Globalization Lecture 1 What is it? How best to think about it?

GlobalizationLecture 1

What is it?How best to think about it?

1) What is globalization?

2) Definitions of globalization

3) History of globalization

4) Globalization of the economy

Tomorrow: globalization of politics, social relations and culture

WHAT IS GLOBALIZATION?1) Whole world interconnected

- interdependence of all parts of world

2) Intensification of world-wide phenomena

3) Trans-national relations

- erosion of national boundaries

4) “Domino effects”

- events have long-distance ramifications e.g. September 11

WHAT IS GLOBALIZATION?5) Alteration of space

- distances shortened

- technological changes

6) Alteration of time

- things happen quicker

7) Sense of “globality” /

Global consciousness

- experience all places as interdependent

- “the whole planet”

- “the whole of humankind”

Definitions of GlobalizationPolitical, economic, social and

cultural aspects

“an immense enlargement of

world communication and a

world market” (Fredric Jameson)

- Updated Frankfurt School view

- capitalist market spreads everywhere

- the negative consequences of capitalism spread globally

Definitions of Globalization“the intensification of world-wide social

relations” (Anthony Giddens)- - “stretching” of social relations across the

globe- - communications and media technologies

“the compression of the world and the intensification of consciousness of the world as a whole” (Roland Robertson)

- - world becomes “smaller”- - world is experienced as “one place”

Definitions of GlobalizationDeterritorialization:

“a process (or set of processes) which embodies a transformation in the spatial organization of social relations and transactions - assessed in terms of their extensity, intensity, velocity and impact - generating transcontinental or inter-regional flows and networks of activity” (David Held)

1) Processes across and beyond nation-states

2) Processes across whole regions e.g. European Union

History of GlobalizationLast 30 years

- Electronic communications technology

- Cheap air travel

- Spread of capitalism after fall of Communism in 1989 and 1991

- Development of a truly “global” capitalism

History of GlobalizationSince beginnings of capitalismEspecially since mid-19th century

Marx and Engels, The Communist Manifesto (1848)“The bourgeoisie has through its exploitation of the world

market given a cosmopolitan character to production and consumption in every country. All old established national industries have been destroyed or are daily being destroyed. They are dislodged by new industries, whose introduction becomes a life and death question for all civilised nations. In place of the old local and national seclusion and self-sufficiency, we have intercourse in every direction, universal inter-dependence of nations.”

History of Globalization

Since Western “discovery” of Americas

1492 – Christopher Columbus

“Old World” (Europe, Asia,

Africa) meets “New World”

Literally “global” relations:

- trade, war, migration, etc.

History of GlobalizationSince beginnings of human history

- mankind spreads out from East Africa- one million years ago

- humans reach every part of the planet

- reach southern tip of South America

c. 10,000 BC

Globalization of the EconomySpread of capitalism to most

major parts of world e.g. Russia, China

Global division of labour:- All countries’ economies

strongly interconnected with each other

- Complex global web of interdependency

- Global “organic solidarity”

Trans-national mobility of:

1) money & wealth

- through computer technology

2) jobs, goods & services

3) business-people

“Trans-national business class” (Leslie Sklair)

A new global elite

Trans-national Corporations (TNCs)- e.g. Coca-Cola, Nike, Gap, Nokia,

News International

Investment in countries - cheap labour, low taxes

Mobility of capital:- pull out of one country and move

elsewhere:

Free trade: no national barriers to trade

Neo-liberal ideology:

free markets = no State interference in economy = wealth for all

World Trade Organisation (WTO)

International Monetary Fund (IMF)

World Bank

Reduction of a government’s control of its country’s economy

Globalization of EconomyRight-wing view (e.g. Francis Fukuyama):

- free trade benefits all countries

- poorer countries’ economies develop and citizens get richer

- capitalism brings with it the benefits of

consumerism

democracy

human rights

- “Global Village”

Left-wing viewe.g. Noam Chomsky, Zygmunt Bauman

World united in some ways - especially economically: world-wide

capitalist market- Habermas: world-wide capitalist system;

colonizes local life-worlds

World divided in other ways- increasing wealth in Developed World,

increasing poverty in Developing World- globalization works in Western interests

Immanuel Wallerstein: World-Systems Theory

1) Globalization = new form of imperialism

2) Not direct but indirect

Not political but economic control

3) Globalization based on rich “core”

nations and poor “periphery” nations

4) Developing world debt

5) Job insecurity in core nations:- Decline of manufacturing

- “off-shoring”