multilateral political world and to the increase of objects, markets and so on into each others countries.
Some opponents of globalization see the phenomenon as the promotion of corporatist interests. They also claim that the increasing autonomy and strength of corporate entities shapes the political policy of countries.
International Social Forums
See main articles: European Social Forum, the Asian Social Forum,(Africa Social Forum), World Social Forum (WSF).
The first WSF in 2001 was an initiative of the administration of Porto Alegre in Brazil. The slogan of the World Social Forum was "Another World Is Possible". It was here that the WSF's Charter of Principles was adopted to provide a framework for the forums.
The WSF became a periodic meeting: in 2002 and 2003 it was held again in Porto Alegre and became a rallying point for worldwide protest against the American invasion of Iraq. In 2004 it was moved to Mumbai (formerly known as Bombay, in India), to make it more accessible to the populations of Asia and Africa. This last appointment saw the participation of 75,000 delegates.
In the meantime, regional forums took place following the example of the WSF, adopting its Charter of Principles. The first European Social Forum (ESF) was held in November 2002 in Florence. The slogan was "Against the war, against racism and against neo-liberalism". It saw the participation of 60,000 delegates and ended with a huge demonstration against the war (1,000,000 people according to the organizers). The other two ESFs took place in Paris and London, in 2003 and 2004 respectively.
Recently there has been some discussion behind the movement about the role of the social forums. Some see them as a "popular university", an occasion to make many people aware of the problems of globalization. Others would prefer that delegates concentrate their efforts on the coordination and organization of the movement and on the planning of new campaigns. However it has often been argued that in the dominated countries (most of the world) the WSF is little more than an 'NGO fair' driven by Northern NGOs and donors most of which are hostile to popular movements of the poor.
See also
Further reading
- Bastardas-Boada, Albert (2002), “World Language Policy in the Era of Globalization: Diversity and Intercommunication from the Perspective of 'Complexity'", Noves SL, Revista de Sociolingüística (Barcelona), http://www6.gencat.net/llengcat/noves/hm02estiu/metodologia/a_bastardas1_9.htm.
- Peter Berger, (The National Interest, Fall 1997).
- Gernot Kohler and Emilio José Chaves (Editors) “Globalization: Critical Perspectives” Haupauge, New York: Nova Science Publishers (http://www.novapublishers.com/) ISBN 1-59033-346-2. With contributions by Samir Amin, Christopher Chase Dunn, Andre Gunder Frank, Immanuel Wallerstein
- Steger, Manfred B., “Globalism: the new market ideology” Lanham, Md.: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, c2002. ISBN 0742500721
- Tausch, Arno (2008), ‘Multicultural Europe: Effects of the Global Lisbon Process.’ Hauppauge, N.Y.: Nova Science Publishers (for info: https://www.novapublishers.com/catalog/).
- Tausch, Arno (2009), “Titanic 2010? The European Union and its failed “Lisbon strategy”” Hauppauge, N.Y.: Nova Science Publishers (for info: https://www.novapublishers.com/catalog/).
External links
-
- Latin America More Globalized
-
-
-
-
- a speech by Federal Reserve chairman Ben Bernanke
- BBC News
- by Murray Weidenbaum
- from University of Texas
- at UC Riverside
- from the Ecology and Society Journal
-
-
-
Multimedia
- CBC Television reports on the opening of Moscow McDonalds (1990) - sample of Western business expanding into former communist countries.
- 2007 film about the impacts of globalisation in Thailand and the Philippines.
|
