The Contemporary World 2020
The Contemporary World
This module on GED 104 - The Contemporary World is designed to introduce
students to varied concepts and perspectives of globalization; its effects to different
social units and different challenges posed by it.
This module is comprised of seven units with various subtopics.
Unit I deals with the introduction to globalization where students will be able to
present their own personal concepts of globalization; and be able to identify different
underlying philosophies out of these notions.
Unit II concerns with the structures of globalization which include the subtopics
on the global economy, market integration, the global interstate system and
contemporary global governance. Here, students will be able to articulate a stance on
global economic integration; identify attributes of global corporations; explain the effects
of globalization in governments as well as the challenges of global governance in the
twenty first century.
Unit III deals with a world of ideas where Global Divides: the North and the South
as well as Asian regionalism is the focus. Students in this unit will be able to
differentiate the Global South for the third world and identify the factors leading to a
greater integration of the Asian region.
Unit IV presents a world of ideas in relation to global media culture and
globalization of religion. Students in this unit will be able to determine the drive of
various media to different forms of global integration, as well as the relationship
between religion and global conflict including global peace.
Unit V focuses on globalization and mobility dealing on the subtopics about the
global city, global demography and global migration. Students in this unit will be able to
identify the attributes of the global city; explain the theory of demographic transition as it
affects global population, and analyze economic, cultural and social factors underlying
the global movements of the people.
Unit VI concerns toward a sustainable world focusing on sustainable
development and global food security. In this unit, students will be able to differentiate
stability from sustainability and give concepts on global food security.
Unit VII deals with global citizenship. Here, students will develop appreciation on
the ethical obligations of global citizenship.
1
The Contemporary World 2020
With the different lessons covered in this module, it is hoped that students will
gain the necessary competencies, skills and values intended for this course.
2
The Contemporary World 2020
The Contemporary World
Weeks
1-2
Introduction to Globalization
3-5
The Structures of Globalization
.The Global Economy
. Market Integration
. The Global Interstate System
. Contemporary Global Governance
6-8
A World of Regions
. Global Divides: The North and the South
. Asian Regionalism
9 Midterm
!0-11
A World of Ideas
. Global Media Cultures
. The Globalization of Religion
12-14
Global Population and Mobility
.The Global City
. Global Demography
.Global Migration
15-16
Towards a Sustainable World
. Sustainable Development
. Global Food Security
17-18
Global Citizenship
3
The Contemporary World 2020
The Contemporary World
At the end of the course the students should be able to:
A. Competencies
1. Distinguish different interpretations of and approaches to globalization;
2. Describe the emergence of global economic, political, social, and cultural
systems;
3. Analyze the various contemporary drivers of globalization;
4. Understand the issues confronting the nation-state; and
5. Assess the effects of globalization on different social units and their
responses.
B. Skills
1. Analyze contemporary news events in the context of globalization;
2. Analyze global issues in relation to Filipinos and the Philippines; and
3. Write a research paper with proper citations on a topic related to
globalization.
C. Values
1. Articulate personal positions on various global issues; and
2. Identify the ethical implications of global citizenship
4
The Contemporary World 2020
UNIT I INTRODUCTION TO GLOBALIZATION
Coverage: Weeks 1 and 2
Duration: 6 hours
Learning Objectives: After studying the unit, the students should be able to:





synthesize the definitions of globalization by the different authorities;
explain the different attributes or characteristics of globalization;
trace the historical periods of globalization;
identify the different dimensions of globalization; and
expound the major ideological claims of advocates of globalism.
Globalization Concepts, Meanings, Features, and Dimensions
Globalization is the process in which people, ideas and goods spread
throughout the world, spurring more interaction and integration between the world's
cultures, governments and economies(1).
Globalization is a process of interaction and integration among the people,
companies, and governments of different nations, a process driven by international
trade and investment and aided by information technology. This process has effects on
the environment, on culture, on political systems, on economic development and
prosperity, and on human physical well-being in societies around the world (2).
Globalization is about growing worldwide connectivity.
Example:
People are engaged in buying and selling from other places in far-away lands like
the famed Silk Road across Central Asia that connected China and Europe during the
Middle Age for thousands of years and they also invested in enterprises in other
countries for centuries.
There were similarities in features of those prevailing wave of globalization
before the outbreak of the First World War in 1914 to the current wave. There is an
increase cross border- trade, investment, and migration due to policy and technical
developments in the past few decades. It is in the area of economic development that
observers believe the world has entered a new phase. Today’s globalization is farther,
5
The Contemporary World 2020
faster, cheaper, and deeper in compared to earlier wave of globalization (3).
Example:
Since 1950, the volume of world trade has increased by 20 times and from 1997
to 1999, flows of foreign investment nearly doubled from $468 billion to $827
domestically.
In the years since the Second World War, and especially during the past two
decades, many governments have adopted free-market economic systems, vastly
increasing their own productive potential and creating myriad new opportunities for
international trade and investment. Governments also have negotiated dramatic
reductions in barriers to commerce and have established international agreements to
promote trade in goods, services, and investment. Taking advantage of new
opportunities in foreign markets, corporations have built foreign factories and
established production and marketing arrangements with foreign partners. A defining
feature of globalization, therefore, is an international industrial and financial business
structure (4).
One principal driver of globalization is technology. Economic life is dramatically
transformed by advancement in information technology. All sorts of individual economic
actors like consumers, investors, and businesses which are valuable new tools for
identifying and pursuing economic opportunities, including faster and more informed
analyses of economic trends around the world, easy transfers of assets, and
collaboration with far-flung partners are provided by information technologies.
Globalization is the process of integration of economies across the world through
cross-border flow of factors product and information (5). According to the International
Monetary Fund (IMF) globalization is the growing economic interdependence of
countries worldwide through increasing volume and variety of cross border transactions
in goods and services and of international capital flows and also through the more rapid
and wide diffusion of technology (6).
Globalization is an expansion, and intensification of social relations and
consciousness across world time and world space. It is about growing worldwide
connectivity according to Steger.
Further, globalization is considered a multi-dimensional process involving
economic, political, technological, cultural, religious and ecological dimensions. It
suggests a dynamic process of change that results in either positive or negative
development. It leads to the creation of something new; it involves the multiplication of
6
The Contemporary World 2020
social connections and various activities that transgress traditional and political,
economic, cultural and geographical lines.
Attributes, Qualities or Characteristics of Globalization
Globalization has four characteristics or qualities. These are:
1. It involves both the creation of new social networks and the multiplication of existing
connections that cut across traditional, political, economic, cultural, and geographical
boundaries.
Example:
Brazilian World Cup: Today’s media combine conventional TV coverage with
multiple streaming feeds into digital devices and networking sites that transcend
nationally based services.
2. Globalization is reflected in the expansion and the stretching of social relations,
activities, and connections.
Examples:



Reaching of financial markets around the globe
Occurrence of electronic around the clock
Emergence of gigantic and virtually identical shopping malls in all
continents to cater to consumers who can afford commodities all over the
world-including products whose various components were manufactured
in different countries. This process is called social stretching.
Covered in the process of social stretching are:
 Non-governmental organization
 Commercial enterprises
 Social clubs
 Regional & global institutions and associations (UN, EU, ASEAN, Google
and others)
7
The Contemporary World 2020
3. Globalization involves the intensification and acceleration of social exchanges
and activities.
Examples:



The worldwide web relays distant information in real time
Satellites provide consumers with instant pictures of remote events
Sophisticated social networking by means of facebook or twitter has
become routine activity for more than a billion people around the globe.
The intensification of worldwide social relations means that local happenings are
shaped by events occurring far away, and vice versa. This means that there is
intermingling of local and global, with the national and regional in overlapping horizontal
scale.
4. Globalization processes do not occur merely or an objective, material level but they
also involve the subjective plane of human consciousness. Without erasing local and
national attachments, the compression of the world into a single place has increasingly
made global the frame of reference for human thought and action.
Globalization involves both the macro-structures of a global community and the
micro-structures of global personhood. It extends deep into the core of the self and its
dispositions, facilitating the creation of multiple individual and collective identities
nurtured by the intensifying relations between the personal and the global. They differ
from each other by acceleration in the speed of social exchanges and widening of
geographical scopes (7).
Historical Periods of Globalization
1. The Prehistoric Period (10000 BCE-3500 BCE)
In this earliest phase of globalization, contacts among hunters and gatherers –
who were spread around the world – were geographically limited. In this period due to
absence of advanced forms of technology, globalization was severely limited.
2. The Pre-modern Period (3500 BCE- 1500 CE)
In this period the invention of writing and the wheel were great social and
technological boosts that moved globalization to a new level. The invention of wheel in
addition to roads made the transportation of people and goods more efficient. On the
other hand writing facilitated the spread of ideas and inventions.
8
The Contemporary World 2020
3. The Early Modern Period (1500-1750)
It is the period between the Enlightenment and the Renaissance. In this period,
European Enlightenment project tried to achieve a universal form of morality and law.
This with the emergence of European metropolitan centers and unlimited material
accumulation which led to the capitalist world system helped to strengthen globalization.
4. The Modern Period (1750-1970)
Innovations in transportation and communication technology, population
explosion, and increase in migration led to more cultural exchanges and transformation
in traditional social patterns. Process of industrialization also accelerated.
5. The Contemporary Period (from 1970 to present)
The creation, expansion, and acceleration of worldwide interdependencies
occurred in a dramatic way and it was a kind of leap in the history of globalization.
Dimensions of Globalization
There are six dimensions in globalization. These include: economic, political,
technological, cultural, religious and ecological dimensions.
1. Economic Dimension
This refers to the extensive development of economic relations across the globe
as a result of technology and the enormous flow of capital that has stimulated trade in
both sources and goods (8).



Major players in the current century’s global economic order
1. Huge international corporations (General Motors, Walmart,
Mitsubishi)
International Economic Institutions (IMF, World Bank, The World
Trade Organization)
Trading Systems
The result of these powerful forces resulted in the wide gap between the rich and
the poor countries.
Major Sources of Economic Growth across Countries (9)
1. Property rights
2. Regulatory institutions
3. Institutions for macro-economics
9
The Contemporary World 2020
4. Stabilization
5. Institutions for social influence
7. Institutions for conflict management
Economic institutions have decisive influence on investment in physical and
human capital, technology, and industrial productions. It is also important for resource
distribution.
2. Political Dimension
This refers to an enlargement and strengthening of political interrelations across
the globe (10).
Political Issues that Surface in this Dimension
1. The principle of state sovereignty
2. Increasing impact of various intergovernmental organization
3. Future shapes of regional and global governance
The globalization rendered almost powerless any political efforts to introduce
restrictive policies affecting individual states, with the results that the world in many
ways turned into a borderless world. Governments often seek to restrict the migration of
peoples, especially those coming from the poor countries in the global South (11 a).
In the development of supra-national structures and associations held together
by common concerns and mutually agreed upon norm, the most obvious is political
globalization.
On the part of the involved parties, informal structures which are considered
binding, bring together world power centers due to common interests.
Example:


Global cities like New York, London, Tokyo, and Singapore are closely
connected with one another than they are to various cities in their own
countries.
European Union, United nations, NATO, The World Trade Organization
3. Cultural Dimension
This refers to the increase in the amount of cultural flows across the globe.
Cultural interconnections are at the foundations of contemporary globalization (11b).
10
The Contemporary World 2020
Individualism and consumerism which are the dominant cultural characteristics of
our age and the drive for economic success stimulated by the internet and other
technological devices circulate much more easily than they did in earlier periods. In the
dissemination of popular culture, transactional media corporations play a major role
which brought a sharp rise in homogenized popular culture that is manifested in the
dominance of fast food restaurant on more aspects of life throughout the world.
Cultural diversity often results hybridization- a constructive interaction process
between global and local characteristics which is often visible in food, music, dance, film,
fashion, and language. As a result there is a scarcely any society in the world that
expresses itself in its own self-contained and authentic culture (11c).
Media empires generated and directed the extensive flow of culture. Examples of
these are Yahoo, Google, Microsoft, and Disney. Advertisement plays an important role
in this cultural flow by featuring various celebrities in the television aside from
transforming newscast into entertainment shows.
4. Religious Dimension
Religion is a personal or institutionalized set of attitudes, beliefs, and practices
relating to or manifesting faithful devotion to an acknowledged ultimate reality or deity
(12)
. It is the most important defining element of any civilization as contrasted with race,
language, or way of life. As such, it is also portrayed as a defining element in future
conflicts. Whether the root cause of a particular conflict or merely a vehicle for the
mobilization of nationalist or ethnic passions, religion is certainly central to much of the
strife currently taking place around the globe (13).
Jihadist globalism is a religious response to the materialist assault by the ungodly
West in the rest of the world. Coming out of what they consider a pure form of Islam, its
disciples seek to destroy all those alien influences that have been imposed on Muslim
people. It applies to those extremely violent strains of religion that convert the global
imaginary into very concrete political agendas and terrorist tactics. It is also applied to
those violent fundamentalists in the West who seek to transform the world into a
Christian Empire (14).
Example:


Bin Ladin understands umma as a single community of believers
professing faith in the one and only God, but at the same time committed
to destroying not only alien invaders but also corrupt Islamic elites in order
to return power to the Muslim masses.
Since one third of the world’s Muslim population lives in non-Islamic
countries, the restoration of God’s proper reign must be a global event.
Hence, Al-Qaeda established jihadist cells in various parts of the world.
11
The Contemporary World 2020
Roman Catholic Teaching of Globalization
There are eight (8) principles that summarize the Roman Catholic Teachings (15).
1. Commitment to universal human rights
2. Commitment to the social nature of the human person
3. Commitment to the common good
4. Solidarity (The principle of Solidarity affirms that membership in the human
family means that all bear responsibility for one another.)
5. Preferential option of the poor (In the Theology of the Incarnation- Christ God
became poor for us so as to enrich us by his poverty. The poor are susceptible to
the effects of environmental irresponsibility because they live in countries where
cheap building materials and cheap labor are readily available. They regularly
work in farming, fishing, and forestry, areas which suffer environmental damage).
6. Subsidiary (The Catholic Church teaches that decisions should be made at the
lowest level in order to achieve the common good.
7. Justice
8. Integral Humanism- is concerned with whole person
Justice is divided in three (3) categories:
1. Commutative justice
This aims at fulfilling the terms of contracts and other
promises on both personal and social level.
2. Distributive justice
This ensures a basic equity in how both the burden and the
goods of society are distributed and that ensures that every person
enjoys a basically equal moral and legal standing apart from
differences in wealth, privilege, talent and achievements
3. Social justice
This refers to the creation of the conditions in which the first
two categories of justice can be realized and the common good
identified and defended.
According to catholic teaching, a just society is one which these forms of justice
are assured because they are required by human dignity.
12
The Contemporary World 2020
5. Ideological Dimensions
Ideology is a system of widely shared ideas, beliefs, norms and values among a
group of people. It is often used to legitimize certain political interests or to defend
dominant power structures. Ideology connects human actions with some generalized
claims (14a).Globalization is a social process of intensifying global interdependence while
globalism is an ideology that gives the concept of neo-liberal values and meanings to
globalization.
Major Ideological Claims of Advocates of Globalism (14b)
1. Globalization is about the liberalization and global integration of markets.
The problem with this claim is that liberalization and integration of markets
happen through political project of engineering free markets by interference of
centralized state power, and it is in contrast to the neoliberal ideal of limited role
of governments.
2. Globalization is inevitable and irreversible.
Globalists believe that spread of market forces driven by technological
innovations is inevitable in globalization. Neoliberals use this claim to convince
people to adopt the natural discipline of the market if they want to prosper, which
implies the elimination of government controls over the market.
3. Nobody is in charge of globalization.
This claim seeks to depoliticize the public debate on globalization and
neutralizing anti -globalist movements.
4. Globalization benefits everyone.
Globalists talk about the benefits of market liberalization such as rising
global living standards, economic efficiency, individual freedom, and technological
progress. But the reality is that the opportunities of globalization are spread
unequally and power and wealth are concentrated among a specific group of
people, regions and corporations.
5. Globalization furthers the spread of democracy in the world.
For the globalists democracy and free markets are synonymous.
The neoliberal explanation of globalization is ideological because it is politically
motivated and contributes to the construction of particular meanings of globalization
which stabilize existing power relations. Globalism tries to create collective meaning and
shape people’s identities.
13
The Contemporary World 2020
References:
1. searchcio.techtarget.com/definition/globalization
2. http://www.globalization101.org/what-is-globalization/
3. Thomas Friedman. (2012). International Politics: Concepts, Theories, & Issues. Sage publications.
Edited by Rumki Basu
4. https://www.globalization101.org/what-is-globalization/
5. Cherunilam, Francis (2010). International Business: Text and Cases. 5th Edition.PHI Learning Private
Limited. New Delhi.
6. Cited by Charles Michell (2000). International Business Culture. World Trade Press. California
7. Steger. Manfred Globalization: A Very Short Introduction Published by OUP Oxford
8. Pereira, Carlos and Vladimir Teles (2011). Political Institutions, Economic Growth, and Democracy:
The Substitute Effect. https:// www. brookings. Edu/ opinions/
political- institutions –economic-
growth- and- democracy- the – substitute- effect/. January 19
9. Rodrik, D. (2007). One Economics Many Recipes: Globalization, Institutions, and Economic
Growth Princeton: Princeton University Press.
10. Book Review on Globalization: a very short introduction. Faculties of American Studies. http:// www.
American. Mcgill.ca/nast/; http:/ /www. American. Edu/sis /cnas.
11.(a,b,c,) Seazolts, Kevin R (2012). A Virtuous Church: Catholic Theology, Ethics, and Liturgy for the
21st Century
12. Samuel P. Huntington (1997). The Clash of Civilizations and the Remaking of World Order (New York:
Touchstone/Simon and Schuster
13. Johnston, Douglas M. Religion and Culture: Human Dimensions of Globalization. http:// indian
strategic knowledge online. com/ web/ C31 Johns. pdf
14. Seazolts, Kevin R (2012). A Virtuous Church: Catholic Theology, Ethics, and Liturgy for the 21st
Century
16. (a,b) Steger, Manfred. Globalization: A Very Short Introduction. Published by OUP Oxford
.
14
The Contemporary World 2020
UNIT I INTRODUCTION TO GLOBALIZATION
Unit Test:
A. Identification. Answer the following item by supplying the correct answer on
the blank.
__________ 1. In this period the invention of writing and the wheel were great social
and technological boosts that moved globalization to a new level.
__________ 2. It is often used to legitimize certain political interests or to defend
dominant power structures.
__________ 3. This is considered as one principal driver of globalization.
__________ 4. This refers to the extensive development of economic relations across
the globe as a result of technology and the enormous flow of capital
that has stimulated trade in both sources and goods
__________ 5. This results hybridization- a constructive interaction process between
global and local characteristics which is often visible in food, music,
dance, film, fashion, and language
__________ 6. This is a religious response to the materialist assault by the ungodly
West in the rest of the world.
__________ 7. The period of leap in the history of globalization.
__________ 8. This process has effects on the environment, on culture, on political
systems, on economic development and prosperity, and on human
physical well-being in societies around the world; this is about growing
worldwide connectivity.
__________ /__________ 9 - 10. These are the dominant cultural characteristics of our
age and the drive for economic success stimulated by the internet and
other technological devices circulate much more easily than they did in
earlier periods.
15
The Contemporary World 2020
B. True or False. Identify whether the statement is correct or not. Write True if it is
correct, False if not.
__________1. Today’s globalization, relatively, has more disadvantages in comparison
to earlier wave of globalization.
__________2. During the Prehistoric Period, globalization was severely limited.
__________3. Globalization involves the macro-structures of a global community as its
basic coverage and concern.
__________4. Media empires generated and directed the extensive flow of culture.
__________5. Social justice ensures a basic equity in how both the burden and the
goods of society are distributed and that ensures that every person
enjoys a basically equal moral and legal standing apart from differences
in wealth, privilege, talent and achievements
__________6. The Roman Catholic teaching of globalization believes that the poor are
susceptible to the effects of environmental irresponsibility because they
live in countries where building materials and labor are expensive.
__________7. Social networking, social stretching, and controlled social exchanges and
activities are among the positive implications of globalization.
__________8. People engaging in buying and selling from other places in far-away
lands is an example of how globalization works.
__________9. Globalization processes occur on an objective, material level of human
consciousness.
__________10. Process of industrialization accelerated during the Modern Period.
C. Essay
Discuss the major ideological claims of advocates of globalism, and express your
point of agreement/disagreement. (5 points each)
1. Globalization is about the liberalization and global integration of markets.
16
The Contemporary World 2020
2. Globalization is inevitable and irreversible.
3. Nobody is in charge of globalization.
4. Globalization benefits everyone.
5. Globalization furthers the spread of democracy in the world.
17
The Contemporary World 2020
UNIT II THE STRUCTURES OF GLOBALIZATION
Coverage: Week 3, 4, and 5
Duration: 9 hours
The Global Economy (2.25 hours; week 3)
Market Integration (2.25 hours; week 3 and 4)
The Global Interstate System (2.25 hours; week 4 and 5)
Contemporary Global Governance (2.25 hours; week 5)
Learning Objectives: After studying the unit, the students should be able to:




define economic globalization
explain the two major driving forces of global economy
differentiate economic globalization from internationalization
trace the origin of economic globalization
1.The Global Economy
2. Market Integration
3.The Global Interstate System
4. Contemporary Global Governance
THE GLOBAL ECONOMY
Economic globalization refers to the increasing interdependence of world
economies as a result of the growing scale of cross-border trade of commodities and
services, flow of international capital and wide and rapid spread of technologies. It
reflects the continuing expansion and mutual integration of market frontiers, and is an
irreversible trend for the economic development in the whole world at the turn of the
millennium (17).
According to the International Monetary Fund (18) economic globalization is a
historical process, the result of human innovation and technological progress. It refers to
the increasing integration of economies around the world, particularly through the
18
The Contemporary World 2020
movement of goods, services, and capital across borders. It also refers to the
movement of people (labor) and knowledge (technology) across international borders.
In economic terms, globalization is nothing but a process making the world
economy an organic system by extending transnational economic processes and
economic relations to more and more countries and by deepening the economic
interdependencies among them (19).
Two Major Driving Forces for Economic Globalization
1. The rapid growing of information in all types of productive activities
2. Marketization (A restructuring process that enables state enterprises to
operate as market-oriented firms by changing the legal environment in which
they operate (20) and can be achieved through reduction of state subsidies,
organizational restructuring of management such as corporatization,
decentralization, and privatization (21).
Rapid development of science and technologies served as basis for immediate
globalization of the world economies which in turn provided an environment where there
is a swift spreading of market economic system all over the world. It is also developed
based on the increasing cross-border division of labor which penetrates within the
enterprises of different countries on the level of production chains.
Dimensions of Economic Globalization
1. The globalization of trade of goods and services
2. The globalization of financial and capital markets
3. The globalization of technology and communication
4. The globalization of production
Difference between Economic Globalization from Internationalization
Economic globalization is a functional integration between internationally
dispersed activities which means that it is a qualitative transformation rather than a
quantitative change while internationalization is an extension of economic activities
between internationally dispersed activities (22).
Economic globalization produces its own major players in the form of
transnational corporations (TNCs), the main driving forces of economic globalization of
19
The Contemporary World 2020
the last 100 years or roughly two-thirds of world export (23). Transnational corporation
otherwise known as multi -national corporation is a corporation that has a home base,
but is registered, operates and has assets or other facilities in at least one other country
at one time (24). Examples are the US-based General Electric (GE), the Coca-Cola
Company of Atlanta, Georgia, US Nike and others.
Origin of Economic Globalization
Economic globalization is a process that creates an organic system of the world
economy.
In the 16th century world system analysts identify the origin of modernity and
globalization through long distance trade in the 16th century (25). This best known
example of archaic globalization is the Silk Road, which started in western China,
reached the boundaries of the Parthian empire, and continued onwards towards Rome
(26)
. It also connected Asia, Africa, and Europe (27).
In the 17th and 18th century global economy exists only in trade and exchange
rather than production as the world export to World GDP did not reached 1 to 2 percent
(28)
.
In the 19th century the advent of globalization approaching its modern form is
witnessed. A short period before World War I is referred to as golden age of
globalization characterized by relative peace, free trade, financial and economic stability
(29)
. Growth in international exchange of goods accelerated in the second quarter of the
th
19 century. Global economy in the 19th and 20th centuries grew by an average of
nearly 4 percent per annum, which is roughly twice as high as growth in the national
incomes of the developed economies since the late 19th century (30).
International Monetary Systems and Gold Standard
International monetary system (IMS) refers to a system that forms rules and
standards for facilitating international trade among the nations. It helps in reallocating
the capital and investment from one nation to another. It is the global network of the
government and financial institutions that determine the exchange rate of different
currencies for international trade. It is a governing body that sets rules and regulations
by which different nations exchange currencies with each other (31).
IMS as rules, customs, instruments, facilities, and organizations for effecting
international payments with the main task of facilitating cross-border transactions,
20
The Contemporary World 2020
especially trade and investment (32). It also reflects economic power and interests, as
money is inherently political, an integral part of high politics or diplomacy (33).
Evolution of the International Monetary System
In 1870 to 1914, with the help of gold and silver, trade was carried without any
institutional support. Monetary system during that time was decentralized while market
based and money played a minor role in international trade in contrast to gold.
Gold was believed to guarantee a non-inflationary, stable economic environment,
a means for accelerating international trade (34) and the gold standard functioned as a
fixed exchange rate regime, with gold as the only international reserve.
Gold Standard is a system of backing a country’s currency with its gold reserves.
Such currencies are freely convertible into gold at a fixed price, and the country settles
all its international trade transactions in gold (35)
After World War I, the use of gold declined due to increased expenditure and
inflation which were caused by war. Major economic powers were on gold standards but
could not maintain it and failed because of the Great depression in 1931.
In 1944, 730 representatives of 44 nations met at Bretton Woods, New
Hampshire, United States to create a new international monetary system called as the
Bretton Woods system, the aim of which is to create a stabilized international currency
system and ensure a monetary stability for all the nations.
Since the United States held most of the world’s gold, all the nations would
determine the values of their currencies in terms of dollar. The central banks of nations
were given the task of maintaining fixed exchange rates with respect to dollar for each
currency. The Bretton Woods system ended in 1971 as the trade deficit and growing
inflation undermined the value of dollar in the whole world. In 1973, the floating
exchange rate system, also known as flexible exchange rate system was developed
that was market based (36).
To assess whether the gold standard was successful, the following roles of a
properly designed IMS must be considered: to lend order and stability to foreign
exchange markets, to encourage the elimination of balance-of-payments problems, and
to provide access to international credits in the event of disruptive shocks (37). The gold
standard has never worked satisfactorily in controlling inflation or maintaining
equilibrium in international transactions.
21
The Contemporary World 2020
European Monetary Integration
European monetary integration refers to a 30-year long process that began at
the end of the 1960s as a form of monetary cooperation intended to reduce the
excessive influence of the US dollar on domestic exchange rates, and led, through
various attempts, to the creation of a Monetary Union and a common currency. This
Union brings many benefits to Member States.
However, over the past decade, the build-up of macroeconomic imbalances, and
the imprudent fiscal policies of some Member States, resulted in the continuing double
crisis in banking and sovereign. As a result of this crisis, many individual Member States
face difficult re-adjustment processes, and Members States collectively must reappraise
the governance architecture of Monetary Union and adopt new mechanisms to detect,
prevent, and correct problematic economic trends (38).
The European Monetary System (EMS) on the other hand is a 1979
arrangement between several European countries which links their currencies in an
attempt to stabilize the exchange rate. This system was succeeded by the
European Economic and Monetary Union (EMU), an institution of the European
Union (EU), which established a common currency called the euro.
The European Monetary System originated in an attempt to stabilize inflation and
stop large exchange rate fluctuations between European countries. Then, in June 1998,
the European Central Bank was established and, in January 1999, a unified currency,
the euro, was born and came to be used by most EU member countries (39).
According to the European Commission in 2008, the first ten years of the EMU
were an evident success for participating countries in terms of increased trade and
capital transactions, more integrated economies, restored macroeconomic stability and
the utilization of Euro as the second most widely used reserve currency. But in 2008 to
2009 the European Union (EU) is presented with dramatic challenges brought by global
financial and economic crisis.
The EU in 2010 in response to the crisis enacted the three- pillar financial rescue
program which includes: the European Financial Stability Mechanism, the European
Financial Stability Facility, the financial assistance of International Monetary Fund (IMF).
Since the three -pillar system is temporary EU in 2013 activated its own permanent
European Stability Mechanism.
The future of EMU depends on the willingness of
member states to agree on more fundamental changes in the governance of Eurozone.
The European Financial Stability Mechanism (EFSM) is a permanent fund
created by the European Union (EU) to provide emergency assistance to member
states within the Union. It raises money through the financial markets, and is
guaranteed by the European Commission. Fund raised through the markets, use the
22
The Contemporary World 2020
budget of the European Union as collateral. The European Financial Stability Facility
(EFSF) on the other hand, is an organization created by the European Union to provide
assistance to member states with unstable economies. The EFSF is a special purpose
vehicle (SPV) managed by the European Investment Bank, a lending institution. The
fund raises money by issuing debt, and distributes the funds to eurozone countries
whose lending institutions need to be recapitalized who need help managing their
sovereign debt or who need financial stabilization (40).
International Trade and Trade Policies
International trade is the exchange of goods, services and capital across
national borders. It is a multi-million dollar activity, central to the Gross Domestic
Product (GDP) of many countries, and it is the only way for many people in many
countries to acquire resources (41). In acquiring products where demand is inelastic and
domestic supply is inadequate absent traders, consumers and suppliers are forced to
either develop substitute goods or devote a large percentage of their income.
International trade is the exchange of goods or services along international
borders. This type of trade allows for a greater competition and more competitive pricing
in the market (42). The two key concepts in the economics of international trade are
specialization and comparative advantage. Comparative advantage comes in; so long
as the two countries have different relative efficiencies, the two countries can benefit
from trade – the country with absolute advantage will still benefit by directing its
resources to those goods where it is most productive and trading for the others while
specialization refers to this process; countries as well as individual businesses can
maximize their welfare by specializing in the production of those goods where they are
most efficient and enjoy the largest advantages over rivals (43).
More affordable products for the consumer is also the result of competition. The
economy of the world is also affected by the exchange of goods as dictated by supply
and demand, making goods and services obtainable which may not be available
globally to consumers. Trading globally gives consumers and countries the opportunity
to be exposed to goods and services not available in their own countries. Almost every
kind of products can be found on the international market aside from services being
traded like banking, tourism, etc. Global trade allows wealthy countries to use their
resources such as labor, technology, or capital more efficiently. Because countries are
endowed with different assets and natural resources, some countries may produce the
same good more efficiently and therefore sell it more cheaply than other countries (44).
Specialization in international trade happens if a country cannot efficiently produce an
item and obtain it by trading with another country that can.
Trade policies on the other hand refer to the regulations and agreement of
foreign countries (45). It defines standards, goals, rules, and regulations that pertain to
23
The Contemporary World 2020
trade relation between countries (46). Each country has specific policies formulated by its
officials. Boosting the nation’s international trade is the aim of each country. Taxes
imposes on import and export, inspection, regulations, tariffs and quotas are all part of
country’s trade policy.
Focuses of Trade Policy in International Trade
Tariffs
These are taxes or duties paid for a particular class of imports or exports.
Imposing taxes on imported and exported goods is a right of every country.
Heavy tariffs on imported goods are levied by some nations for the protection of
their local industries. The prices of imported goods in local markets are inflated
due to high imported taxes to ensure demand of local products.
Trade barriers
Theses are measures that governments or public authorities introduce to
make imported goods or services less competitive than locally produced goods
and services (47). They are state-imposed restrictions on trading a particular
product or with a specific nation. It can be linked to the product, service like
technical requirement and it can also be administrative in nature such as rules
and procedures of transactions. Tariffs, duties, subsidies, embargoes and quotas
are the most common trade barriers.
Safety
This ensures that imported products in the country are of high quality.
Inspection regulations laid down by public officials ensure the safety and quality
standards of imported products.
Types of Trade Policies
National Trade Policy
This safeguards the best interest of its trade and citizen.
Bilateral Trade Policy
24
The Contemporary World 2020
To regulate the trade and business relations between two nations, this
policy is formed. Under the trade agreement the national trade policies of both
the nations and their negotiations are considered while bilateral trade policy is
being formulated.
International Trade Policy
This defines the international trade policy under their charter like
International economic organizations, such as Organization for Economic
operation and Development (OECD), World Trade Organization (WTO)
International Monetary Fund (IMF).The best interests of both developed
developing nations are upheld by the policies.
the
Coand
and
Trade Policy and International Economy
In most developed countries where open market economy prevails, the
international economic organizations support free trade policies. In the case of
developing nations partially-shielded trade practices are preferred to protect their local
trade industries. The following are dependent on globalization: sound trade policies for
market changes, establishment of free and fair trade practices and expansion of
possibilities for booming international trade.
The World Trade Organization (WTO)
The World Trade Organization (WTO) deals with the global rules of trade
between nations with the main function of ensuring that trade flows smoothly,
predictably and freely. It is the only global international organization dealing with the
rules of trade between nations with WTO agreements, negotiated and signed by the
bulk of the world’s trading nations and ratified in their parliaments at its heart (48). WTO
is viewed as the means by which industrialized countries can gain access to the
markets of developing countries (49).
Global Economy Outsourcing
Outsourcing is an activity that requires search for a partner and relation-specific
investments that are governed by incomplete contracts and the extent of international
outsourcing depends on the thickness of the domestic and foreign market for input
suppliers, the relative cost of searching in each market, the relative cost of customizing
inputs and the nature of the contracting environment in each country (50). Subcontracting
is a central element of the new economy (51). It is the practice of assigning part of the
obligations and tasks under a contract to another party known as a subcontractor and
25
The Contemporary World 2020
especially prevalent in areas where complex projects are the norm like construction and
information technology (52).
Outsourcing is a means of finding a partner with which a firm can establish a
bilateral relationship and having the partner undertake relationship-specific investments
so that it becomes able to produce goods and services that fit the firm’s particular needs.
Often, the bilateral relationship is governed by a contract, but even in those cases the
legal document does not ensure that the partners will conduct the promised activities
with the same care that the firm would use itself if it were to perform the tasks (53).
One of the most rapidly growing components of international trade is the
outsourcing of intermediate goods and business services. There are three essential
features of a modern outsourcing strategy.
1. Firms must search for partners with the expertise that allows them to perform
the particular activities that are required.
2. They must convince the potential suppliers to customize products for their
own specific needs.
3. They must induce the necessary relationship-specific investments in an
environment with incomplete contracting.
Possible Determinants of the Location of Outsourcing
1. Size of the country can affect the “thickness” of its markets.
2. The technology for search affects the cost and likelihood of finding a suitable
partner.
3. The technology for specializing components determines the willingness of a
partner to undertake the needed investment in a prototype.
4. The contracting environments can impinge on a firm’s ability to induce a
partner to invest in the relationship.
26
The Contemporary World 2020
References:
The Global Economy
17. Gao Shangquan (2000). Economic Globalization: Trends,
http://www.un.org/en/development/desa/policy/cdp/index.shtml
Risks
and
Risk
Prevention
18. IMF (2008). Globalization: A brief overview. Issues Brief Issue 02/08. Washington, DC.
19. Szentes, T. (2003) World Economics 2. Budapest Akademiai Kiado
20. Hoeven, van der R & György Sziráczki (1997). Lessons from Privatization. Geneva: International
Labour Organization
21. Vickerstaff, Sarah (1998). The Transformation of Labour Relations. Oxford University Press. ISBN 019-828979-0 p.63
22. Dicken P. (2004). Global shift: Reshaping the global economic map in the 21st century.
London :SAGE.
23. Gerrifi, G. (2005). The Global Economy: Organization, Governance, and Development,. In Smesler N
and Swedberg R. (eds) Handbook of Economic Sociology, Princeton, NJ: Princeton University
Press, pp. 160-82.
24.Whiting,
Brianna
examples.html
(2017).
http://study.com/academy/lesson/transnational-corporation-definition-
25. Braudel, F (1973). The Mediterranean and the Mediterranean world in the age of Phillip II. Bekerley
and Los Angeles: University of California Press.
26. Lee, Adela C. Y.(2010). Silkroad Foundation: “Ancient Silk Road Travellers”. Silk-road.com. Rerieved
2010-07-31
27. Gills BK and Thompson WR (2006). Globalization, global histories and historical globalities. In Gills,
BK and Thompson (eds) Globalization and global history. London:Routledge, pp. 1-15.
28. Held D. and McGrew A. (1999). Global Transformations: Politics, economics and culture. Stanford,
CA: Stanford University Press.
29. O’Rourke KH and Williamson JG (1999). Globalization and History. The evolution of a nineteencentury Atlantic economy. Cambridge University Press, pp. 285-300.
30. Pfister, Ulrich, (2012) http:// ieg- ego.eu/en threads/ backgrounds/ globalization=The Periodofthe
Atlantic Economy 18501931.
31.Nitisha. International Monetary System: http:// www. economics discussion. net/ articles/ internationalmonetary system/ 4256
32. Salvatore D. (2007). International Economics. Hoboken; John Wiley and Son.
27
The Contemporary World 2020
33. Cohen, B. (2000). Money and power in world politics. In Lawton TC, Rosenau JN and Verdun AC
(eds) Strange power. Aldershot, UK: Ashgate Publishing pp. 91-113.
34. Einaudi, L. (2001). Money and Politics: European monetary unification and the international gold
standard. 1865-1873. Oxford: Oxford University Press
35. http:// www. business dictionary. Com/ definition/ gold- standard.html
36. www. economics discussion. net/ articles/ international-monetary-system/4256
37. Eichengreen, BJ (1996). Globalizing capital: A History of the International Monetary System.
Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.
38. http:// www. europarl. europa. eu/Reg Data/etudes/ BRIE/2015/551325/ EPRS_ BRI (2015) 551325
_EN. Pdf
39. European Monetary System (EMS) http: www. Investopedia.com/ terms/e/ems.asp#ixzz4vBgDqKo3
40. European Commission, 2008.
41. Investopedia. com Website. “International Trade” Retrieved from: https:// www. investopedia.
com/terms/e/ european- financial- stability- facility. asp
42. http://www.businessdictionary.com/definition/international-trade.html
43. Simpson, Stephen D. Macroeconomics: International Trade. https:// www. Investopedia. com/
university/ macroeconomics/11.asp
44. What is International Trade? https:// Investopedia. com/ articles/03/112503.asp#xzz4y0nbUED8.
45. The Balance .com Website. Trade Policy. Retrieved from: https:// www.the balance.com trade-policy4073939
46.Economywatch.com
Website.
“Trade
Policy”.
Retrieved
from
http://www.economywatch.com/international-trade/trade-policy.html.Dated June 29, 2010
47. Um.dk/en Website. “What is Trade Barrier”. Retrieved from:http://um.dk/en/tradecouncil/barriers/whatis/
48. WTO.org.comWebsite.“The WTO”. Retrieved from https:// www.wto.org/english/the wtoe/thewto
_ehtm 2018.
49. Khor M. (1995). “The WTO and the South: Implications and Recent Developments”. Third World
Network
50. Grossman, Gene, and Helpman, Elhanan (2005). Outsourcing in a Global Economy. Review of
Economic Studies. Retrieved from: http//about.jstor.org.com
28
The Contemporary World 2020
51. Financial times, July 31, 2001
52.
Investopedia.com
Website
(2018).
Subcontracting
https://
www.investopedia.com/terms/s
subcontracting.asp#ixzz5QIC0Oxw
53. Marsh, P. (2001). “A Sharp Sense of the Limits of Outsourcing”. The Financial Times, 31 July, 10
29
The Contemporary World 2020
UNIT II THE STRUCTURES OF GLOBALIZATION
Coverage: Week 3, 4, and 5
Duration:9 hours
The Global Economy (2.25 hours; week 3)
Market Integration (2.25 hours; week 3 and 4)
The Global Interstate System (2.25 hours; week 4 and 5)
Contemporary Global Governance (2.25 hours; week 5)
Learning Objectives: After studying the unit, the students should be able to:




define economic globalization
explain the two major driving forces of global economy
differentiate economic globalization from internationalization
trace the origin of economic globalization
1.The Global Economy
2. Market Integration
3.The Global Interstate System
4. Contemporary Global Governance
MARKET INTEGRATION
Market integration refers to how easily two or more markets can trade with each
other (54a). It occurs when prices among different locations or related goods follow similar
patterns over a long period of time. Groups of prices often move proportionally to each
other and when this relation is very clear among different markets it is said that the
markets are integrated (54b).
The term is further used in identifying related phenomenon of market of goods
and services experiencing similar patterns of increase or decrease in prices of products.
It may also refer to the movement of prices of related goods and services sold in a
defined geographical location in similar patterns. When government implement certain
strategy to control the direction of economy then integration is intentional while shifting
30
The Contemporary World 2020
in supply and demand that has a spillover effect on several markets is another factor of
market integration. One way of helping integration of market by reducing barriers to
trade and increasing fluidity between markets is through foreign trade.
Market integration exists when there are exerted effects that prompt similar
changes or shifts in other markets that focus on related goods on events occurring
within two or more markets.
Example:
China produces toys at a cheaper price than the US. If foreign trade increased
between the two countries, toys could be sold to the US more easily, making them more
available, thus reducing price (55a).
If the demand for baby dolls within a given geographical market were to suddenly
be reduced by 50%, there is a good chance that the demand for baby doll clothing
would also decrease in proportion within that same geographical market. Should the
baby market increase, this would usually mean that the market for doll clothing would
also increase. Both markets would have the chance to adjust pricing in order to deal
with the new circumstances surrounding the demand, as well as adjust other factors,
such as production (55b).
Types of Related Markets where Market Integration Occurs
Stock Market Integration
This is a condition in which stock markets in different countries trend
together and depict same expected risk adjusted returns. Two markets are
perfectly integrated if investors can pass from one market to another without
paying any extra costs and if there are possibilities of arbitration which
ensures the equivalence of stock prices on both markets (56) .
Financial Market Integration
It is an open market economy between countries facilitated by a common
currency and the elimination of technical, regulatory and tax differences to
encourage free flow of capital and investment across borders (57). It occurs when
lending rates in several different markets begin to move in tandem with one
another. Emergence of similar patterns within the capital, stock, and financial
31
The Contemporary World 2020
markets with those trends coming together to exert a profound influence on the
economy of that nation is involved in the integration within a nation.
Global Corporation
A global corporation is a business that operates in two or more countries. It
also goes by the name "multinational company" (58). Several advantages are offered by
global expansion of business over running a strictly domestic company. Success in
different types of economies is achieved by means of multiple countries operation while
it causes also logistic and cultural challenges. Expanding revenue opportunities and
diversifying business risk are the purposes of becoming global corporation. Access to
more customers and capital is obtained through a model that works domestically well
and translates foreign markets well.
Example:
One can find more customers in a country whose economy is vibrant and
expanding in lieu of stagnant local and domestic economy or market share that has hit a
plateau.
Historical Periods of Global Corporation
An approach to the study of globalization that locates the phenomenon itself in
early patterns of trade and exchange is known as historical globalization.
In early historical periods as both cities and countries extended their reach
beyond their own borders, a form of globalization was initiated which then followed
complex patterns of interactive engagements organized through trade and industry
directly influenced by the emergent and subsequently dominant technologies especially
in shipping and navigation (59). The entities operating within this environment were
functionally and organizationally not different from contemporary organizations being
possessed with head offices, foreign branch plants, corporate hierarchies,
extraterritorial business law, and even bit of foreign direct investment and value-added
activity (60).
Combination of invention and social organization resulting to increase in
worldwide capital and wealth of nation is allowed by modern nation state system that
emerged in the period prior to the end of World War II. American Corporations led the
economic recovery and expansion after the World War II destruction. This period up to
32
The Contemporary World 2020
the reentry of Japanese and European corporation to the global scene is viewed as
multinational corporations (MNCs) (61). From the end of World War II to the present is
considered the period of transformation of global corporation.
The Finance Function in a Global Corporation
As corporations go global, capital markets open up within them, giving
companies a powerful mechanism for arbitrage across national financial markets (62).
Chief financial officers (CFOs) must balance the opportunities with the challenges of
operating in multiple environments in managing their internal markets in building an
advantage. These three functions can be created by CFOs through exploiting their
internal capital markets.
1. Financing
A group’s tax bill can be reduced by the CFO like borrowing in countries
with high tax rates and lending to operations in countries with lower rates.
2. Risk Management
Global firms can offset natural currency exposures through worldwide
operations instead of managing currency exposures through financial markets.
3. Capital budgeting
Getting smarter on valuing investment opportunities CFOs can add value.
Foreign Direct Investment
Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) was of corporate origin. It is a major driver of
extended global corporate development. It is an investment made by a company or
individual in one country in business interests in another country, in the form of either
establishing business operations or acquiring business assets in the other country, such
as ownership or controlling interest in a foreign company and the key feature of foreign
direct investment is that it is an investment made that establishes either effective control
of, or at least substantial influence over, the decision making of a foreign business (63).
Foreign direct investment is made open to economies; frequently involves more
than just a capital investment and includes provision of management or technology as
well. There are many methods to establish FDIs such as opening a subsidiary or
associate company in a foreign country; acquiring a controlling interest in an existing
foreign company, or by means of a merger or joint venture with a foreign company.
33
The Contemporary World 2020
BRICS Economies
Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa (BRICS) is an acronym for the
combined economies of Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa. BRIC, without
South Africa, was originally coined in 2003 by Goldman Sachs, which speculates that by
2050 these four economies will be the most dominant. South Africa was added to the
list on April 13, 2011 creating "BRICS"(64a). These five countries were among the fastest
growing emerging markets as of 2011.
Further, Brazil, Russia, India and China (BRIC) refer to the idea that China and
India will, by 2050, become the world's dominant suppliers of manufactured goods and
services, respectively, while Brazil and Russia will become similarly dominant as
suppliers of raw materials. Due to lower labor and production costs in these countries
now including a fifth nation, South Africa, many companies have also cited BRIC as a
source of foreign expansion opportunity i.e. promising economies in which to invest (64b).
General Agreement on Trade in Services (GATS)
The General Agreement on Trade in Services (GATS) is the first multilateral
agreement covering trade in services which was negotiated during the last round of
multilateral trade negotiations, called the Uruguay Round, and came into force in 1995.
The GATS provides a framework of rules governing services trade, establishes a
mechanism for countries to make commitments to liberalize trade in services and
provides a mechanism for resolving disputes between countries (65).
GATS has similar principle with the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade
(GATT) that deals with trade in goods. The two primary objectives of GATTS are to
ensure that all signatories are treated equitably when accessing foreign markets; and
second, to promote progressive liberalization of trade and services.
34
The Contemporary World 2020
References
Market Integration
54.(a,b) De Braux, P. (2017) “What is Market Integration” Retrieved from: https:// www. qoura. Com/
What –is-market-integration. Dated March 3, 2017.
55.(a,b)
“What
is
Market
Integration”
Retrieved
from:
http://www.wisegeek.com/what-is-market-
integration.html (n.d.)
56. Arouri, M.E.H. and Jawadi, F. (2009), “Stock market integration in emerging countries: further
evidence
from
the
Philippines
and
Retrieved
Mexico”,
from:
www.finance‐innovation.org/risk09/work/1208330.pdf Dated: October 9, 2010.
57. Investorwords.com Website. “Integrated Financial Market” Retrieved from: http:// www. investorwords.
Com/ 15491/ integrated financial markets. html #ixzz55 p6oq8Hb.
58. Kokemuller, Neil. (2018). “What is a Global Corporation?” Retrieved from: http:// smallbusiness,chron.
com/ global- corporation- 63267. Html
59. Harvey D. (1990). The Condition of Post Modernity: An Inquiry into the Origins of Cultural Change .
Oxford: Blackwell Publishers.
60. Moore K. and Lewis D. 2000 Foundation of Corporate Empire. London: Prentice Hall.
61 Barnet and Mueller (1974). Global Reach: The Power of the multinational corporations. New York:
Simon and Schuster
62.Desai, Mihir A. 2008. The Finance Function in a Global Corporation. Harvard Business Publishing.
63. Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) https://www. investopedia.com/ terms/f/fdi. asp#ixzz58qxoZoR0
64.(a,b,)
Brazil,
Russia,
India,
China
And
South
Africa
(BRICS)
https://www.
investopedia.com/terms/b/brics.asp#ixzz58r2tplyS
65.General Agreement on Trade in Services (GATS) 2013 http://www. international. gc.ca/tradeagreements-accords-commerciaux/wto-omc/gats-agcs/index.aspx?lang=eng
35
The Contemporary World 2020
UNIT II THE STRUCTURES OF GLOBALIZATION
Coverage: Week 3, 4, and 5
Duration: 9 hours
The Global Economy (2.25 hours; week 3)
Market Integration (2.25 hours; week 3 and 4)
The Global Interstate System (2.25 hours; week 4 and 5)
Contemporary Global Governance (2.25 hours; week 5)
Learning Objectives: After studying the unit, the students should be able to:




define economic globalization
explain the two major driving forces of global economy
differentiate economic globalization from internationalization
trace the origin of economic globalization
1.The Global Economy
2. Market Integration
3.The Global Interstate System
4. Contemporary Global Governance
THE GLOBAL INTERSTATE SYSTEM
Globalization and the Nation- States
Globalization in the early years of the 21st century has not displaced the state.
Max Weber, a German social theorist define state as a compulsory political organization
with a centralized government that maintains a monopoly of the legitimate use of force
within a certain territory (66). Hedley Bull, a 20th century international philosopher stated
that states are independent political communities each of which possesses a
government and asserts sovereignty in relation to a particular portion of the earth’s
surface and a particular segment of the human population (67). This means that
government and constitutions come and go but states readily endure.
36
The Contemporary World 2020
Nation on the other hand is an imagined political community and imagined as
both inherently limited and sovereign (68a).

It is imagined because the members of even the smallest nation will never
know most of their fellow- members, meet them, or even hear of them, yet
in the minds of each lives the image of their communion (68b).

The nation is imagined as limited because even the largest of them,
encompassing perhaps a billion human beings, has finite, if elastic,
boundaries, beyond which lie other nations (68c).

It is imagined as sovereign because the concept was born in an age in
which Enlightenment and Revolution were destroying the legitimacy of the
divinely ordained, hierarchical dynastic realm…nations dream of being
free, and if under God, directly so. The gauge and emblem of this freedom
is the sovereign state (68d).

It is imagined as community, because regardless of actual inequality and
exploitation that may prevail in each, the nation is always conceived as a
deep horizontal comradeship (68e).
In everyday political speech and media commentary, the terms nation and states
are used interchangeably. The term nation-state has a dual concept, with the modern
state going back to the Peace of Westphalia, and nationalism tracing back to
Protestantism, the Enlightenment, the rise of the vernacular, with both concepts of
nation and state fused in the French Revolution. Nation –states are territorial
organizations characterized by the monopolization of legitimate violence (qua states)
while nation –states are membership associations with a collective identity and a
democratic pretension to rule (qua nation) (69).
The State and the Economic Interdependence
The rising momentum of global free-market capitalism in the final decades of the
20 century, the accompanying rise in transnational enterprises, and the resulting
disparities between easy flows of money and commodities across international boarders
and the legal barriers and logistical hurdles that keep most workers tied to their home
communities are associated with globalization.
th
The belief that globalization imposes a forced choice upon states either to
conform to free market principles or run the risk of being left behind is termed into a
phrase called “Golden Straitjacket” by Thomas Friedman, a neoliberalism journalist and
advocate, to illustrate the forcing of states into policies that suit the preferences of
investment houses and corporate executives (Electronic Herd) who swiftly move money
and resources into countries favored as adaptable to the demands of international
business and withdraw even more rapidly from countries deemed uncompetitive (70a).
37
The Contemporary World 2020
Further, countries are compared to individual stocks where the states and their
government are rewarded and punished similar to buying and selling shares of
individual companies. States also have lost an important element of economic
sovereignty and that neo-liberalism is beyond contestation (70b).
There are two things that will happen if a country is in Golden Straitjacket: the
economy grows and politics shrinks. It is a straitjacket because it narrows the political
and economic policy choices of those in power to relatively tight parameters. This is the
reason of the difficulty of finding any real differences today between ruling and
opposition parties in those countries that have put on the Golden Staitjacket (71) .
Neoliberalism and Economic Sovereignty
Neoliberalism is the intensification of the influence and dominance of capital. It
is the elevation of capitalism as a mode of production into an ethic, a set of political
imperatives, and a cultural logic. It is a project to strengthen, restore, or, in some cases,
constitute anew the power of economic elites. It values market exchange as an ethic in
itself capable of acting as a guide to all human action and substituting for all previous
held ethical beliefs. It emphasizes the significance of contractual relations in the
marketplace. It also holds that the social good will be maximized by maximizing the
reach and frequency market transactions, and it seeks to bring all human action into
domain of the market (72).
Economic sovereignty on the other hand is the power or national governments
to make decisions independently of those made by other governments (73). Globalization
as an increase in the international integration of markets for goods, services, capital and
labor, is also a counterpoint of national sovereignty. In a globalized world economy,
governments have no alternative but to adopt neoliberal economic policies of
privatization, deregulations, and reductions in public expenditures (74a).
There are four different concepts of sovereignty. These include:
International Legal Sovereignty
It refers to the acceptance of a given state as a member of the
international community.
Westphalian Sovereignty
It is based on the principle that one sovereign state should not interfere in
the domestic arrangements of another.
Interdependence Sovereignty
It is the capacity and willingness to control flows of people, goods and
capital into and out of the country.
38
The Contemporary World 2020
Domestic Sovereignty
It is the capacity of a state to choose and implement policies within the
territory (74b)
Global economic trends are influenced by economic sovereignty of an individual
member. The increase of the number of international organizations and the expansion
of their functions have undeniably restricted an individual country's sovereignty to
certain extent. The most typical example is the increasingly extensive involvement of
the world's three leading financial institutions the World Bank (WB), the International
Momentary Fund (IMF) and the World Trade Organization (WTO) in domestic economic
affairs of their members. The 60,000-plus transnational corporations, which developed
rapidly in the latter half of the last century, are now sharing or "encroaching upon"
individual country's "sovereignty" in the economic domain (75).
Many underdeveloped nations that resorted to foreign assistance and
interventions resulted to the deprivation of government as regard control of their
economy due to the disorderly domestic economic establishments. Due to this, some
scholars predicted the loss of their economic sovereignty under this form of neocolonialism. More importantly, some of the world's leading economic entities, such as
the United States, the European Union and Japan, by taking advantage of their
predominant economic status, are affecting or infringing upon other countries' economic
sovereignty. Under these circumstances, an increasing number of scholars have
concluded that the economic dominion of individual nations has come to an end. While
countries inevitably cede some control over their economic sovereignty to external
actors, it is the “structural power” of sovereign states which still dictates the terms and
tenets of globalization (76).
Economic and Political Integration (European Integration)
European integration is the process of industrial, political, legal, economic,
social and cultural integration of states wholly or partially in Europe. European
integration has primarily come about through the European Union and its policies (77).
European Union (EU), is an international organization comprising 28 European
countries and governing common economic, social, and security policies (78). In the early
21st century EU expanded into central and eastern Europe with the following members:
Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria, Croatia, Cyprus, Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Finland,
France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Ireland, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Malta,
the Netherlands, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, and
the United Kingdom.
39
The Contemporary World 2020
Economic integration can be described as a process and a means by which a
group of countries strives to increase their level of welfare (79). It is an arrangement
between different regions that often includes the reduction or elimination of trade
barriers, and the coordination of monetary and fiscal policies (80). Reducing costs for
both consumers and producers and increasing trade between the countries involved in
the agreement are the aims of economic integration.
Seven Stages of Economic Integration
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
Preferential trading area (PTA)
Free trade area
Customs union
Common market
Economic union
Eonomic and monetary union
Complete economic integration
Preferential Trade Areas (PTAs) happens when there’s an agreement on
reducing or eliminating tariff (tax or duty to be paid on a particular class of imports or
exports) barriers on selected goods imported from other members of countries within
the geographical region or areas. Agreement can either be bilateral (between two
countries), or multi-lateral (several countries). Free Trade Areas (FTAs) are created
when two or more countries in a region agree to reduce or eliminate barriers to trade on
all goods coming from other members. The North Atlantic Free Trade
Agreement (NAFTA) is an example of such a free trade area, and includes the USA,
Canada, and Mexico (81).
Free Trade Agreements (FTAs) or Preferential Trade Tgreements (PTAs)
eliminate import tariffs as well as import quotas between signatory countries. These
agreements can be limited to a few sectors or can encompass all aspects of
international trade. FTAs can also include formal mechanisms to resolve trade
disputes. The North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) is an example of such
an arrangement (82).
Removal of tariff barriers between members, together with the acceptance of a
common or unified external tariff against non-members is involved in the Custom
Union. Single payment or duty is made by countries exporting to customs union. Goods
inside the union can move freely with no additional tariffs. Members shared tariff
revenues while a small share is retained by the country that the collects the duty.
Removing internal barriers to trade and requiring participating nations to harmonize their
external policy as well as building a free trade area are put up by customs union.
One major step towards economic integration is Common Market (CM). All
barriers to the mobility of people, capital and other resources within the area in question,
as well as eliminating non- tariff barriers to trade, such as the regulatory treatment of
40
The Contemporary World 2020
product standards are removed by CM aside from containing the provisions of a
customs union. The extension of free trade from just tangible goods, to include all
economic resources which means that all barriers are eliminated to allow the free
movement of goods, services, capital, and labor, including removal of tariffs and
reduced non-tariff barriers is the key feature of a common market.
The trading bloc that has both a common market between members, and a
common trade policy towards non-members, although members are free to pursue
independent macro-economic policies is termed Economic Union. It requires
coordinated monetary and fiscal policies as well as labor market, regional development,
transportation and industrial policies. In economic union the use of a common currency
and a unified monetary policy is considered. The best example of Economic union is the
European Union (EU).
As a key stage towards complete integration, the Economic and Monetary
Union (EMU) involves a single economic market, a common trade policy, a single
currency and a common monetary policy. It represents a major step in the integration of
EU economies. EMU involves the coordination of economic and fiscal policies, a
common monetary policy and a common currency, the euro. EMU is a means to provide
stability and for stronger, more sustainable and inclusive growth across the euro area
and the EU as a whole for the sake of improving the lives of EU citizens (83).
Complete Economic Integration is the final stage of economic integration in
which member states completely forego independence of both monetary and fiscal
policies. States that participate in complete economic integration have no control of
economic policy including economic trade rules. There is full monetary union where
regulations regarding labor and capital are shared between member states and this
includes a single currency. There is also a complete harmonization of fiscal policy which
includes shared regulation of tax and benefit rates (84). Involved in complete economic
integration are single economic market, a common trade policy, a single currency, a
common monetary policy, together with a single fiscal policy, including common tax and
benefit rates or the complete harmonization of all policies, rates, and economic trade
rules.
Political integration refers to the integration of components within political
systems; the integration of political systems with economic, social, and other human
systems; and the political processes by which social, economic, and political systems
become integrated (85). Creating common policy frame work that creates equal
conditions for the functions of the integrated parts of the economy is the aim of policy
integration. Political integration is mainly based on welfare increasing effects of
integrated policy making according to the Economics of European integration. It brings
economic benefits by leading the recovery of effectiveness in policy making.
41
The Contemporary World 2020
Theories of European Integration
Neo-functionalism
This theory focuses on the supranational institutions of the EU of which the main
driving forces of integration are interest group activity at the European and national
levels, political party activity, and the role of governments and supranational institutions.
The European integration is mostly seen as an upper class- driven process- driven by
national and international political and economic upper crusts.
It is a theory of regional integration, building on the work of Ernst B. Haas, an
American political scientist and Leon Lindberg, also an American political scientist. Jean
Monnet's approach to European integration, which aimed at integrating individual
sectors in hopes of achieving spill-over effects. The core of neo-functionalism is the use
of the concept ‘spill –over’, situations when an initial decision by governments to place a
certain sector under the authority of central institutions creates pressures to extend the
authority of the institutions into neighboring areas of policy, such as currency exchange
rates, taxation, and wages. This core claim meant that European integration is selfsustaining: ‘spill-over’ triggers the economic and political dynamics driving further
cooperation (86).
Intergovernmentalism
This theory provides a conceptual explanation of the European integration
process. The main concept of the Intergovernmentalism is emphasizing on the role of
national states in the European integration; in another words it argues that "European
integration is driven by the interest and actions of nation states" (87). This theory was
suggested by Stanley Hoffmann.The theory proposed the Logic of Diversity, which 'set
limits to the degree which the ‘spill-over’ process can limit the freedom of action of the
governments...the logic of diversity implies that on vital issues, losses are not
compensated by gains on other issues' (88).
Liberal Intergovernmentalism
This a dominant political theory developed by Andrew Moravsik in 1993 to
explain European integration. Application of rational institutionalism to the field of
European integration is the aim of this theory. Moravcsik stated that 'state-society
relations--the relationship of state to the domestic and transnational social context in
which they are embedded--have a fundamental impact on state behavior in world
politics and that the 'universal condition of world politics is globalization.' It is the web of
globalized economic, social and political relationships that determines the living
conditions of individual citizens, corporations and civic groups and shapes what they
want and thus what their governments want” (89). Liberal intergovermentalists stated that
the bargaining power of member states is important in the pursuit of integration, and
package deals and side payments also occur in the process of making deals.
42
The Contemporary World 2020
New Institutionalism
This theory emphasized the importance of institutions in the process of European
integration. Its three key strands are: rational choice, sociological and historical.
Multi-level Governance (MLG)
This is a new theory of European integration. Writers Liesbet Hooghe and Gary
Marks defined MLG as dispersion of authority across multiple levels of political
governance. They stated that over the last fifty years, authority and sovereignty has
moved away from national governments in Europe, not just to the supranational level
with the EU, but also to subnational levels such as regional assemblies and local
authorities (90)
Transnational Activism in States
Transnational activism can be defined as the mobilization of collective claims
by actors located in more than one country and/or addressing more than one national
government and/or international governmental organization or another international
actor (91). It is a social movements and other society organizations and individuals
operating across state borders (92). It also refers to the the coordinated international
campaigns on the part of networks of activists against international actors, other states,
or international institutions (93).
A social movement is a type of group action. It refers to the organizational
structures and strategies that may empower oppressed populations to mount effective
challenges and resist the more powerful and advantaged elites". They are large,
sometimes informal, groupings of individuals or organizations which focus on
specific political or social issues. They carry out, resist, or undo a social change. They
provide a way of social change from the bottom within nations (94). A social movement
is a collective challenges to elites, authorities, other groups or cultural codes by people
with common purposes and solidarity in sustained interactions with elites, opponents
and authorities (95).
The global justice movement describes the loose collection of individuals and
groups often referred to as a “movement of movements”, who advocate fair trade rules
and are negative to current institutions of global economics such as the World Trade
Organization (91). The movement is often labeled the anti-globalization movement by the
mainstream media. Those involved, frequently deny that they are anti-globalization,
insisting that they support the globalization of communication and people and oppose
only the global expansion of corporate power (96). Anti- capitalist and universalist
perspective on globalization in also indicated in the term differentiating the movement
from those whose politics are based on a defense of conservative on national
sovereignty as they identified opponents of globalization.
43
The Contemporary World 2020
The new transnational activism is as multifaceted as the internationalism.
Although globalization and global neo-liberalism are frames around which many
activists mobilize, the protests and organizations are not the product of a global
imaginary but of domestically rooted activists who are the connective tissue of the
global and the local, working as activators, brokers and advocates for claims both
domestic and international (97).
Social Media and the State
Social media is a computer-based technology that facilitates the sharing of ideas
and information and the building of virtual networks and communities. By design, social
media is internet based and offers users easy electronic communication of personal
information and other content, such as videos and photos. Users engage with social
media via computer, tablet or smartphone via web-based software or web application,
often utilizing it for messaging (98). It “empowers” individuals to have a voice (99).
Many social movements have increasingly seen social media as a means to
collaboratively crowdsource with diverse stakeholders (100). In large organizations, social
media are often supported because the technology can help foster the sense of a
“digital village” (101) where individuals are able to “see” the lives of others within their
organization and feel closer to them (102). Social media are used commercially as a key
mode for product exposure and messaging (103). Landscape of organizational
communication within social movements is shaped and often fundamentally influenced
by social media. Rippling effects which touch many different aspects of the movements
process from resource mobilization to actual interventions is often created by social
media. Social movements can and do draw from accumulated knowledge gleaned from
previous movements and activities. Social media have changed the ways in which this
knowledge is being recorded and passed on (104).
New forms of digital media are accompanied by globalization in bringing to light
the possibilities for merging new kinds of communities via networks and creating new
arenas for political interaction, identity and belonging. The concept of network society
affirms that citizens and civil society organizations can increasingly use networks to gain
power relative states by generating alternative discourses that have the potential to
overwhelm the disciplinary discursive capacity of the state as a necessary step to
neutralizing its use of violence (105). It is believed that states are making pragmatic
transformation by adapting to fit in among decisive global networks in finance, education,
science, technology, arts, culture and sports. New Media opens up potential for citizens
to gain leverage. It is the only power of global civil society acting on the public mind via
the media and communication networks that may eventually overcome the historical
inertia of nation states (106).
44
The Contemporary World 2020
References:
The Global Interstate System
66. Weber, M. (1997). The Theory of Social and Economic Organization. New York: Free Press.
67. Bull, H. (1995). The Anarchichal Society: A Study of Order and World Politics. 2nd Edition, New York:
Columbia University Press.
68. (a,b,c,d,e) Anderson, B. (1991). Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origin and Spread of
Nationalism. London: Verso.
69. Joppke, C. (1998). Immigration Challenges the nation-state In: Joppke, C. (ed.) Challenge to the
Nation-State Immigration in Western Europe and The United States. Oxford University Press.
70. (a,b)Friedman, T. (2000). The Lexus and the Olive Tree. 2nd edn, New York: Farrar, Straus and
Giroux
71. Beder,
Sharon. (2017). Golden Straitjacket. Retrieved from: http:// www.
herinst. Org/
BusinessManagedDemocracy/government/international/straitjacket.html.
72. Harvey, David (2005). A Brief History of Neoliberalism. Oxford University Press, 2005.
73. Lse.co.uk Website. Economic Sovereignty Definition. Retrieved from: http:// www. lse. co. uk/finance
glossary. Asp? Search Term==economic & iArticleID=2196 &definition= economic -sovereignty
74.(a, b) Quiggin, John. (2001). Symposium in Globalization, Globalization and Economic Sovereignty.
The Journal of Political Philosophy: Vol 9, Number1
75.
Pang,
Zhongying.
(2005).
Globalization
vs
Economic
Sovereignty.
Retrieved
From:
https://yaleglobal.yale.edu/ content/globalization-vs-economic-sovereignty
76. European Integration. Retrieved from: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/European_integration
77. https://www.britannica.com/topic/European-Union
78. Fiess, Norbert and Fugazza, Marco. (2002). European Integration: A Review of the Literature and
Lessons
for
NAFTA.
Retrieved
from:
http://web.worldbank.org/archive/website00955A/WEB/PDF/FIESS_FU.PDF
79. Economic Integration Retrieved from https:// www. Investopedia. Com/ terms/ e/economic integration.
Asp#ixzz5LmqfRI9Q
80.Economicsonline.co.uk
Website.2018.
http://www.economicsonline.
co.uk/Global_
economics/
Economic_integration.html
45
The Contemporary World 2020
81. Holden, M. (2003). Stages of Economic Integration: From Autarky to Economic Union Retrieved from:
http://publications.gc.ca/Collection-R/LoPBdP/inbrief/prb0249- e.htm#customs
82.Ec.europa.eu
Website.
Economic
and
Monetary
Union
(EMU).Retrieved
from:
https://ec.europa.eu/info/business-economy-euro/economic-and-fiscal-policycoordination/economic-and-monetary-union_en
83. Coursehero.com Website. Complete Economic Integration. 2018. https://www. coursehero. com/file/
18689383/Complete-Economic-Integration-Factsheet/
84. Teune, Henry. Political Integration. International Encyclopedia of Political Science. Retrieved from:
http: // sk. Sagepub.com/ referenmce/ intlpoliticalscience/ n454.xml
85.
Neo-Functionalism
Explains
the
Integration
ofthe
European
Union.
Retrieved
from:
https://idebate.org/.../economy-economic-policy-economy-general-international-euro.
86. Hix, S. 1999. “The Political System of the European Union”, Houndmills: Macmillan Press
87. Hoffmann, S. ‘Obstinate or Obsolete? The fate of the nation-state and the case of Western Europe’,
Daedalus, Vol. 95, No.3, pp.862-915.
88. Slaughter, Anne-Marie. (2017). The Chessboard and the Web. Startegies of Connection in a
Networked World
89. Differences between Economic and Political Integration Politics Essay. (2013). Retrieved from
https://www.ukessays.com/essays/politics/differences-between-economic-and-politicalintegration-politics-essay.php?vref=1
90.Della Porta. (2018). Activism, Transnational. Encyclopedia of Gobal Studies. Retrieved from
http://sk.sagepub.com/reference/globalstudies/n7.xml
91. Piper, Nicola and Anders Uhlin, eds. (2004). Transnational Activism in Asia: Problems of Power and
Democracy. London: Routledge.
92. Della Porta, Donatella and Sidney Tarrow. 2005. “Introduction: Transnational Processes and Social
Activism. An Introduction in Transnational Protest and Global Activism. eds. Donatella Della
Porta and Sidney Tarrow. Lanham: Rowman & Littlefield: 1-17.
93. Deric., Shannon, (2011-01-01). Political sociology : oppression, resistance, and the state. Pine Forge
Press. p. 150. ISBN 9781412980401. OCLC 746832550.
94. Sidney Tarrow (1994). Power in Movement: Collective Action, Social Movements and Politics.
Cambridge University Press, 1994. ISBN 0-521-42271-X
95. Tom Mertes (2004). "A Movement of Movements", New York: Verso, 2004
46
The Contemporary World 2020
96.
Della Porta, D. (2005). “The Social Bases of the Global Justice Movement: Some Theoretical
Reflections and Empirical Evidence from the First European Social Forum.” Civil Society and
Social Movements Programme Paper No. 21.Geneva: UNRISD (United Nations Research
Institute for Social Development).
97. Tarrow S. (2005). The New Transnational Activism. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
98. Social Media https://www.investopedia.com/terms/s/social-media.asp#ixzz5OES5Phv0
99. Murthy, D. (2016). Urban social media demographics: An exploration of Twitter use in major American
cities. Journal of Computer-Mediated Communication, 21, 33–49.
100. Lovejoy, K., & Saxton, G. D. (2012). Information, community, and action: How nonprofit
organizations use social media. Journal of Computer-Mediated Communication, 17, 337–353.
101. Berghel, H. (1995). Maiden voyage. Communications of the ACM, 38, 25–27.
102. Brzozowski, M. J., Sandholm, T., & Hogg, T. (2009, May 10–13). Effects of feedback and peer
pressure on contributions to enterprise social media. Paper presented at the proceedings of the
ACM 2009 international conference on supporting group work, Sanibel Island, FL.
103. Kaplan, A. M., & Haenlein, M. (2010). Users of the world, unite! The challenges and opportunities of
social media. Business Horizons, 53, 59–68. doi:10.1016/j.bushor.2009.09.003
104. Introduction to Social Media, Activism, and Organizations Dhiraj Murthy Retrieved from:
http://journals.sagepub.com/doi/pdf/10.1177/2056305117750716
105. Castells, M. (2000) The Rise of the Network Society (The Information Age: Economy, Society and
Culture, Volume 1). New York: Wiley – Blackwell.
106. Castells, M. (2009) Communication Power. Oxford: Oxford University Press
47
The Contemporary World 2020
UNIT II THE STRUCTURES OF GLOBALIZATION
Coverage: Week 3, 4, and 5
Duration:9 hours
The Global Economy (2.25 hours; week 3)
Market Integration (2.25 hours; week 3 and 4)
The Global Interstate System (2.25 hours; week 4 and 5)
Contemporary Global Governance (2.25 hours; week 5)
Learning Objectives: After studying the unit, the students should be able to:




define economic globalization
explain the two major driving forces of global economy
differentiate economic globalization from internationalization
trace the origin of economic globalization
1.The Global Economy
2. Market Integration
3.The Global Interstate System
4. Contemporary Global Governance
The Contemporary Global Governance
Global governance or world governance is a product of neo-liberal paradigm
shifts in international political and economic relations (107). It is a movement towards
political integration of transnational actors aimed at negotiating responses to problems
that affect more than one state or region. It tends to involve institutionalization. These
institutions of global governance – the United Nations, the International Criminal Court,
the World Bank, etc. – tend to have limited or demarcated power to enforce compliance
(108)
.
Global governance is a tool to identify solutions to problems created by neoliberal globalization. Its concept relates to the interaction of myriad collective or
individual entities emanating from various societal and professional orientations,
48
The Contemporary World 2020
which form networks that engage to address issues that threaten local and global
communities. It is concerned with issues that have become too complex for a single
state to address alone. Humanitarian crises, military conflicts between and within
states, climate change and economic volatility pose serious threats to human security
in all societies; therefore, a variety of actors and expertise is necessary to properly
frame threats, devise pertinent policy, implement effectively and evaluate results
accurately to alleviate such threats (109).
Global governance can be thus understood as the sum of laws, norms, policies,
and institutions that define, constitute, and mediate trans-border relations between
states, cultures, citizens, intergovernmental and nongovernmental organizations, and
the market. It embraces the totality of institutions, policies, rules practices, norms,
procedures, and initiatives by which states and citizens try to bring more predictability,
stability, and order to their responses to transnational challenges-such as climate
change and environmental degradation, nuclear proliferation, and terrorism which go
beyond the capacity of a single state to solve (110).
Global governance is viewed as the sum of governance processes operating in
the absence of world government. Both the international organizations (lOs) and the
United Nations (UN) being the only universal membership and general-purpose
international organization, are essential to the understanding of contemporary global
governance (111). The two types of International Organizations are those with universal
membership and those with limited membership. Examples of IOs with universal
membership include: UN, Bretton Woods institutions and World Trade Organization
(WTO). Limited membership includes European Union (EU) and the North Atlantic
Treaty Organization (NATO).
The Roles and Functions of the United Nations
As an intergovernmental organization, the United Nation is tasked to promote
international co-operation and to create and maintain international order. It is the largest,
most familiar, most internationally represented and most powerful intergovernmental
organization in the world (112).
The United Nations (UN) in the world of politics has the roles of preventing and
managing conflicts, regulating armaments, championing human rights and international
humanitarian law, liberating the colonized, providing economic and technical aid in
newly liberated countries, organizing elections, empowering women, educating children,
feeding the hungry, sheltering the disposed and displaced, housing the refugees,
tending the sick and coordinating disaster relief and assistance. In policy motivation,
peacekeeping is the most important feature of UN activity in peace and security.
The UN aims to save succeeding generations from the scourge of war; to
reaffirm faith in fundamental human rights; to establish conditions under which justice
and respect for the obligations arising from treaties and other sources of international
law can be maintained; and to promote social progress and better standards of life in
larger freedom (113).
49
The Contemporary World 2020
Four Main Purposes of the UN Charter (114)- a written grant by a country's
legislative or sovereign power, by which an institution such as a company, college, or
city is created and its rights and privileges defined.
1. Maintaining worldwide peace and security
2. Developing relations among nations
3. Fostering cooperation between nations in order to solve economic, social,
cultural, or humanitarian international problems
4. Providing a forum for bringing countries together to meet the UN's purposes and
goals
There were five stages or main gaps meet by UN in the 21st century. These are
knowledge, norms, policy, institutions and compliance. A critical hole in any of the five
stages can cause efforts at problem solving to collapse.
Challenges of Global Governance in the Twenty-first Century
Global governance can be understood as the sum of laws, norms, policies, and
institutions that define, constitute, and mediate trans-border relations between states,
cultures, citizens, intergovernmental and nongovernmental organizations, and the
market. It is a process which allows interconnectivity across different borders and
sovereign territories. Global governance is governing, without sovereign authority,
relationships that transcend national frontiers. Global governance has evolved as one of
the most influencing tools for globalization which has led to the foundation of
sustainable development projects around the globe. (115).
Issues that involve interwoven domestic and foreign challenges include threats at
the beginning of the century which include ethnic conflicts, infectious diseases, and
terrorism as well as a new generation of global challenges including climate change,
energy security, food and water scarcity, international migration flows and new
technologies. The multiple links among climate change and resources issues, the
economic crisis, and state fragility – ‘hubs’ of risks for the future – illustrate the
interconnected nature of the challenges on the international agenda today. Domestic
politics creates tight constraints on international cooperation and reduces the scope for
compromise. Diverse perspectives on and suspicions about global governance, which is
seen as a Western concept, add to the difficulties of effectively mastering the growing
number of challenges (116).
The new governance challenges in the 21st century being related to globalization
entail multiple trajectories of change within states, among actors inside and outside
nation states, as well as new forms of resource mobilization and risk allocation. Within
states the first trajectory or path is the depoliticization which can be observed in the
form of delegating decisions to independent regulators and experts, central banks, or
judiciaries. A second trajectory is the rescaling of economic and social relations well
beyond the territorial boundaries of nation states, facilitated by transnational legal
50
The Contemporary World 2020
arrangements that have their roots in national law. Law is also a critical ingredient for
transforming real assets into commodities and ultimately financial assets, that is, the
third path which is the capitalization of assets (117). Different effects are expected on
different constituencies within and across domestic polities (an organized society; a
state as a political entity). Direct participation or inclusion in these processes are
benefitted by some though others face exclusion. Considered important for effective
governance include recognition of these paths or trajectories and their potentially
destabilizing effects for polities.
The Role of the Nation -State in Globalization
Basic Elements of a State
1. Territory
2. People
3. Sovereign Power
Nation- state role in globalization is complex. Since nation-states are divided by
physical and economic boundaries, reduced barriers in international commerce and
communication are considered their potential threat. Sovereignty of individual nations is
not abolished by expanded trade among countries, instead globalization is a force that
changed the way nation-states deal with one another, particularly in the area of
international commerce (118a).
Globalization has potential effects to globalization. These include favoring
Westernization which means that other nation-states are at a disadvantage when
dealing with the Americas and Europe, most especially in the agricultural industry, in
which second- and third-world nations face competition from Western companies (118b)
and another is that nation-states are forced to examine their economic policies in light
of the many challenges and opportunities that multinational corporations and other
entities of international commerce present.
Nation-states are challenged by multinational corporations to address the issue
of foreign direct investments to force nation-states to ascertain the allowable
international influence in their economies. A sense of interdependence is created by
globalization among nations to create among nations of differing economic strengths an
imbalance of power.
The role of the nation-state in a global world is largely a regulatory one as the
chief factor in global interdependence (118c). In setting international commerce policies,
isolated states are forced to engage to one another, while nation-state’s domestic role is
51
The Contemporary World 2020
unchanged. Roles of some states were diminished while others have exalted roles due
to interactions of various economic imbalances.
Globalization’s Impact on the State
Factors which lead to the increase and acceleration of movement of people,
information, commodities and capital.
1. Lifting of trade barriers
2. Liberalization of world capital markets
3. Swift technological progress (information technology, transportation and
communication)
Problems afflicting the world today which are increasingly transnational in naturethose that cannot be solved at the national level or State to State negotiations.
1.
2.
3.
4.
Poverty
Environmental pollution
Economic crisis
Organized crime and terrorism
Effects of greater economic and social interdependence to national decisionmaking processes.
1. It calls for a transfer of decisions to the international level
2. It requires many decisions to be transferred to local levels of government due
to an increase in the demand for participation.
Decision making processes in globalization is complex as it takes place in
various levels such as sub-national, national, and global which lead to the growth of a
multi-layered system of governance. The following are guaranteed by nation-State:
internal and external security, law established, national welfare systems funding,
structures provided for popular representation, public accountability instituted, and
framework for economic and social activities built.
In a world of expanded globalization, the need to supply collective public goods,
to manage externalities and to provide for minority needs persist (119). The State persists
because its need grows and because of its undiminished local resource pools and
socioeconomic problems on which States are based. The State remains the key actor in
the domestic as well as international arenas and that States which are effective are
essential for both tasks, and their capacity for both needs strengthening (120).
52
The Contemporary World 2020
The following can be guaranteed only by the States through independent courts:
1. Respect of human rights and justice
2. Promote the national welfare
3. Protect the general interest
The State has the roles in operating the intricate web of multi-lateral
arrangements and inter-governmental regimes, enter into agreements with other States,
make policies which shape national and global activities, agenda of integration by
clearly pronouncing the problem of capacity inadequacy of individual States.This
indicates political leverage of some States in shaping the international agenda while
developing countries have less active roles.
Though State is required by globalization to imrove its capacity to deal with
greater openness, it must remain central to the well-being of its citizens and to the
proper management of social and economic development. It should also be responsible
for adopting policies, which are conducive to greater economic integration not forgetting
that further global integration can be reversed by state policies inimical to openness, as
occurred between the two World Wars which means that globalization does not reduce
the role of the nation-State, but redefines it given the pressures and responses it must
give at the local, national and international levels (121).
53
The Contemporary World 2020
References:
Contemporary Global Governance
107.Jang,
Jinseop,
governance:
McSparren
Jason
present
& Rashchupkina.(2016). Nature.com
and
future.
2016
Website.
Retrieved
Global
from:
https://www.nature.com/articles/palcomms201545
108. Global Governance: The Strategy of Governance, Social welfare, and Exclusion? Retrieved from:
https://socialecologies.
word press. com/
2015/07/31/ global-governance-the-strategy-of-
governance-social-welfare-and-exclusion/ July 31, 2015
109. Bierman F. and Pattberg P. (2008) Global environmental governance: Taking stock, moving. Annual
Review of Environment and Resources.
110. Weiss, Thomas G. (2009) What happened to the Idea of World Government? International Studies
Quarterly 53(2):253-271
111. Weiss T.G., Kamran A.Z. (2009) Global Governance as International Organization. In: Whitman
J. (eds) Palgrave Advances in Global Governance. Palgrave Advances. Palgrave Macmillan,
London
112. Fomerand, J., Lynch, C.M., and Mingst, K. (2018). https://www.britannica.com/topic/United-Nations
103. Enotes.com Website (2018). What is the Function of the United Nation. Retrieved from:
https://www.enotes.com/homework-help/what-function-un-who-ruler-349667
114. Stephenson, Andrea. (2018). What is the United Nations? -Definition, History, Members & Purpose.
Retrieved from: https://study.com/academy/lesson/what-is-the-united-nations-definition-historymembers-purpose.html
115. Kumar, Kundan Jha. (2018). Global Governance in the 21st Century. Retrieved from:
http://english.lokaantar.com/articles/global-governance-21st-century/
116. Pramod, Mishra. (2013). Emerging Challenges to Global Governance in 21st Century. Academic
Journal of Interdisciplinary Studies. MCSER Publishing, Rome-Italy Vol 2 No 8.
117. Pistor, Katharina and Adaman Fikret. (2014).Governance Challenges in the 21st Century. Retrieved
from: https://globalcenters.columbia.edu/events/governance-challenges-21st-century
118 (a, b, c). Hall, Mary (2018). What is the Role of the nation-state in globalization. Retrieved from:
https://www. investopedia. com /ask/answer/022415/
54
The Contemporary World 2020
119. Jones, Barry R.J. (2000) The World turned upside down? Globalization and the future of the state,
p.268, St. Martin’s Press, New York.
120. United Nations (2000). Millennium Report of the Secretary-General. “We, the Peoples: The Role of
the United Nations in the 21st Century" A/54/2000. 25
121. Bertucci, G. And Alberti, A. Globalization and the Role of the State: Challenges and Perspectives.
Retrieved from: https: // pdfs. semantic scholar. org/9edd/ 97224 bb298453e6 ff5 c08afc 56dd9
e6064e. pdf.
55
The Contemporary World 2020
UNIT II THE STRUCTURES OF GLOBALIZATION
Unit Test:
D. Identification. Answer the following item by supplying the correct answer on
the blank.
Foreign Direct Investment
(FDI)
General Agreement on Trade
in Services (GATS)
Global governance
Complete Economic
Integration
Market integration
Economic integration
Transnational activism
Neoliberalism
Economic Union
United Nation
Global corporation
Economic sovereignty
Social media
Financial Market Integration
Neo-functionalism
__________1. It is a major driver of extended global corporate development.
__________2.This is the power of national governments to make decisions
independently of those made by other governments
__________3. This is a product of neo-liberal paradigm shifts in international political
and economic relations. It is a movement towards political integration of
transnational actors aimed at negotiating responses to problems that
affect more than one state or region.
__________4. This is a computer-based technology that facilitates the sharing of ideas
and information and the building of virtual networks and communities.
__________5. This provides a framework of rules governing services trade, establishes
a mechanism for countries to make commitments to liberalize trade in
services and provides a mechanism for resolving disputes between
countries.
__________6. It is an arrangement between different regions that often includes the
reduction or elimination of trade barriers, and the coordination of
monetary and fiscal policies.
__________7. It is an open market economy between countries facilitated by a common
currency and the elimination of technical, regulatory and tax differences
to encourage free flow of capital and investment across borders.
56
The Contemporary World 2020
__________8. This can be defined as the mobilization of collective claims by actors
located in more than one country and/or addressing more than one
national government and/or international governmental organization or
another international actor.
__________9. This is a business that operates in two or more countries.
__________10. This exists when there are exerted effects that prompt similar changes
or shifts in other markets that focus on related goods on events occurring
within two or more markets.
__________11. This is the final stage of economic integration in which member states
completely forego independence of both monetary and fiscal policies.
__________12. This focuses on the supranational institutions of the European Union of
which the main driving forces of integration are interest group activity at
the European and national levels, political party activity, and the role of
governments and supranational institutions.
__________13. This is the intensification of the influence and dominance of capital. It is
the elevation of capitalism as a mode of production into an ethic, a set of
political imperatives, and a cultural logic.
__________14. This is tasked to promote international co-operation and to create and
maintain international order. It is the largest, most familiar, most
internationally represented and most powerful intergovernmental
organization in the world.
__________15. It requires coordinated monetary and fiscal policies as well as labor
market, regional development, transportation and industrial policies.
E. True or False. Identify whether the statement is correct or not. Write True if it is
correct, False if not. Underline the what makes the statement incorrect, then
provide the corrections. (2 points each)
__________1. There are two things that will happen if a country is in Golden Straitjacket:
the politics grows and the economy shrinks.
__________2. Foreign direct investment is made open to economies; frequently
involves more than just a capital investment and includes provision of
management or technology as well.
57
The Contemporary World 2020
__________3. In a globalized world economy, governments are independently deciding
on case of adopting neoliberal economic policies of privatization,
deregulations, and reductions in public expenditures.
__________4. When government implement certain strategy to control the direction of
economy then integration is intentional while shifting in supply and
demand that has a spillover effect on several markets is another factor of
market integration.
__________5. Westphalian Sovereignty refers to the capacity of a state to choose and
implement policies within the territory.
__________6. The increase of the number of international organizations and the
expansion of their functions helps enable an individual country's
sovereignty to certain extent.
__________7. Combination of invention and social organization resulting to increase in
worldwide capital and wealth of nation is allowed by modern nation state
system that emerged in the period prior to the end of World War II.
__________8. Augmenting costs for both consumers and producers and reducing trade
between the countries involved in the agreement are the aims of
economic integration.
__________9. Free Trade Areas (FTAs) are created when two or more countries in a
region agree to strictly implement restriction barriers to trade on all goods
coming from other members.
__________10. Creating unique policy frame work that creates strict individual state
conditions for the functions of the integrated parts of the economy is the
aim of policy integration.
__________11. The global justice movement describes the strengthened collection of
individuals and groups often referred to as a “movement of movements”,
who advocate fair trade rules and are positively in agreement to current
institutions of global economics such as the World Trade Organization.
__________12. Getting smarter on valuing investment opportunities Chief Financial
Officers can add value.
__________13. Landscape of organizational communication within social movements is
secured and independent to the influences of the social media.
__________14. To prevent stance on politics, peacekeeping is kept to be the least
important feature of UN activity in peace and security.
58
The Contemporary World 2020
__________15. The belief that globalization imposes a forced choice upon states either
to conform to free market principles or run the risk of being left behind is
termed into a phrase called “Golden Straitjacket”.
F. Essay. Answer the following questions. (5 points each)
1. Explain the difference between Economic Globalization from Internationalization, and
does a country/state exercise and play the advantage of both.
2. How could a country like the Philippines benefit in the concept of globalization
specifically in the aspect of market integration?
3. How do social media function in a globalized state?Cite specific examples.
4. What are the challenges of Global Governance in the Twenty-first Century?
59
The Contemporary World 2020
UNIT III THE WORLD OF REGIONS
Coverage: Weeks 6, 7 and 8
Duration: 9 hours
Global Divides: The North and the South (4.5 hours; week 6 and 7)
Asian Regionalism (4.5 hours; week 7 and 8)
Learning Objectives: After studying the unit, the students should be able to:




define the term Global South
differentiate the Global South from the Third World
Differentiate regionalization from globalization
Identify the factors leading to a greater integration of the Asian Region
1. Global Divides: The North and the South (focus: Latin America)
2. Asian Regionalism
Global Divides: The North and the South (focus: Latin America)
Global South refers to the regions of Latin America, Asia, Africa, and Oceania
mostly low- income and often politically or culturally marginalized. It may also be called
the "developing World" such as Africa, Latin America, and the developing countries in
Asia, "developing countries," "less developed countries," and "less developed regions”
(122)
including poorer "southern" regions of wealthy "northern" countries (123).
In general, Global South refers to these countries' "interconnected histories
of colonialism, neo-imperialism, and differential economic and social change through
which large inequalities in living standards, life expectancy, and access to resources are
maintained (124). Contemporary critics of neo-liberal globalization use the global south as
a banner to rally countries victimized by the violent economic cures of institutions like
the International Monetary Fund.
60
The Contemporary World 2020
Three Primary Concepts of Global South
1. It refers to economically disadvantaged nation-states and as a post-cold war
alternative to “Third World”.
Third World" is a phrase frequently used to describe a developing nation. The
phrase "Third World" arose during the Cold War to identify countries whose views did
not align with NATO and capitalism or the Soviet Union and communism. The First
World described countries whose views aligned with NATO and capitalism, and the
Second World referred to countries that supported communism and the Soviet Union
(125a)
.
Third World countries are largely characterized as poor and underdeveloped. In
these countries, low levels of education, poor infrastructure, improper sanitation and
poor access to health care mean living conditions are seen as inferior to those in the
world's more developed nations. As a result, the terms Third World country and
developing nation have become increasingly interchangeable in recent decades (126b).
2. The Global South captures a deterritorialized geography of capitalism’s externalities
and means to account for subjugated peoples within the borders of wealthier
countries, such that there are economic Souths in the geographic North and Norths
in the geographic South.
3. It refers to the resistant imaginary of a transnational political subject that results
from a shared experience of subjugation under contemporary global capitalism.
The global South is not a directional designation or a point due south from a fixed
north. It is a symbolic designation meant to capture the semblance of cohesion that
emerged when former colonial entities engaged in political projects of decolonization
and moved toward the realization of a post- colonial international order (126).
The process of globalization places into question geographically bound
conceptions of poverty and inequality. The increase and intensification of global flows
spread both poverty and affluence. Spaces of underdevelopment in developed countries
may mirror the poverty of the global south, and spaces of affluence mirror those of the
global north (127).
The strongest vehicle for social redistribution and the main mechanism for social
transfer is the state. The redistributative function of the state becomes crucial in the
context of economic globalization where the goal of neo-liberal economists and
institutions is precisely to dismantle local state oversight (128).
61
The Contemporary World 2020
The development of the global south must begin by drawing most of the country’s
financial resources for development from within rather than becoming dependent on
foreign investments and foreign financial markets (129).
The global south is not relevant for those who live in countries traditionally
associated with it but also signifies that the south continues to be globalized. It also
represents emergent forms of progressive cosmopolitanism. It is an always emergent
and provisional internationalism.
New Internationalism in the Global South
The ills of the global south are being globalized. Underdeveloped states of the
global south are ravaged by merciless IMF policies in the 1980’s. The economic
prescriptions of the IMF as cures are recommended for countries in the global south.
Other countries like Greece realize the similarity of problems in the global south that
inspirations were drawn from poorer nations. The global south has provided model of
resistance for the world like Gandhi’s non-violence that initially directed at colonial
authority in India is now part of global protest culture, as well as benefits of critiques of
international financial institutions from the experiences and writings of intellectuals and
activists from the global south.
A similar globalization of the south’s concern is arising from the issue about
global environment. Amidst the existential threat of climate change the most radical
notions of climate justice are being articulated in the global south. As global problems
increase, it is necessary for people in the north to support people from the south.
As a symbol and metaphor, global south is not only relevant for those who live in
countries traditionally associated with it. The global in global south does not only mean
that the south is the globe but also signifies that the south continues to be globalized.
The global south while embedded in specific geographic imaginaries, represents
emergent forms of progressive cosmopolitanism. It is always emergent and provisional
internationalism.
62
The Contemporary World 2020
Asian Regionalism
Regionalism refers to the decentralization of political powers or competencies
from a higher towards a lower political level. More specifically, it distinguishes between
top-down from bottom up regionalism where top - down regionalism describes the
decentralization of competencies or the establishment of regional institutions by the
state while bottom -up includes all patterns of endeavors toward political
decentralization from within the particular region (130).
Globalization is the intensification of economic, political, social, and cultural
relations across borders and a consciousness of that intensification, with a concomitant
diminution in the significance of territorial boundaries (131).
Views of Globalization in the Asia Pacific and South Asia
Globalization is an external phenomenon being pushed into the region by world
powers particularly the United States and Europe. From this perspective, globalization
can be understood as a process that transforms the Asia Pacific and South Asia. It is a
force for good bringing economic development, political progress, and social and
cultural diversity to the region.
The Asia Pacific and South Asia refer together to the regions of East (or
Northeast) Asia, South Asia, the Pacific Islands, and South Asia. It includes some of the
world’s most economically developed states such as Japan, South Korea, Singapore,
and Taiwan, and highly impoverished countries such as Cambodia, Laos, and Nepal. It
also includes the largest and most populous states on the globe including China and
India and some of the world’s smallest such as the Maldives and Bhutan (132).
The Asia and South Pacific has emerged over the past decade as a new political
force in the world. The economies of Japan, Korea, Indonesia, Vietnam and Pakistan
have strategic relevance in today’s global system. They are the focused of global
powers outside of the region. A foreign policy shift called “Pacific Pivot” was
implemented by the United States to commit more resources and attention to the region.
This shift which is also called “Atlantic Century” was termed “Pacific Century” by US
Secretary of States Hilary Clinton. He stated that the Asia Pacific has become a key
driver of global politics. It is the home to several key allies and important emerging
powers like China, India, and Indonesia.
Globalization in the Asia Pacific and South Asia is an external phenomenon
being pushed into the region by world powers like US and Europe. Globalization in this
context is a process that transforms the Asia Pacific and South Asia. It can be viewed
as a force for good, bringing economic development, political progress, and social and
cultural diversity.
63
The Contemporary World 2020
Asia Pacific and South Asia’s Impact on Globalization
Asia was the central global force in the early modern world economy. It was the
site of the most important trade routes and in some places more advanced in
technology than West such as science and medicine. Colonies in the Asia pacific and
South Asia influenced the West and vice versa. They were often “laboratories of
modernity” (133). Colonialism was not simply a practice of Western Domination but a
product of what one thinks of as Western and modern.
1. Japan embarked on procuring raw materials like coal and iron at unprecedented
economies of scale allowing them to gain a competitive edge in the global manufacturing market
as well as globalized shipping and procurement patterns which other countries modeled (134).
2. China pursues similar pattern of development at present and is now the world’s largest
importers of basic raw materials such as iron and surpassed Japan, the US and Europe in steel
production. It also surpassed the World bank in lending to developing countries. It had an
enormous impact on the availability and consumption of goods around the world (135). This simple
scale of China’s development is shaping and furthering globalization.
3. India opened -up and emphasized an export-oriented strategy. Textiles and other low
wage sectors have been a key part of the economy with highly successful software development
exports. It also plays a key role in global service provisions as trends in outsourcing and offshoring increase (136).
4. India and China have also become a major source of international migrant labor, which
is also one of the fundamental characteristics of the era of globalization. This includes the
migration of highly skilled labor into the high- tech industry based in Silicon Valley. India, China
and the Philippines were three of the top four recipient states of migrant remittances.
5. The trend of the rising regional free arrangements in the Asia Pacific and South Asia.
This kind of regionalism would mean as bulwark to globalization or as compatible and even
pushing forward the process of global economic integration. Regionalism can promote learning,
assuage domestic audiences to the benefits of free trade, and form the institutional framework to
scale up from regional cooperation o global cooperation (137). Regionalism can act as springboard
for globalization.
One distinguishing feature of regional institutions in Asia Pacific and South Asia is the
adoption of “Open Regionalism” which aims to develop and maintain cooperation with outside
actors. This is meant to resolve the tension between the rise of regional trade agreements and
the push for global trade as embodied by World Trade Organization (WTO) (138), the only global
international organization dealing with the rules of trade between nations (139).
“Open” refers to the principle of non-discrimination, more specifically an openness in
membership and openness in terms of economic flows (140). Open regionalism is embodied by
Asia Pacific Economic cooperation or APEC.
6. In culture and globalization in the region, the source of a wide variety of cultural
phenomena that have spread outward to the West and the rest of the world is the region.
Examples include “hello Kitty” created in Japan including Anime, Pokemon, Power Rangers
which become regional and global phenomenon; the regional and global rise of Korean popular
culture called ‘K-Wave” comprising of Korean dramas, music (K-pop) and the smash hit
“Gangnam Style” of Korean pop star PSY.
Asia Pacific and South Asia are on the receiving end of globalization. The region serves
as the source of many aspects of globalization process which can be seen in history, economy,
political structure and culture.
64
The Contemporary World 2020
The Region-Making in Southeast Asia and Middle-Class Formation:
The Third Wave
Regionalization entails complex and dynamic interactions between and among
governmental and nongovernmental actors which resulted to hybrid East Asia. The
main engines of hybridization are explained by the successive waves of regional
economic development that is powered by developmental states and national and
transnational capitalism that nurtured sizeable middle-classes that share a lot in
common in terms of professional lives and their lifestyles, in fashion, leisure, and
entertainment, in their aspirations and dreams. The middle-class occupies different
positions in their respective societies as well as in relation to their nation-states as they
constitute the expanding regional consumer market (141).
The product of regional economic development in the post war era are the middle
classes in east Asia. Regional economic development took place within the context of
the American informal empire in “Free Asia”, with the US-led regional security system
and the triangular trade system as its two major pillars. Furthermore, the national states
in the region promoted it actively under democratic or authoritarian developmentalist
regimes, both of which espoused the politics of productivity, a politics of that
transformed political issues into problems of output and sought to neutralize class
conflict in favor of a consensus on economic growth (142).
The first wave of regional economic development took place in japan from mid1950’s to the early 1970s and led to the emergence of a middle-class by the early
1970s. The second wave took place between the 1960s and 1980s in South Korea,
Taiwan, Hongkong and Singapore and led to the formation of middle -class societies in
these countries by the 1980s.
Two salient points in the history of east Asian middle-class formation.
1. Middle class formation in Southeast Asia was driven by global and regional
transnational capitalism working in alliance with national states while middle class in
Japan, South Korea, and Taiwan were created by developmental states and national
capitalism.
2. New urban middle classes in East Asia, whether in Japan, South Korea,
Taiwan, or Southeast Asia, with their middle-class jobs, education, and income, have in
turn created their own new lifestyles commensurate with their middle-class income and
status.
Middle Classes in The Philippines
New urban middle classes emerged in the post 1986 Philippines. They were
created through growth in retail trade, manufacture, banking, real estate development,
and an expanding range of specialist services such as accounting, advertising,
computing, and market research. Fostered by government policies of liberalization and
65
The Contemporary World 2020
deregulation, the development of these new enterprises has been oriented both toward
the export and domestic markets and has entailed increasingly diverse sources of
foreign investment and variable subcontracting, franchise, and service relationships,
with a noticeable expansion of ties connecting
the Philippines to other countries in
East and Southeast Asia.
Regional Implications of Middle -Class Formation in East Asia
Complex historical forces shaped new urban middle classes. They are product of
regional economic development, which has taken place in waves under the U.S.
informal empire over a half century, first in Japan, then in South Korea, Taiwan,
Hongkong, and Singapore, Thailand, Malaysia, Indonesia and Philippines, and now in
China. They are product as well for development states. Their lifestyles have been
shaped in very complex ways by their appropriation of things American, Japanese,
Chinese, South Korean, Islamic and other ways of life, often mediated by the market.
The political consequences of the rise of East Asia middle classes vary. The
cultural and political hegemony of the South Korean middle classes is embodied by
single generation, while that of the Taiwanese middle classes manifest itself in the
political assertiveness of an ethnic majority. Southeast Asian middle classes also
exemplify the diversity and complexity of class formation. Thai middle classes are
coherent socially, hegemonic culturally, and ascend politically; their counterparts in
Malaysia and Indonesia are socially divided, dependent on the state, politically assertive
and vulnerable; and the Philippine middle classes are socially coherent, less dependent
on the state, culturally ascendant, but politically vacillating.
66
The Contemporary World 2020
References:
Global Divides: The North and the South (focus: Latin America)
122. Mitlin, D., Satterthwaite, D. (2013). Urban Poverty in the Global South: Scale and nature. Routledge.
ISBN 9780415624664.
123. Braveboy-Wagner, J.A. (2003). The foreign Policies of the Global South: Rethinking Conceptual
Frameworks. Lynne Rienner Publishers.ISBN 9781588261755.
124. Dados, N. And Connell, R. 2012. The Global South. Contexts, Vol.11, No.1.ISSN 1536-5042.
American Sociological Association. Retrieved from: http:// contexts.sagepub. com DOI 10.1177/
15365042124 36479.
125.(a,b) Investopedia.com Website. Third World. Retrieved from: www. investopedia. com. / terms /thirdworld. Asp# ixzz5TbHF Kexe
126. Grovogui,S. (2011). A Revolution Nonetheless: The Global South in International Relations. The
Global South 591:175-190.
127. Claudio, Lisandro. Locating the Global South. The Sage Handbook of Globalization. Vol. I.
128. Hobsbawm, E.J. (1996). The Future of the state: development and Change. 27(2) : 267-268.
129. Bello, W.F. (2006). Deglobalization. Ideas for a New World Economy. Philippine edn. Quezon City;
Ateneo De manila University Press.
REFERENCES
Asian Regionalism
130. Michael Keating, (1995). "Europeanism and Regionalism", in Barry Jones and Michael Keating
(eds.), The European Union and the Regions. Oxford.
131. Bretherton, Charlotte. (1996). “Introduction: Global Politics in the 1990s” in Charlotte Bretherton and
Geoffrey Ponton, eds., Global Politics: An Introduction (Cambridge, MA: Blackwell), 1–19.
132. Kimura, E. Globalization and the Asia Pacific and South Asia. The Sage Handbook of Globalization.
Vol 1.
133. Stoler, Al (ed).(2006). Haunted
by Empire geographies of Intimacy in North American History,
Durham: Duke University Press Books.
134. Bunker, S.G. (2007). East Asia and the Global Economy: Japan’s Assent with Implications to
China’s Future. John Hopkin’s studies in Globalization. Baltimore. John Hopkin’s University
Press.
135. Nolan, P. 2004. Transforming China: Globalization, Transition and Development. London, Anthem
Press.
67
The Contemporary World 2020
136. Dossani and Kenny. (2007). The Next wave of Globalization: Relocating Service Provision to India
World Development.
137. Lee, J.W. and Park, I. (2005). Free Trade Areas in East Asia: Discriminatory or Non-Discriminatory?
The World Economy.
138. Bergsten, C.F. 1997. Open Regionalism. The World Economy.
139.What
is the WTO? Retrieved from:
https:// www.wto. org/english / the wto_e/
what is_e/
whatis_e.htm
140. Sutton, M. (2007). Open Regionalism and the Asia Pacific: Implications for the Rise of the East
Asian Economic Community. Ritsumeikan International Affairs.
141. Shiraishi, Takashi, (2006). “The Third Wave: Southeast Asia and the Middle-Class Formation in the
Making of a Region. Ed. Peter Katzenstein and Takashi Shiraishi. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University
Press.
142. Maier, C. S. (1978). The politics of productivity: Foundations of American international economic
policy after world war II. In P. J. Katzenstein (Ed.), Between power and plenty: Foreign
economic policies of advanced industrial states. Madison: University of Wisconsin Press.
68
The Contemporary World 2020
UNIT III
A WORLD OF REGIONS
Unit Test:
G. Identification. Answer the following item by supplying the correct answer on
the blank.
__________1.This describes the decentralization of competencies or the establishment
of regional institutions by the state.
__________2.They are largely characterized as poor and underdeveloped. In these
countries, low levels of education, poor infrastructure, improper sanitation
and poor access to health care mean living conditions are seen
as inferior to those in the world's more developed nations.
__________3.This is the term for colonies in the Asia pacific and South Asia influenced
the West and vice versa.
__________4.It includes some of the world’s most economically developed states such
as Japan, South Korea, Singapore, and Taiwan, and highly impoverished
countries such as Cambodia, Laos, and Nepal.
__________5.This aims to develop and maintain cooperation with outside actors. This
is meant to resolve the tension between the rise of regional trade
agreements and the push for global trade as embodied by World Trade
Organization (WTO).
__________6.This is the only global international organization dealing with the rules of
trade between nations.
__________7.This
refers
to
these
countries'
"interconnected
histories
of colonialism, neo-imperialism, and differential economic and social
change through which large inequalities in living standards, life
expectancy, and access to resources are maintained.
__________8.They occupy different positions in their respective societies as well as in
relation to their nation-states as they constitute the expanding regional
consumer market.
__________9.They were created through growth in retail trade, manufacture, banking,
real estate development, and an expanding range of specialist services
such as accounting, advertising, computing, and market research.
__________10.This is a foreign policy shift was implemented by the United States to
commit more resources and attention to the region.
69
The Contemporary World 2020
H. True or False. Identify whether the statement is correct or not. Write True if it is
correct, False if not. Underline the what makes the statement incorrect, then
provide the corrections. (2 points each)
__________1.Contemporary critics of neo-liberal globalization use the north devides as
a banner to rally countries victimized by the violent economic cures of
institutions like the International Monetary Fund.
__________2.The Second World described countries whose views aligned with NATO
and capitalism, and the Third World referred to countries
that supported communism and the Soviet Union.
__________3.The ills of the global south are being globalized.
__________4.The strongest vehicle for social redistribution and the main mechanism
for social transfer is regionalism.
__________5.Spaces of underdevelopment in developed countries may mirror the
poverty of the global south, and spaces of affluence mirror those of the
global north.
__________6.The global in global south does not only mean that the south is the globe
but also signifies that the south has attained high globalization.
__________7.Globalization is the intensification of economic, political, social, and
cultural relations across borders and a consciousness of that
intensification, with a concomitant diminution in the significance of
territorial boundaries
__________8. Globalization in the Asia Pacific and South Asia is an external
phenomenon being pushed into the region by world powers like Grater
Asia and the Americas.
__________9.The global south is not relevant for those who live in countries
traditionally associated with it but also signifies that the south continues
to be globalized.
__________10.Regionalism refers to the centralization of political powers or
competencies from a higher towards a lower political level.
70
The Contemporary World 2020
I. Essay. Answer the following questions. (5 points each)
1. Explain the Asia Pacific and South Asia’s Impact on Globalization.
A. Japan
B. China
C. India
D. Philippine
71
The Contemporary World 2020
UNIT IV THE WORLD OF IDEAS
Coverage: Weeks 10 and 11
Duration: 6 hours
The Global Media Cultures (3 hours; week 10)
The Globalization of Religion (3 hours; week 11)
Learning Objectives: After studying the unit, the students should be able to:


Explain the dynamics between local and global cultural production
Explain how globalization affects religious practices and beliefs
1. The Global Media Cultures
2. The Globalization of Religion
The Global Media Cultures
Globalization and identity, globalization and human rights, globalization and
culture, or globalization and terrorism are some concepts related to the study of
globalization by many scholars. Among these concepts, the one that offers special
insights is globalization and media. They are partners and act as a unit. Situations
created through globalization and media make people conceive they belong to one
world called global village, a term coined by Marshall MacLuhan in early 1960’s, a
Canadian media theorist, to express the idea that people throughout the world are
interconnected through the use of new media technologies (143).
According to scholars, the world is globalized in the 1900s upon the
advancement of media and transportation technology. Changes in migration patterns
where people move easily and advancement in media which brought changes to human
life heightens globalization. As a process, globalization worked silently for millennia
without having been given a name; as a trend it had been with us since the beginning of
history and further argued that a multitude of threads connect us faraway places from
an ancient time (144).
72
The Contemporary World 2020
Globalization and Media
Globalization which refers to economic and political integration on a world scale,
has a crucial cultural dimension in which the media has the central role. Global
institution like the media has an impact upon the structures and processes of the
nation‐state, including its national culture. In that sense, media globalization is about
how most national media systems have become more internationalized, becoming more
open to outside influences, both in their content and in their ownership and control (145).
Five Time Periods in the Study of Globalization and Media
1. Oral Communication
Globalization as a social process is characterized by the existence of global
economic, political, cultural, linguistic and environmental interconnections and flows that
make the many of the currently existing borders and boundaries irrelevant.
Of all forms of media, human speech is the oldest and most enduring. Humans
are allowed to cooperate and communicate through language. Human ability to move
from one place to another and to adapt to a new and different environment are
facilitated by the sharing of information of other peoples (146). Languages as a means to
develop the ability to communicate across culture are the lifeline of globalization.
Without language there would be no globalization; and vice versa, without globalization
there would be no world languages (147).
2. Script
Writing is humankind’s principal technology for collecting, manipulating, storing,
retrieving, communicating and disseminating information. Writing may have been
invented independently three times in different parts of the world: in the Near East,
China and Mesoamerica. Writing is a system of graphic marks representing the units of
a specific language. Cuneiform script created in Mesopotamia, present-day Iraq, is the
only writing system which can be traced to its earliest prehistoric origin.
This antecedent of the cuneiform script was a system of counting and recording goods
with clay tokens. The evolution of writing from tokens to pictography, syllabary and
alphabet illustrates the development of information processing to deal with larger amounts
of data in ever greater abstraction (148).
Humans communicate and shared knowledge and ideas through script- the very first
writing. The origin of writing was in the form of carvings such as wood, stone, bones and
others. The medium that drove humans to globalization was the script of Ancient Egyptian
written in papyrus (plant). Written and orderly arrangement of documents pertaining to
religious, cultural, economic and religious practices are done through script for
dissemination to other places. These can also be handed down from generation to
73
The Contemporary World 2020
generation. Script is an important tool for globalization as it considers the integration of
economy, politics and culture to the world. The great civilization from Egypt to Rome and
China were made possible through script (149).
3. The Printing Press
The printing press is a device that allows for the mass production of
uniform printed matter, mainly text in the form of books, pamphlets and
newspapers (150) . It revolutionized society in China where it was created.
Johannes Gutenberg further developed this in the 15 th century with his invention
of the Gutenberg press.
The following are the consequences of the printing press
(151)
:
1. The printing press changed the very nature of knowledge. It preserved
knowledge which had been more malleable in oral cultures. It also
standardized knowledge.
2. Print encouraged the challenge of political and religious authority
because of its ability to circulate competing views. Printing press
encouraged the literacy of the public and the growth of schools.
Lands and culture were learned by people through travels. News
around the world were brought through inexpensive and easily obtained
magazines and daily newspapers. People learned about the world.
Indeed, printing press helped foster globalization and knowledge of
globalization.
4. Electronic Media
It refers to the broadcast or storage media that take advantage of electronic
technology. They may include television, radio, internet, fax, CD-ROMs, DVD, and
any other medium that requires electricity or digital encoding of information. The
term electronic media is often used in contrast with print media (152) .
On going globalization processes such as economic, political, and cultural
are revolutionized by a host of new media in the beginning of the 19th century.
These electronic media in the likes of telegraph, telephone, radio, film, and
television continously open up new perspectives of globalization. In the 20th
74
The Contemporary World 2020
century, the only available mass media in remote villages was the radio while film
was soon developed as an artistic medium for great cultural expression. The most
powerful and pervasive mass media is television as it brought the visual and aural
power of film with the accessibility of radio. The introduction of television was a
defining moment in globalization (153) . Thus,the world is proclaimed a global
village because of television (154) .
5.Digital Media
Phones and television are now considered digital while computer is
considered
the most important media influencing globalization. Computers
give access to global and market place and transformed cultural life. The
following are the companies involved in globalization: Microsoft, Apple, Google,
and Facebook.
Our daily life is revolutionized by digital media. People are able to adopt
and adapt new parctices like fashion, sports, music, food and many others
through access of information provided by computers. They also exchange ideas,
establish relations and linkages through the use of skype, google, chat, and zoom.
Popular Music and Globalization
Music participates in the reinforcing of boundaries of culture and identity.
Popular music explains the complex dynamics of globalization not only because it
is popular but music is highly mediated, is deeply invested in meaning and has
proven to be an extremely mobile and resourceful capital (155) .
World music is defined as the umbrella category which various types of
traditional and non Western music are produced for Western consumption (156 ). It
is a label of industrial origin that refers to an amalgamated global marketplace of
sounds as ethnic commodities (157) . Globalization is not something that happen to
music or has a certain impact on it. Changes in musical culture constitute one of
the aspects of globalization, and they concern institutions, system of value, and
social groups involved in musical life (158 ). The change in popular music is not the
outcome of globalization but rather popular music industry is a part of
globalization phenomena (159) .
75
The Contemporary World 2020
The Globalization of Religion
Globalization implicates religions in several ways. It calls forth religious response
and interpretation. Religions played important roles in bringing about and characterizing
globalization. Among the consequences of this implication for religion is that
globalization encourages religious pluralism. Religions identify themselves in relation to
one another, and they become less rooted in particular places because of diasporas
and transnational ties. Globalization further provides fertile ground for a variety of
noninstitutionalized religious manifestations and for the development of religion as a
political and cultural resource (160).
Perspectives on the Role of Religion in the Globalization Process (161)
1. The Modernist Perspective.
It is the perspective of most intellectuals and academics.Its view is that all
secularizations would eventually look alike and the different religions would all end up
as the same secular and “rational” philosophy. It sees religion revivals as sometimes
being a reaction to the Enlightenment and modernization.
2. Post-Modernist Perspective.
It rejects the Enlightenment, modernist values of rationalism, empiricism, and
science, along with the Enlightenment, modernist structures of capitalism, bureaucracy,
and even liberalism. The core value of post-modernism is expressive individualism. The
post-modernist perspective can include “spiritual experiences,” but only those without
religious constraints. Post-modernism is largely hyper- secularism, and it joins
modernism in predicting, and eagerly anticipating, the disappearance of traditional
religions. Globalization, by breaking up and dissolving every traditional, local, and
national structure, will bring about the universal triumph of expressive individualism.
3. The Pre-Modernist Perspective.
There is an alternative perspective, one which is post-modern in its occurrence
but which is pre-modern in its sensibility. It is best represented and articulated by the
Roman Catholic Church, especially by Pope John Paul II. The Pope’s understanding is
drawn from his experiences with Poland, but it encompasses events in other countries
as well. Each religion has secularized in its own distinctive way, which has resulted in its
own distinctive secular outcome. This suggests that even if globalization brings about
more secularization, it will not soon bring about one common, global worldview.
Secularization is understood as a shift in the overall frameworks of human
condition; it makes it possible for people to have a choice between belief and non belief
in a manner hitherto unknown (162 ).
76
The Contemporary World 2020
Transnational Religion and Multiple Glocalization
Throughout the 20th century migration of faiths across the globe has been a
major feature. One of these features is the deterritorialization of religion – that is , the
appearance and the efflorescence of religious traditions in places where these
previously had been largely unknown or were at least in a minority position (163).
Transnational religion is a means of describing solutions to new-found situations
that people face as a result of migration and it comes as two quite distinct blends of
religious universalism and local particularism.
1. It is possible for religious universalism to gain the upperhand, whereby
universalism becomes the central reference for immigrant communities. In
such instances, religious transnationalism is often depicted as a religion
going global.
2. It is possible for local ethnic or national particularism to gain or maintain
the most important place for local immigrant communities.
In such instances, transnational national communities are constructed and
religious hierarchies perform dual religious and secular functions that ensure the
groups’ survival (164). Fundamentalist or revivalist movement attempt to construct pure
religion that sheds the cultural tradition in which past religious life was immersed (165).
Transnational religion is used to describe cases of institutional transnationalism
whereby communities living outside the national territory of particular states maintain
religious attachments to their home churches or institutional (166).
Indigenization, hybridization or glocalization are processes that register the ability
of religion to mould into the fabric of different communities in ways that connect it
intimately with communal and local relations (167). Global -local or glocal religion
represents a genre of expression, communication and individual identities (168). It
involves the consideration of an entire range of responses as outcomes instead of a
single master narrative of secularization and modernization (169).
Forms of Glocalization
1. indigenization
2. vernacularization
3. nationalization
77
The Contemporary World 2020
4. transnationalization
Indigenization is connected with the specific faiths with ethnic groups whereby
religion and culture were often fused into a single unit. It is also connected to the
survival of particular ethnic groups. Vernacularization involved the rise of vernacular
language endowed with the symbolic ability of offering privileged access to the sacred
and often promoted by empires (170).
Nationalization connected the consolidation of specific nations with particular
confessions and has been a popular strategy both in Western and eastern Europe (171).
Transnationalization complemented religious nationalization by forcing groups to
identify with specific religious traditions of real or imagine national homelands or to
adopt a more universalist vision of religion (172).
78
The Contemporary World 2020
References:
The Global Media Cultures
143. McLuhan, M.(1962). The Gutenberg Galaxy: The making of typographic Man, London: Routledge
and Kegan Paul.
144. Chanda, Nayan (2007). Bound Together: How Traders, Preachers, Adventures, and Warriors
Shaped Globalization. New Haven: Yale University Press.
145. Sinclair, John. (2015). Media and Globalization. Retrieved from: https:// onlinelibrary. wiley. Com/
doi/ abs/ 10.1002/9781405165518. Webeos063. Pub2
146. Ostler,n. (2005) Empires of the Word: A Language History of the world. New York: HarperCollins.
147.Schwegler,
Armin.
(2006).
Language
and
Globalization.
Retrieved
from:
http://www.
globalization101.org/ uploads/File/Syllabus-Lang-Globalization.pdf.
148. Besserat, Denise S. (2014). The Evolution of Writing. Retrieved from: https://sites. utexas.edu/
dsb/tokens/ the-evolution-of-writing/
149. Powell, B.B. (2009). Writing: Theory and History of the Technology of Civilization. Oxford: Blackwell.
150. Printing Press. (2018).Retrieved from: https://www.history.com/topics/inventions/printing-press
151. Eisenstein E. (1979.) The Printing Press as an Agent of Change. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge
University Press.
152. What is electronic Media? Retrieved from: http://www.businessdictionary.com/definition/electronicmedia.html
153. Lule, J. (2012) Globalization and Media: Global Village of Babel. New York: Rowman and
Littlefield.
154. McLuhan, M. (1962). Understanding Media; The Extensions of Man. New York: Signet.
155.
El-Ghadban,
Yara,
Popular
Music
and
Globalization.
The
SAGE
handbook
of
Globalization.
156. White B.W. (2012) Music and Globalization. Critical encounters. Bloomington and Indiapolis:
Indiana University Press.’ And
157. Feld, S. (2012) “My Life in the bush of ghosts: Would Music’ and the commodificationof
religious experience. In Wjite BW (ed) Bloomington and Indiapolis: Indiana university
Press.
158. Baltzis, Alexandros G. Globalization and Musical Culture, Acta Musicological. Vol.77.
159. Eva, Philip, Seana and Zihao. The Relationship between globalization and Music. https://
popmusicif. Wordpress. Com/ globalization
79
The Contemporary World 2020
References:
The Globalization of Religion
160. Globalization and Religion. (2020). https;// www. Encyclopedia.com environment/encyclopediasalmanacs-transcipts-and-maps/ globalization-and-religion.
161. Religion and Globalization. Retrieved from: https;// www.fri.org/ article/ 1999/05/ religion-andglobalization
162. Roudometof, V. (2014). Religion and Gobalization. Manfred Stegger, Paul Battersby and Joseph M.
Siracusa. Eds. The SAGE handbook of Globalization. Two Vols. Thousand Oaks:SAGE.
163.Cassanova, J. (2001). Religion the New Millennium and Globalization (2000 Presidential Address).
Sociology of Religion; Martin, D. 2001. Pentecostalism:The World their Parish.. Maiden, MA;
Basil Blackwell; Roy, O. 2004. Globalized Islam: The Search for a new Ummah.new York:
Columbia University Press
164. Roudometof, V. (2000) Transnationalism and Globalization: The Greek-Orthodox Diaspora between
Orthodox Universalism and Transnational Nationalism Diaspora
165. Roy, O. (2010). Holy Ignorance: When Religion and Culture Part Ways. London: Hurst & Co.
166. Roudometof, V. (2014). Religion and Gobalization. Manfred Stegger, Paul Battersby and Joseph M.
Siracusa (eds._ The SAGE handbook of Globalization. Two Vols. Thousand Oaks:SAGE.
167. Burke, P. (2009). Cultural Hybridity.London: Polity; Pieterse , JN 2003 Globalization and Culture:
Global Melange. Lnham, MD:Rowman and Littlefield.
168. Robertson, R. (1991) Globalization, Modernization,and Postmodernization. The Ambiguous Position
of Religion. In Robertson R. and Garret, W. (eds)Religion and Global Order. New York:
Paragon House ; Robertson, R. and Garret,W. 1991. Religion and Globalization. An
Introduction. In Robertson R. and Garret, W. (eds)Religion and Global Order. New York:
Paragon House.
169. Beyer, P. (2007). Globalization and Clocalization.In Beckford JA and Demerath NJ III (eds) The
SAGE Handbook of the Sociology of Religion. London:SAGE.
170. Roudometof, V. 2013. The Glocalization of Eastern Orthodox Christianity : European Journal of
Social Theory; Roudometof, V. 2014. Globalization and Orthodox Christianity . In Leaustan L
(ed) Eastern Christianities in the 21st Century : London : Routledge.
80
The Contemporary World 2020
171.Gorski, P.S. 2000 The Mosaic Moment :An Early Modernist Critic of Modernist Theories .; Hastings
1997,; Roudometof, V. 2001. Nationalism, globalization and Orthodoxy: The Social Origins of
Ethnic Cinflict in the balkans. Westport, CT: Greenwood.
172. Roudometof, V. 2014. Religion and Gobalization. Manfred Stegger, Paul Battersby and Joseph M.
Siracusa (eds._ The SAGE handbook of Globalization. Two Vols. Thousand Oaks:SAGE.
81
The Contemporary World 2020
UNIT IV
A WORLD OF IDEAS
Unit Test:
J. Identification. Answer the following item by supplying the correct answer on
the blank.
__________1.This is a syllabary and alphabet illustrates the development of information
processing to deal with larger amounts of data in ever greater abstraction.
__________2.This refers to how most national media systems have become more
internationalized, becoming more open to outside influences, both in their
content and in their ownership and control.
__________3.They may include television, radio, internet, fax, CD-ROMs, DVD,
and any other medium that requires electricity or digital encoding of
information.
__________4.This is considered
globalization.
the
most
important
media
influencing
__________5.This is humankind’s principal technology for collecting, manipulating,
storing, retrieving, communicating and disseminating information.
__________6.This is a term that expresses the idea that people throughout the world
are interconnected through the use of new media technologies.
__________7.Who coined the term global village?
__________8.This is defined as the umbrella category which various types of
traditional and non Western music are produced for Western
consumption.
__________9.Of all forms of media, this is considered the oldest and most enduring.
__________10.This is a device that allows for the mass production of uniform
printed matter, mainly text in the form of books, pamphlets and
newspapers.
82
The Contemporary World 2020
K. True or False. Identify whether the statement is correct or not. Write True if it is
correct, False if not. Underline the what makes the statement incorrect, then
provide the corrections. (2 points each)
__________1.Written and orderly arrangement of documents pertaining to religious,
cultural, economic and religious practices are done through script for
dissemination to other places.
__________2.The introduction
globalization.
of
cellphones
was
a
defining
moment
in
__________3.Lands and culture were learned by people through rituals.
__________4.The term electronic media is often used in reference to print media.
__________5.Music participates in the reinforcing of boundaries of culture and
identity.
__________6.On going globalization processes such as economic, political, and
cultural are revolutionized by a host of new media in the beginning
of the 19th century.
__________7.The change in popular music is not the outcome of globalization but
rather popular music industry is a part of globalization phenomena.
__________8.In the 20th century, the only available mass media in remote villages
was the radio while film was soon developed as an artistic medium
for great cultural expression.
__________9.Human ability to move from one place to another and to adapt to a new
and different environment are facilitated by the sharing of information of
other peoples.
__________10.The following
are the companies involved in globalization:
Microsoft, Apple, Google, and Facebook.
L. Essay.
2. Explain briefly.
A. Globalization and Media (3 points each)
a. Oral Communication
83
The Contemporary World 2020
b. Script/Writing
c. Printing Press
d. Electronic Media
e. Digital Media
B. How are the Filipino youth being influenced by globalization in terms of popular
music? (5 points)
84
The Contemporary World 2020
UNIT V GLOBAL POPULATION AND MOBILITY
Coverage: Weeks 12, 13 and 14
Duration: 9 hours
The Global City (3 hours; week 12)
Global Demography (3 hours; week 13)
Global Migration (3 hours; week 14)
Learning Objectives: After studying the unit, the students should be able to:
●
Define what global city is
●
Identify the attributes of a global city
●
Define demography
●
Describe and explain the the theory of demographic transition and its effect on global
population
●
Identify the effects of overpopulation on the economic welfare
●
Identify the types and reasons for migration of the people
●
Analyze the factors underlying the global movements of people
●
Discuss the effects of global migration on the economic well-being of states
1. The Global City
2. Global Demography
3. Global Migration
Global City: Its Definition and Concepts
As defined, a global city is an urban centre that enjoys significant competitive
advantages and that serves as a hub within a globalized economic system. The term
has its origins in research on cities carried out during the 1980s, which examined the
common characteristics of the world’s most important cities. However, with increased
attention being paid to processes of globalization during subsequent years, these world
cities came to be known as global cities. Linked with globalization was the idea of
spatial reorganization and the hypothesis that cities were becoming key loci within
85
The Contemporary World 2020
global networks of production, finance, and telecommunications. In some formulations
of the global city thesis, then, such cities are seen as the building blocks of globalization.
173
What constitutes a global city were primarily economic. As such, New York,
London, and Tokyo can be identified as global cities, all of which are hubs of global
finance and capitalism. 174 This concept of global cities was used to describe these three
urban centers of New York, London, and Tokyo as economic centers that exert control
over the world’s political economy. World cities are categorized as such based on the
global reach of organization found in them. Not only are there inequalities between
these cities there also exists inequalities within each city. 175 Alternatively, these cities
can be seen as important nodes in a variety of global networks.176
Although cities are major beneficiaries of globalization, they are also the most
severely affected by global problems. Therefore the city faces peculiar political
problems, wherein it is often fruitlessly seeing to deal locally with global problems and
local politics has become overloaded.177
Indicators of a Global City
The following are the foremost characteristics of a global city. 178
1. Seats of Economic Power
New York may have the largest stock market in the world but Tokyo houses the
most number of corporate headquarters (613 company headquarters as against 217 in
New York, its competitor). Shanghai may have a smaller stock market compared to New
York and Tokyo, but plays a critical role in the global economic supply chain ever since
China has become the manufacturing center of the world. Shanghai has the world’s
busiest container port, moving over 33 million container units in 2013.
2. Centers of Authority
Washington DC may not be wealthy as New York but it is the seat of American
state power. People around the world know its major landmarks: the White House, the
Capitol Building (Congress), the Supreme Court, the Lincoln Memorial, and the
Washington Monument. Similarly, compared with Sydney and Melbourne, Canberra is a
sleepy town and thus is not as attractive to tourists. But as Australia’s political capital, it
is home to the country’s top politicians, bureaucrats, and policy advisors.
3. Centers of Political Influence
Cities that house major international organizations may also be considered
centers of political influence. The headquaters of the United Nations is in New York,
and that of the European Union is in Brussels. An influential political city near the
Philippines is Jakarta, which is not just the capital of Indonesia, but also the location of
the main headquarters of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN).
86
The Contemporary World 2020
Powerful political hubs exert influence on their own countires as well as on international
affairs. The European Central Bank which oversees the Euro (the European Union’s
currency), is based in Frankfurt.
4. Centers of Higher Learning and Culture
A city’s intellectual influence is seen through the influence of its publishing
industry. Many of the books that people read are published in places like New York ,
London, or Paris. The New York Times carries the name of New York City but it is far
from being a local newspaper. People read it not just across America, but also all over
the world. One of the reasons for many tourists visiting Boston is that they want to see
Harvard University - the world’s top university.
Many Asian teenagers are moving to cities in Australia because of the leading
language universities there. Los Angeles, the center of the American film industry may
also be considered a global city. A less obvious example, however, is Copenhagen, the
capital of Denmark. It is so small that one can tour the entire city by bicycle in thirty
minutes. It is not the home of a major stock market, and its population is rather
homogenous. However, Copenhagen is now considered as one of the culinary capitals
of the world, with its top restaurants incommensurate with its size. Similarly, Manchester,
England in the 1980’s was a dreary, industrial city. But many prominent post-punk and
New Wave bands - Joy Division, the Smiths, the Happy Mondays - hailed from this city,
making it a global household name.
In Southeast Asia, Singapore is slowly becoming a cultural hub for the region. It
now houses some of the region’s top television stations and news organization (MTV
Southeast Asia and Channel News Asia). Its various art galleries and cinemas also
show paintings from artists and filmmakers respectively from the Philippines and
Thailand. It is, in fact, sometimes easier to watch the movie of a Filipino indie filmmaker
in Singapore than it is in Manila.
5. Economic Opportunities
Economic opportunities in a global city make it attractive to talents from across
the world. Since the 1970’s, many of the top IT programmers and engineers from Asia
have moved to San Francisco Bay Area to become some of the key figures in Silicon
Valley’s technology boom. London remains a preferred destination for many Filipinos
with nursing degrees.
6. Economic Competitiveness
The Economist Intelligence Unit has added other criteria like market size,
purchasing power of citizens, size of the middle class, and potential for growth. Based
on this criteria, tiny Singapore is considered Asia’s most competitive city because of its
strong market, efficient and incorruptible government, and livability. 179 It also houses
the regional offices of many major global corporations.
87
The Contemporary World 2020
Cities as Engines of Globalization
Cities are the engines of globalization. They are social magnets, growing faster
and faster. In the current generation, urban life has become the dominant form of
human life throughout the world. An increasing number of large cities, with populations
of over five million, are already identified as global cities, cities that are nodes of global
as much as national networks. In 2000, there were 18 megacities (over 10 million)‚ such
as Mumbai, Tokyo, New York City/Newark and Mexico City had populations in excess
of 10 million inhabitants. Greater Tokyo already has 35 million. The Hong
Kong/Guangzhow area is even larger, perhaps 120 million.
The social magnetism of these urban areas is generating larger and denser
metropolitan communities to the point that they are joining together to become regional
conurbations. In 1900, 5% of the world population was urban. In 2007, the count passed
50%. By 2050, up to 75% is anticipated. Urban growth is faster outside the Western
world, fastest in the poorest areas, such as Africa and the poorer parts of Asia,
producing the most serious problems‚ which as the processes of globalization also
progress will cease to be African and Asian problems and will become global problems.
Movement into cities increases political voice and participation, as previously isolated
rural populations become players on city streets, on the Internet, and in migration.
As the pace of growth accelerates, the distinguishing cultural features of
established historical cities become diluted. Established institutional forms of
governance and services do not work with larger numbers. In the past, cities worked
differently in culturally different parts of the world, and experienced different problems.
Now, institutional innovation is failing to keep up with the rate of growth and change,
and the problems confronting urban populations depend more on size and the rate of
growth than on cultural expectations. 180
Global Demography
Demography: Meaning and Its Origin
The term demography was derived from the Greek words demos for “population”
and graphia for “description” or “writing,” thus the phrase, “writings about population.” 181
It was coined by Achille Guillard, a Belgian statistician, in 1855. However, the origins of
modern demography can be traced back to the John Graunt’s analysis of ‘Bills of
Mortality’ which was published in 1662. 182
By its meaning, as cited by Tulchinsky, demography refers to the study of
populations, with reference to size and density, fertility, mortality, growth, age
distribution, migration, and vital statistics and the interaction of all these with social and
economic conditions”. As such, demography is based on vital statistics reporting and
special surveys of population size and density; it measures trends over time. 183
88
The Contemporary World 2020
Demographic transition started in mid- or late 1700’s in Europe. During that time,
death rates and fertility began to decline. High to low fertility happened 200 years in
France and 100 years in the United States. In other parts of the world, the transition
began later. It was only in the 20th century that mortality decline in Africa and Asia, with
the exemption of Japan. In India, life expectancy in India was only 24 years in the early
20th century while the same life expectancy occurred in China in 1929 until 1931.
Fertility decline in Asia did not begin until the 1950’s and so on. 184 In the case of Japan,
it was until the 1930’s that “total fertility rate did not drop below five births per woman”
185
This resulted in rapid population growth after the Second World War affecting the
age structure of Asia and the developing world. Specifically, the baby boom in the
developing world was caused by the decline of infant and child mortality rates. The
West, on the other hand, experienced baby boom that resulted from rising birth rates.
Effect of Demographic Transition
A remarkable effect of the demographic transition is ‘the enormous gap in life
expectancy that emerged between Japan and the West on the one hand and the rest of
the world on the other.” By 1820, the life expectancy at birth of Japan and the West was
12 years greater than that of other countries. It increased by 20 years by 1900. Although
there was an improvement in life expectancy all throughout the world in 1900-1950, the
gap had reached 22 years. In 1999, the gap declined to 14 years. These differences in
time of transition affected the global population. During the 19th century, Europe and the
West had an increased in share in the world’s population, from 22.0 percent to 33.0
percent, while Asia and Oceania’s contribution dropped from 69.0 percent to 56.7. India
and China suffered from economic stagnation and decline during that time. 186
There was a reverse in global population shares during the 20th century as Africa,
Asia, Latin America, and Oceania had high levels of population growth rates. Population
growth shows a more remarkable shift: “Between 1820 and 1980, 69.3 percent of the
world’s population growth occurred in Europe and Western offshoots. Between 1950
and 2000, however, only 11.7 percent occurred in the region.” 187
The United States projected that population growth will be shifted toward Africa.
It is estimated that by 2150, the region’s share to the world population will be almost 20
percent, relatively much greater than its share in 1820 (seven percent) and in 1900 (six
percent). Also, in 2150, there will be a projected increase of two billion if we combine
the population of Asia, Latin America, and Oceania.
In terms of age structure, the overall trend in Japan and the West was downward
until 1950. Their dependency ratio was close to 0.5. It only increased, although
temporary, when the baby boom after the Second World War occurred. Japan’s
dependency ratio, however, increased between 1888 and 1920. its dependency ratio
was higher than the West between 1920 and the early 1950’s. It dropped in 1970 and
89
The Contemporary World 2020
later since its precipitous decline in childbearing during the 1950’s and low fertility rates
in recent years.
The developing countries like India and the Philippines had higher dependency
ratios than the West in 1900. A great increase in dependency ratio was caused by the
decline in infant and child mortality and high levels of fertility, with its peak around 1970.
Dependency ratios started to disappear because there is a decline in global birth
rate. Furthermore, the gap in fertility between the West and the less developed
countries became smaller by the 21st century. Over the next 50 years, the cases of
dependency ratios of these two areas in the world will be reversed. 188 The aging
populations will cause a rise in dependency ratio, starting in the West.
Theory of Demographic Transition
Demographic transition theory suggests that future population growth will
develop along a predictable four- or five-stage model.189
Stage 1
In stage one, pre-industrial society, death rates and birth rates are high and
roughly in balance. An example of this stage is the United States in the 1800s. All
human populations are believed to have had this balance until the late 18th century,
when this balance ended in Western Europe. In fact, growth rates were less than 0.05%
at least since the Agricultural Revolution over 10,000 years ago.
Population growth is typically very slow in this stage, because the society is
constrained by the available food supply; therefore, unless the society develops new
technologies to increase food production (e.g. discovers new sources of food or
achieves higher crop yields), any fluctuations in birth rates are soon matched by death
rates.
Stage 2
In stage two, that of a developing country, death rates drop rapidly due to
improvements in food supply and sanitation, which increase life spans and reduce
disease. Afghanistan is currently in this stage.
The improvements specific to food supply typically include selective breeding and
crop rotation and farming techniques. Other improvements generally include access to
technology, basic healthcare, and education. For example, numerous improvements in
public health reduce mortality, especially childhood mortality. Prior to the mid-20th
90
The Contemporary World 2020
century, these improvements in public health were primarily in the areas of food
handling, water supply, sewage, and personal hygiene. Another variable often cited is
the increase in female literacy combined with public health education programs which
emerged in the late 19th and early 20th centuries.
In Europe, the death rate decline started in the late 18th century in northwestern
Europe and spread to the south and east over approximately the next 100 years.
Without a corresponding fall in birth rates this produces an imbalance, and the countries
in this stage experience a large increase in population.
Stage 3
In stage three, birth rates fall. Mexico’s population is at this stage. Birth rates
decrease due to various fertility factors such as access to contraception, increases in
wages, urbanization, a reduction in subsistence agriculture, an increase in the status
and education of women, a reduction in the value of children’s work, an increase in
parental investment in the education of children and other social changes. Population
growth begins to level off. The birth rate decline in developed countries started in the
late 19th century in northern Europe.
While improvements in contraception do play a role in birth rate decline, it should
be noted that contraceptives were not generally available nor widely used in the 19th
century and as a result likely did not play a significant role in the decline then.
It is important to note that birth rate decline is caused also by a transition in
values; not just because of the availability of contraceptives.
Stage 4
During stage four, there are both low birth rates and low death rates. Birth rates
may drop to well below replacement level as has happened in countries like Germany,
Italy, and Japan, leading to a shrinking population, a threat to many industries that rely
on population growth. Sweden is considered to currently be in Stage 4.
As the large group born during stage two ages, it creates an economic burden on
the shrinking working population. Death rates may remain consistently low or increase
slightly due to increases in lifestyle diseases due to low exercise levels and high obesity
and an aging population in developed countries. By the late 20th century, birth rates and
death rates in developed countries leveled off at lower rates.
Stage 5 (Debated)
Some scholars delineate a separate fifth stage of below-replacement fertility
levels. Others hypothesize a different stage five involving an increase in fertility. The
91
The Contemporary World 2020
United Nations Population Fund (2008) categorizes nations as high-fertility,
intermediate-fertility, or low-fertility. The United Nations (UN) anticipates the population
growth will triple between 2011 and 2100 in high-fertility countries, which are currently
concentrated in sub-Saharan Africa.
For countries with intermediate fertility rates (the United States, India, and
Mexico all fall into this category), growth is expected to be about 26 percent. Low-fertility
countries like China, Australia, and most of Europe will actually see population decline
of approximately 20 percent.
Global Migration: Meaning and Concept
Globalization has made migration possible and an inevitable fact. As defined by
Cambridge dictionary, 190 global migration is a situation in which people go to live in
foreign countries especially to find a job. Though it can be often seen as a permanent
move rather than a complex series of backward or onward series, 191 the term
migration is often conceptualized as a move from an origin to a destination, or from a
place of birth to another destination across administrative borders within a country or
international borders. 192
Types of Migration
Internal migration
This refers to people moving from one area to another within one country
International migration
This refers to the movement people who cross the borders of one country
to another.
The latter can be broken down into five groups:
First are those who move permanently to another country (immigrants). The
second refers to workers who stay in another country for a fixed period (at least 6
months in a year).193 Illegal immigrants comprise the third group, while the fourth are
migrants whose families have “petitioned” them to move to the destination country.
The fifth group are refugees (also known as assylum-seekers), i.e., those “unable or
92
The Contemporary World 2020
unwilling to return because of a well-founded fear of persecution on acccount of race,
religion, nationality, membership in a particular social group, or political opinion. “ 194
Many countries face issues of illegal migration. The United States faces a major
influx of illegal immigrants from Mexico and other Central American states 195. A fence is
being constructed on the US-Mexico border to control this flow of people. 196 However,
its efficacy is questioned and it is thought that it will only be illegal immigrants to adopt
more dangerous methods to gain entry. In addition, tighter borders have also had the
effect of “locking in” people who might otherwise have left the country. 197 Other
countries with similar concerns about illegal immigration include Great Britain,
Switzerland, and Greece as well as other countries in Asia.
A strong case can be made on the backlash against illegal immigrants 198. In the
North, such immigrants constitute a younger workforce that does work which locals may
not perform, and they are consumers who contribute to growth. They also send
remittances back to family members in the country of origin, which improves the lives of
the recipients, reduces poverty rates, and increases the level of education as well as the
foreign reserves of the home country 199. Banks are often unwilling or unable to handle
the type (small amounts of money) and volume of remittances. As a result, specialized
organizations play a major role in the transmission of remittances. In terms of
remittances, the Philippines is one of the leaders when it comes to the flow of
remittances ($14.7 billion), next to India ($24.5 billion) and China ($21.1 billion). 200
Reasons for Migration
People decide to migrate because of push and pull factors. A push factor
induces people to move out of their present location, whereas a pull factor induces
people to move into a new location. As migration for most people is a major step not
taken lightly, both push and pull factors typically play a role. To migrate, people view
their current place of residence so negatively that they feel pushed away, and they view
another place so attractively that they feel pulled toward it.201 The following are the
factors underlying the global movement of the people.
1. Cultural Factor
Cultural factor can be especially a compelling push factor, forcing people to
emigrate from a country. Forced international migration has historically occurred for two
main cultural reasons: slavery and political instability. Millions of people were shipped to
other countries as slaves or as prisoners, especially from Africa to the Western
Hemisphere, during the eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. Large groups of
people are no longer forced to migrate as slaves, but forced international migration
persists because of political instability resulting from cultural diversity.
93
The Contemporary World 2020
2. Socio-political Factor
Socio-political factors have become more prominent force to initiate migration
activities. Political instability in some parts of the world is responsible for migration that
needs to be addressed by the scholars of the world. Situation of war, oppression and
the lack of socio-political rights are the major factors of migration in contemporary time.
Lack of political rights and prevalent exploitation of a particular group or community in
any nation state act as push factors for migration to get away from such situation.
Social conflict forces millions of human creature to leave sometimes their homes
and even their homeland every year to continue breathing on this planet. This
displacement creates a humanitarian nightmare. This human crisis threatens the
security of displaced people. The journalists around the globe describe such situation
with their voice that attracts the people’s attention towards this crisis. For example, we
can quote some headlines as sample ‘growing stream of refugees’ from Sudan, a ‘flood
of boat people’ trying to reach Australia, and a ‘tide of refugees’ inundating Florida. 202
3. Environmental Factor
Despite the fact that human relocation is a fundamental piece of history and
culture of world, ecological change assumes a contributing part in influencing populace
movement, especially on local level. According to IOM (International Organisation of
Migration): “Environmental migrants are persons or groups of persons who, for
compelling reasons of sudden or progressive changes in the environment that adversely
affect their lives or living conditions, are obliged to leave their habitual homes, or choose
to do so, either temporarily or permanently, and who move either within their country or
abroad”. 203 This definition comprises the people who have been displaced by natural
disasters and those who choose to migrate because of worsening environmental
condition of a particular area. The environmentally caused migration can be internal as
well as international.
Environmental migrants commonly suffer with great risks to remain without legal
protection. Sometimes they find themselves outside of their own country and also within
the country. When world leaders of most of the countries came together in Paris to
discuss the matter of climate change and its consequences for migration, it seemed like
they would find long term solution. According to The European Commission, “The
greatest single impact of climate change could be on human migration with millions of
people displaced by shoreline erosion, coastal flooding, and agricultural disruption—a
crisis in the making.” 204
4. Economic Factors
Migration is a process affecting individuals and their families economically. It
ensues as a response to economic development along with social and cultural factors.
Recent studies on the economic impact of migration in European countries as well as
other part of the world have reflected fresh comparative evidence that provides boost for
economy. International migration has two way effects on economic growth. Though it is
94
The Contemporary World 2020
still debatable about its positive impact on GDP growth of a host country, it is
worldwidely recognised that migration expands the skilled workforce.
A recent UNCTAD report notes: ‘Remittances are more stable and predictable as
compared to other financial flows and, more importantly, they are counter-cyclical
providing buffer against economic shocks. In conflict or post–conflict situations,
remittances can be crucial to survival, sustenance, rehabilitation, and reconstruction. In
providing primarily for household livelihoods, remittances are spent on general
consumption items in local communities that contribute to local economies by
supporting small businesses.
Moreover, in contributing to foreign exchange earnings, remittances can spur
economic growth by improving sending countries’ credit worthiness and expanding their
access to international capital markets’. 205 It is also important to consider the impact of
return migration on the economy of a particular country. Return migration has always
put impacts on, at various levels, of economy as well as society in whole.
According to World Migration Report published in 2018, “The total estimated 244
million people living in a country other than their country of birth in 2015 is almost 100
million more than in 1990 (when it was 153 million), and over three times the estimated
number in 1970 (84 million).While the proportion of international migrants globally has
increased over this period, it is evident that the vast majority of people continue to live in
the country in which they were born. Most international migrants in 2015 (around 72%)
were of working age (20 to 64 years of age), with a slight decrease in migrants aged
less than 20 between 2000 and 2015 (17% to 15%), and a constant share 159 (around
12%) of international migrants aged 65 years or more since 2000. 206
95
The Contemporary World 2020
References:
The Global City
173. Global city. (n.d). In Britannica.com. Retrieved from https://www.britannica.com/topic/global-city
174. Sassen, Saskia. (1991).The Global City: New York, London, tokyo. Princeton, N.J.:Princeton
University Press
175. Aldama, P. R. (2018). The Contemporary World First Edition. Manila: Rex Book Store
176. Castells, M. (2000). The rise of the network society. New ed. Malden:Blackwell.
177. Bauman, Z. (2003). Liquid love. Cambridge: Polity.
178. Claudio, Lisandro and Patricio N. Abinales. (2018). The Contemporary World. Manila: C&E
Publishing Inc.
179. “Hot Spots: Benchmarking Global City Competitiveness” (London: The Economist
Intelligence Unit,
2012),https://web.archive.org/web/20140709133545/https://www.economistinsights.com/sitesde
faulty/files/
180.
“Globalization
FAQ
-
Globalization
Studies
in
an
Urban
World”,
Retrieved
from
http://web.sas.upenn.edu
Refrences:
Global Demography
181. Poston,Jr. D. and Leon F. Bouvier. (2016). An Introduction to Demography. Cambridge University
Press. Retrieved from https://www.cambridge.org/core/books/population-and-
society/an-
introduction-to-demography/A646239C30C3E41F767594F87E920FFF
182.Timaeus,
I.
M.
(n.d.).
Demography
Retrieved
from
http://www.medicine.mcgill.ca/epidemiology/hanley/c609/Material/DemographyEoB.pdf
183. Tulchinsky, T. H. and Elena A. Varavikova. (2014). The new public health (Third Edition), measuring,
monitoring
and
evaluating
the
health
of
population.
Retrieved
from
https://www.sciencedirect.com/topics/social-sciences/demographic-transition
184.Aldama, P.K. R. (2018). The Contemporary World. Manila: Rex Book Store
185. Shigeyuki, A., La Croix, S.J., & Mason, A. (2002). Population and globalization. Southeast Asian
Studies. 40, (3)
186.Ibid.
96
The Contemporary World 2020
187.Ibid.
188.Ibid.
189.Caldwell, J. (2006). Demographic Transition Theory. Springer: Australia. Retrieved from
books.google.com
References:
Global Migration
190.Global
migration.
(n.d.)
In
Cambridge
Dictionary.
Retrieved
from
https://dictionary.cambridge.org/us/dictionary/english/global-migration
191. Skeldon, R. (2013). Global Migration: Demographic Aspects and Its Relevance for Development.
Technical
Paper
No.
2013/6.
UN:
New
York.
Retrieved
from
https://www.un.org/en/development/desa/population/migration/publications/technicalpapers/doc
s/EGM.Skeldon_17.12.2013.pdf
192. Santic, D. and Milena Spasovski. (2016). Contemporary world migration - towards new terminology,
patterns and policies. Bulletin of the Serbian Geographical Society. Retrieved from
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/311987791. DOI:
10.2298/GSGD1602001S
193. Castles, S. (2000). “International Migration at the Beginning of the Twenty-first Century: Global
Trends and Issues,” in Global Trends and Issues. Oxford: Blackwell Publishers 269-270
194. Ibid.
195. Thompson,
G.
(2008, October 3). Fewer people are entering US illegally, report says, New York
Times
196.Fletcher, M.A. & Weisman, J. (2006, October 27). Bush signs bill authorizing 700- mile fence for
border. New York Times.
197.Fears, D. (2006, October, 27). Citizenship changes draw objections. New York Times
198. Economist. (2008, January 3). Keep the borders open.
199. Economist. (2007, November 1). Illegal but useful.
200. Malkin, E. (2007, October 26). Mexicans miss money from workers up north. New York Times
201. The Cultural Landscape: Migration. Retrieved from https://www.globalization101.org/economiceffects-of-migration/
97
The Contemporary World 2020
202. Bratton, Michael. “Violence, displacement and democracy in post-conflict societies: evidence from
Mali”. Journal of Contemporary African Studies, 34:4, 2016.pp. 437-458.
203.International Organization of Migration. (2011).
204.European
Commission,
“COP21
UN
Climate
Change
Conference,
http://ec.europa.eu/priorities/energy-union/emissionsreduction/cop21/index_en.htm
Paris,”
(accessed
10 April, 2018).
205. Trade and Development Report, 2011: Post-Crisis Policy Challenges in the World Economy. United
Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD), 2011.
206.“World
Migration
Report
2018.”
International
Organization
for
Migration.
Retrieved
from
www.iom.int/wmr/world-migration-report-2018.
98
The Contemporary World 2020
UNIT V GLOBAL POPULATION AND MOBILITY
Unit Test:
A. Multiple Choice. Choose the letter of the best answer.
__________ 1.Forced international migration has historically occurred for two main
cultural reasons
a. slavery and political instability
b. poverty and absence of legal protection
c. lack of income and environmental threat
d. employment and education
__________ 2.According to European Commission, which of the following is greatly
affected by climate change?
a. agriculture
b. environment
c. economy
d. migration
__________ 3.The following are the contributions of remittance to economic growth,
except:
a.contributes to foreign exchange earnings
b.improves sending countries’ credit worthiness
c. expands access to international capital markets
d. serves as savings in financial institutions
__________ 4. Which of the following acts as push factor for migration in a nation state?
a. lack of political rights and prevalent exploitation of a particular group or community
b. environmental threat and agricultural disruption
c. lack of political protection and resurgence of military elements
d. employment opportunities and educational grants
__________ 5.In contemporary time, the following are considered to be the major sociopolitical factors of migration, except:
a.situation of war
b.oppression
c. political conflict
d. lack of socio-political rights
__________ 6.In conflict or post–conflict situations, remittances can be crucial to the
following, except:
a.survival
b. sustenance
c. debt
d. reconstruction
99
The Contemporary World 2020
__________ 7. Forced international migration persists because of political instability
resulting from;
a. cultural diversity
b. political war
c. sovereignty
d. cross-border conflict
__________ 8. This term refers to people moving from one area to another within one
country.
a. internal migrants
b. immigrants
c. refugees
d. petitioned
__________ 9. This term refers to people crossing the borders of one country to
another.
a. refugees
b. petitioned
c. international migrants
d. internal migrants
__________10.This refers to persons or groups of persons who, for compelling
reasons of sudden or progressive changes in the environment are obliged to leave their
habitual homes, either temporarily or permanently.
a. intenal migrants
b. international migrants
c. immigrants
d. environmental migrants
__________ 11.This term refers to persons of groups of person returning to their
country of origin after having been international migrants in another country.
a. Immigrants
b. international migrants
c. returning migrants
d.internal migrants
__________ 12.This term refers to the migration of people into a country in violation of
the immigration laws of the country.
a.illegal migration
b. internal migration c. international migration
d. migration law
__________ 13.Dependency ratios started to disappear due to
a. decline in global birth rate
b. increase in mortality rate
c. increased rate in migration
d. decline in old age structure
100
The Contemporary World 2020
__________ 14. During the 19th century, these two regions had an increased in share in
the world’s population, from 22.0 percent to 33.0 percent
a. Europe and West b. US and Japan
c. Africa and China
d. Philippines and India
__________ 15. Which is NOT true about global cities?
a.important nodes in a variety of global networks
b.major beneficiaries of globalization
c. with populations of over 5 million
d. with high influx of immigrants
B. Modified True or False. Identify whether the statement is correct or not. Write
True if it is corect, False if not. Modify the word or phrase that makes it incorrect.
__________ 1. Specialized organizations play a major role in the transmission of
remittances.
__________ 2.The rise of internationalization of capital accelerates the formation of
global cities.
__________ 3.In some part of the world, political instability is responsible for migration
of people.
__________ 4.According to World Migration Repprt in 2018, most international migrants
in 2015 were of working age between 20 to 64.
__________ 5.Return migration has always put impacts on, at various levels, of
economy as well as society in whole.
__________ 6.Ecological change assumes a contributing part in influencing populace
movement, especially on international level.
__________ 7. Birth rate decline can also be caused by a transition in values; not just
because of the availability of contraceptives.
__________ 8.The birth rate decline in developed countries started in the late 19th
century in western Europe.
__________ 9. Death rates may remain consistently low or increase slightly due to
increases in lifestyle diseases.
__________ 10. Unless the society develops new technologies to increase food
production , any fluctuations in birth rates are soon matched by mortality rates.
__________ 11. It was only in the 18th century that mortality decline in Africa and Asia,
with the exemption of Japan.
101
The Contemporary World 2020
__________ 12. The United Nations (UN) anticipates the population growth will double
between 2011 and 2100 in high-fertility countries, which are currently concentrated in
sub-Saharan Africa.
__________ 13. Use of contraception may not always be attributed to decline in birth
rate.
__________ 14. World cities are categorized as such based on the global reach of
organization found in them.
__________ 15. Ecological change forces millions of human creature to leave their
homes and even their homeland every year.
C. Essay (5 pts each)
1. Given the attributes of a global city, can the Philippines be also considered as a
global city? Justify your answers.
2. Aside from the above mentioned factors in human migration, what other factors can
you suggest that may contribute to internal and international migration? Explain.
102
The Contemporary World 2020
UNIT VI TOWARDS A SUSTAINABLE WORLD
Coverage: Weeks 15 and 16
Duration: 6 hours
Sustainable Development (3 hours; week 15)
Global Food Security (3 hours; week 16)
Learning Objectives: After studying the unit, students should be able to:
●
Examine the measures of the governments in addressing environmental crisis like
climate change
●
Relate everyday encounters with the various environmental problems
●
Analyze the effect of environmental problems that the world faces today
●
Identify the four dimensions of food security
●
Explain the issues, interventions and public policy implications of global food
security
●
Identify the challenges in food security
●
Critique existing models of global food security
1. Sustainable Development
2. Global Food Security
Sustainable Development and Climate Change
By its meaning, sustainable development has been variously defined, but one of
the most quoted definitions of this term is from the Brundtland Report also known as
Our Common Future, which is a publication released by the World Commission on
Environment and Development in 1987, “sustainable development is development that
meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to
meet their own needs.” 207
As this term primarily relates to how the needs of the people basically through
the consumption and utilization of resources, sustainable development is often linked
with climate change which due to its hazardous effects in the environment is known to
be a major restriction in achieving sustainability.
103
The Contemporary World 2020
This link between sustainable development and climate change is considered
strong. Poor developing countries particularly those developed countries tend to be the
most severely affected by climate change. Undoubtedly, climate change is often seen
as a part of the broader challenge in sustainable development thru a two-fold link: 208
1. Impacts of climate change can severely hamper development efforts in
key sector (e.g. increased threat of natural disasters and growing water
stress will have to be factored into plans for public health infrastructure)
2. Development choice will influence the capacity to mitigate and adapt to
climate change (e.g. policies for forest conservation and sustainable
energy will improve communities’
resilience reducing thereby the
vulnerability of their sources of income to climate change)
In the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, Member States express
their commitment to protect the planet from degradation and take urgent action on
climate change. The Agenda also identifies, in its paragraph 14, climate change as “one
of the greatest challenges of our time” and worries about “its adverse impacts
undermine the ability of all countries to achieve sustainable development. Increases in
global temperature, sea level rise, ocean acidification and other climate change impacts
are seriously affecting coastal areas and low-lying coastal countries, including many
least developed countries and Small Island Developing States. The survival of many
societies, and of the biological support systems of the planet, is at risk”. 209
Various efforts are underway to deal with climate. However, strong resistance on
the part of governments and corporations counters these. There are significant
challenges involved in implementing various measures such as “carbon tax” and
‘carbon neutrality” to deal with environmental problems. 210 It is also difficult to find
alternatives to fossil fuels. For instance, the use of ethanol as an alternative to gasoline
has an attendant set of problems - it is less efficient and it has led to escalation in the
price of corn, which currently serves as major source of ethanol. Although biofuels
themselves produce lower emissions, their extraction and transport contribute
significantly to total emissions. 211
The World’s Leading Environmental Problems
The Conserve Energy Future website
challenges that the world faces today:
212
lists the following environmental
1. Depredation caused by industrial and transportation toxins and plastic in the ground;
the defiling of the sea, rivers, and water beds by oil spills and acid rain; the dumping of
urban waste
2. Changes in global weather patterns (flash floods, extreme snowstorms, and the
spread of deserts) and the surge in ocean and land temperatures leading to a rise in
104
The Contemporary World 2020
sea levels (as the polar ice caps melt because of the weather), plus the flooding of
many lowland areas across the world
3. Overpopulation
4. Exhaustion of the world’s natural non-renewable resources from oil reserves to
minerals to potable water
5. Waste disposal catastrophe due to excessive amount of waste (from plastic to food
packages to electronic waste) unloaded by communities in landfills as well as on the
ocean; and dumping of nuclear waste
6. Destruction of million-year-old ecosystems and the loss of biodiversity (destruction of
the coral reefs and massive deforestation) that have led to the extinction of particular
species and decline in the number of others
7. Reduction of oxygen and increase in carbon dioxide in the atmosphere due to
deforestation, resulting in the rise in ocean acidity by as much as 150 percent in the last
250 years
8. Depletion of ozone layer protecting the planet from the sun’s deadly ultraviolet rays
due to chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs) in the atmosphere
9. Deadly acid rain as a result of fossil fuel combustion, toxic chemicals from erupting
volcanoes, and the massive rotting vegetables filling up garbage dumps or left on the
streets
10. Water pollution arising from industrial and community waste residues seeping into
underground water tables, rivers and seas
11. Urban sprawls that continue to expand as a city turns into a megalopolis, destroying
farmlands, increasing traffic gridlock, and making smog cloud a permanent urban fixture
12. Pandemics and other threats to public health arising from wastes with drinking water,
polluted environment that become the breeding grounds for mosquitoes and disease
carrying rodents, and pollution
13. A radical alteration of food systems because of genetic modifications in food
production
105
The Contemporary World 2020
Global Food Security
What is Food Security?
As said, food security exists when all people, at all times, have access to
adequate, safe, and nutritious food to meet their dietary needs and food preferences for
an active and healthy life. 213 This widely accepted definition of food security
emphasizes the four dimensions of food security 214 which are as follows:
1. food access: access to adequate resources to acquire a healthy and
nutritious diet
2. food use: use of food through adequate diet, clean water and health care to
reach the state of a healthy well-being
3. availability: availability of adequate supply of food, produced either through
domestic or foreign import, including as well the food aid received from outside
the country
4. stability: access to sufficient food at all times, without losing access to food
supply brought by either economic or climatic crisis
Global Food Security: Issues, Interventions and Public Policy Implications
The global food security situation and outlook remains delicately imbalanced
amid surplus food production and the prevalence of hunger, due to the complex
interplay of social, economic, and ecological factors that mediate food security
outcomes at various human and institutional scales. Food production outpaced food
demand over the past 50 years due to expansion in crop area and irrigation, as well as
supportive policy and institutional interventions that led to the fast and sustained growth
in agricultural productivity and improved food security in many parts of the world.
However, future predictions point to a slow-down in agricultural productivity and a foodgap mainly in areas across Africa and Asia which are having ongoing food security
issues.
The problem of food insecurity is expected to worsen due to, among others, rapid
population growth and other emerging challenges such as climate change and rising
demand for biofuels. Climate change poses complex challenges in terms of increased
variability and risk for food producers and the energy and water sectors. There is a
need to look beyond agriculture and invest in affordable and suitable farm technologies
if the problem of food insecurity is to be addressed in a sustainable manner. This
requires both revisiting the current approach of agricultural intervention and reorienting
the existing agricultural research institutions and policy framework.
106
The Contemporary World 2020
Proactive interventions and policies for tackling food security are to be discussed
which include issues such as agriculture for development, ecosystem services from
agriculture, and gender mainstreaming, to extend the focus on food security within and
beyond the agriculture sector, by incorporating cross-cutting issues such as energy
security, resource reuse and recovery, social protection programs, and involving civil
society in food policy making processes by promoting food sovereignty. 215
Challenges in Food Security
Demand for food will be 60% greater than it is today and the challenge of food
security requires the world to feed 9 billion people by 2050. Global food security means
delivering sufficient food to the entire world population. It is, therefore, a priority of all
countries, whether developed or less developed. The security of food also means the
sustainability of society such as population growth, climate change, water scarcity, and
agriculture. The case of India show how complex the issue of food security is in relation
to other factors:
Agriculture accounts for 18% of the economy’s output and 47% of its workforce.
India is the second biggest producer of fruits and vegetables in the world. Yet,
according to the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) of the United Nations, some
194 million Indians are undernourished, the largest number of hungry people in any
single country. An estimated 15.2% of the population of India are too malnourished to
lead a normal life. A third of the world’s malnourished children live in India (n.p.) 216
But perhaps the closest aspect of human life associated with food security is the
environment. A major environmental problem is the destruction of natural habitats,
particularly through deforestation. 217 Industrial fishing has contributed to a significant
destruction of marine life and ecosystems. 218 Biodiversity and usable farmland have
also declined at a rapid pace.
Another significant environmental challenge is that of the decline in the
availability of fresh water. 219 Because of the degradation of soil or desertification,
decline in water supply has transformed what was once considered a public good into a
privatized commodity. 220 The poorest areas of the globe experience a disproportionate
share of water-related problems. The problem is further intensified by the consumption
of “virtual water”, wherein people use up water from elsewhere to produce consumer
products.221 The destruction of the water ecosystem may lead to the creation of “climate
refugees, people who are forcibly displaced due to effects of climate change and
disasters.222
Pollution through toxic chemicals has had a long-term impact on the environment.
The use of persistent organic pollutants (POPs) has led to significant industrial pollution.
223
Greenhouse gases, gases that trap sunlight and heat in the earth’s atmosphere,
contribute greatly to global warming. In turn, this process causes the melting of landbased and glacial ice with potentially catastrophic effects 224, the possibility of
substantial flooding, a reduction in the alkalinity of the oceans, and the destruction of
existing ecosystems. Ultimately, global warming poses a threat to the global supply of
107
The Contemporary World 2020
food as well as to human health. 225 Furthermore, population growth and its attendant
increase in consumption intensify ecological problems. The global flow of dangerous
debris is another major concern, with electronic waste often dumped in developing
countries.
There are different models and agenda pushed by different organizations to
address the issue of global food security. One of this is through sustainability. The
United Nations has set ending hunger, achieving food security and improved security,
and promoting sustainable agriculture as the second of its 17 Sustainable Goals (SDGs)
for the year 2030. The World Economic Forum (2010) also addressed this issue through
the New Vision of Agriculture (NVA) in 2009 wherein public-private partnerships were
established. 226 It has mobilized over $10 billion that reached smallholder farmers.
108
The Contemporary World 2020
References:
Sustainable Development
207.What is sustainable development? (n.d.). Retrieved from https://www.iisd.org/about- iisd/sustainabledevelopment
208.The Energy and Resources Institute (TERI). A Background Paper under contract. United
Nations
Department of Economic and Social Affairs Division for Sustainable Development, New Delhi,
April7.Retrievedfromhttps://sustainabledevelopment.un.org/content/documents/1489mitigation_
paper.pdf
209. https://sustainabledevelopment.un.org/topics/climatechange
210.Armitage, K.C. (2005). State of denial:The United States and the politics of global warming.
Globalizations. 2, (3).
211.Barrionuevo, A. (2007, January, 23). Springtime for ethanol. New York Times.
212.Conserve energy Future, “Environmental Problems,” Retrieved from https://www.conserve- energyfuture.com/15-current-environment-problems.php (accessed last July 29, 2020)
References:
Global Food Security
213.World Food Summit 1996, Rome Declaration on World Food Security
214.Food and Agriculture Organization. Food Security. Policy Brief, June 2006, Issue 2
215.Hanjra, Munir A.; Ferede, T.; Blackwell, J.; Jackson, T. M.; Abbas, A. 2013. Global food security:
facts, issues, interventions and public policy implications. In Hanjra, Munir A. (Ed.). Global food
security: emerging issues and economic implications. New York, NY,USA: Nova Science
Publishers.pp.1-35.(GlobalAgricultureDevelopments)Retrievedfrom
https://hdl.handle.net/10568/37212
216.Breene, k. (2016). Food security and why it matters. World Economic Forum.
217.Diamond, J. (2006). Collapse: How societies choose to fail or succeed. Nwe York: Penguin
218.Goldburg, R. J. (2008). Aquaculture, trade, and fisheries linkages:Unexpected synergies.
Globalization. 5, (2)
219.Conca, K. (2006). Governing water: Contentious transnational political and global
institution
building. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
220.Glantz, M. (1977). Desertification. Boulder, CO: Westview.
221. https://www.foodandwaterwatch.org.
109
The Contemporary World 2020
222. https://www.unhcr.org
223. Revkin, A. C. (2008, March 2). Skeptics on human climate impact seize on cold spell. New
York
Times.
224. Brown, D. (2007, December 17). As temperature rise, health could decline. Washington
Post.
225.Dinham, B. (2007). Pesticides. In Scholte, J.A. & Robertson, R. (eds.). Encyclopedia of globalization.
New York: MTM Publishing
226. World Economic Forum (2010). Realizing a new vision for agriculture: A roadmap for stakeholders.
Retrievedfromhttps://www.weforum.org/docs/IP/2016/NVA?WEF_IP_NVA_Roadmap_Report.p
df.
110
The Contemporary World 2020
UNIT VI TOWARDS A SUSTAINABLE WORLD
Unit Test:
A. Matching Type. Match the items in column with those in column B. Write the
letter before the number.
Column A
Column B
_______ 1. depredation
a. increased birth rates
_______ 2. waste disposal catastrophe
b. loss of biodiversity
_______ 3. overpopulation
c. dumping of urban waste; defiling of sea
and rivers by oil spills
_______ 4. extinction of particular species
_______ 5. massive deforestation
_______ 6. deadly acid rain
d. excessive amount of waste unloaded in
landfills
_______ 7. water pollution
e. Destruction of million-year-old
ecosystem
_______ 8. ozone layer depletion
f. CFC’s in the atmosphere
_______ 9. oxygen reduction in atmosphere
g. genetic modification in food production
_______ 10. radical food system alteration
h. fossil fuel combustion; massive rotting
of vegetables filling up garbage dumps
i. industrial and community waste residues
seeping into underground water tables,
rivers and seas
j. deforestation
B. Completion Type. Fill the blanks with
statement.
word or phrase to complete the
1.The global food security situation and outlook remains delicately _____________
amid surplus food production and the prevalence of hunger.
2.Food production outpaced _______________ over the past 50 years due to
expansion in crop area and irrigation.
3. ______________ poses complex challenges in terms of increased variability and risk
for food producers and the energy and water sectors.
111
The Contemporary World 2020
4.There is a need to look beyond agriculture and invest in affordable and
suitable_________________ if the problem of food insecurity is to be addressed in a
sustainable manner.
5. Proactive interventions and policies for tackling food security are discussed which
include issues such as agriculture for development, ecosystem services from
agriculture, and ________________.
6. Demand for food will be ___________ greater than it is today and the challenge of
food security requires the world to feed 9 billion people by 2050.
7. Global food security means
population.
delivering _______________ to the entire world
8. The security of food also means the _________________ of society such as
population growth, climate change, water scarcity, and agriculture.
9.The closest aspect of human life associated with food security is the ____________.
10. A major environmental problem is the _______________, particularly through
deforestation.
11.Decline in water supply is caused by degradation of soil or ________________.
12.______________ is the use up of water to produce consumer products.
13. One of the models and agenda being pushed by different organizations to address
the issue of global food security is through ______________.
14. The destruction of the water ecosystem may lead to the creation of
_________________, people who are forced to migrate due to lack of access to
wated due to flooding.
15. Instead of dealing with the causes of global warming, there is some interest in
“technological fixes” such as __________________.
C. Essay (5pts each)
1. List and explain 3 practical steps on how people may avert the impact of man-made
pollution on the environment.
112
The Contemporary World 2020
2. What examples of short term environmental projects do you propose that your
immediate community may adopt to curb the impact of environmental degradation?
3. Examine the existing environmental policy/ies in the Philippines. Which do you think
need to be revisited/amended to resolve the environmental crises in the Philippines?
Why?
113
The Contemporary World 2020
UNIT VII GLOBAL CITIZENSHIP
Coverage: Weeks 17
Duration: 3 hours
Learning Objectives: After studying the unit, the students should be able to:
●
Define global citizenship
●
Distinguish the salient features of global citizenship
●
Relates global citizenship with global economy and governance
●
Articulate a personal definition of global citizenship
GLOBAL CITIZENSHIP
Global Citizenship as Defined
As there is no widely accepted definition of global citizenship, oftentimes,
educators use this term loosely. Having been derived from the word city, the term
citizenship tends to suggest allegiance to one’s own country or state. Quitely so, the
concept of citizenship has taken on a new meaning from its historical usage as it has
gone “global”. 227
According to Oxfam International, global citizenship is the idea that, as people,
we are all citizens of the globe who have an equal responsibility for what happens on,
and to our world. 228 This means to say that every global citizen has a duty to address
issues affecting our being citizens. As there could be no formal process to become a
global citizen, holding this citizenship status is something that we all have a right to and
obligation as well.
Given this above definition, citizenship can thus be associated with rights and
obligations. For instance, the right to vote and the obligation to pay taxes. Both rights
and obligations link the individual to the state. It also has to do with our attitude. We
need to be willing to engage and to spend time and effort to the community of which we
feel part of.
Caecilia Johanna van Peski (as cited in Baraldi, 2012) defined global citizenship
“as a moral and ethical disposition that can guide the understanding of individuals or
groups of local and global contexts, and remind them of their relative responsibilities
within various communities.” Global citizens are the glue which binds local communities
together in an increasingly globalized world. In van Peski’s words, “global citizens might
114
The Contemporary World 2020
be a new type of people that can travel within these various boundaries and somehow
still make sense of the world”. 229
Salient Features of Global Citizenship
Global citizenship may seem to have far broader meanings than the above given
ones. Equally, it is still important to note its salient features 230 for a better understanding
of this concept.
1. Global citizenship as a choice and a way of thinking
People come to consider themselves as global citizens through various formative
life experiences and have different interpretations of what it means to them. For many,
the practice of global citizenship is primarily exercised at home through engagement in
global issues or with different cultures in a local setting. For others, global citizenship
means firsthand experience with different countries, people and cultures.
2. Global citizenship as self-awareness and awareness of others
Self-awareness helps students identify with the universalities of human
experience, thus increasing their identification with fellow human beings and their sense
of responsibility toward them.
3. Global citizenship as they practice cultural empathy
Cultural empathy or intercultural competence is commonly articulated as a goal
of global education. Intercultural competence occupies a central position in higher
education’s thinking about global citizenship and is seen as an important skill in the
workplace.
4. Global citizenship as the cultivation of principled decision making
Global citizenship entails an awareness of the interdependence of individuals
and systems as well as a sense of responsibility that follows from it. Although the goal
of undergraduate education should not be to impose a correct set of answers, critical
thinking, cultural empathy and ethical systems and choices are an essential foundation
to principled decision making.
5. Global citizenship as participation in the social and political life of one’s community
There are various types of communities that range from local to global, from
religious to political group. Global citizens feel a sense of connection towards their
communities and translate this connection to participation.
115
The Contemporary World 2020
Global Citizenship and Globalization
Global citizenship does not automatically entail a single attitude and a particular
value with globalization. We must remember that globalization is not a single
phenomenon; rather, there are many globalizations. They are bound to be multiple
futures for multiple globalizations. These globalizations created enemies because
according to one broad view, globalization failed to deliver its promises. 231 The socalled bottom billion lacks infrastructures and has been disenfranchised. The opponents
of globalization blame either Westernization or global capitalism. Thus, the enemies
resist globalization, especially when it comes to global economy and global governance.
Global Citizenship and Global Economy
There are three approaches to global economic resistance. Trade protectionism
involves the systematic government intervention in foreign trade through tariffs and nontariff barriers in order to encourage domestic producers and deter their foreign
competitors. 232 Although there exists a widespread consensus regarding its inefficiency,
trade protectionism is still popular since it shields the domestic economy from systemic
shocks. Fair trade is a different approach to economic globalization, which emerged as
a counter to neoliberal “free trade” principles. 233
Fair trade aims at a moral and equitable global economic system in which, for
instance, price is not set by the market; instead, it is negotiated transparently by both
producers and consumers. Its ability to supply a mass market and its applicability to
manufacture products are also doubted. The third form of resistance to economic
globalization relates to helping the bottom billion. 234 Increasing aid is only one of the
many measures that is required. International norms and standards can be adapted to
the needs of the bottom billion. The reduction of trade barriers would also reduce the
economic marginalization of these people and their nations.
Global Citizenship and Global Governance
When it comes to dealing with political globalization, increased accountability 235
and transparency are the key issues. All political organizations, at different levels,
should be more accountable for their actions because they are now surrounded by an
“ocean of opacity”.236 Increased transparency has been aided by various mechanism
such as transnational justice systems, international tribunals, civil society and
particularly the Transparency International.
Like globalization, resistance to globalization is multiple, complex, contradictory,
and ambiguous. This movement also has the potential to emerge as the new public
sphere, which may uphold progressive values such as autonomy, democracy, peace,
ecological sustainability, and social justice. These forces of resistance are products of
globalization and can be seen as globalization from below. 237 The impetus for such a
116
The Contemporary World 2020
movement comes from individuals, groups and organizations which are oppressed (i.e.,
self-perception) by globalization from above (neoliberal economic systems or
aggressively expanding nations and corporations). They seek a more democratic
process of globalization. However, globalization from below also involves less visible,
more right-wing elements, such as the America First Party and the Taliban. 238
The World Social Forum (WSF) is centered on addressing the lack of democracy
in economic and political affairs. 239 However, the diversity of elements involved in WSF
hinders the development of concrete political proposals. A significant influence on WSF
has been that of cyberactivism, which is based on the “cultural logic of networking” and
“virtual movements”, such as Global Huaren. This cyberpublic was formed as a protest
against the violence, discrimination, and hatred experienced by Chinese residents in
Indonesia after the 1997 Asian financial crisis. In 1998, worldwide rallies condemning
the violence were made possible through the Global Huaren.
Given that there is no world government, the idea of global citizenship demands
the creation of rights and obligations. However, fulfilling the promises of globalization
and the solution to the problems of the contemporary world does not lie on single entity
or individual, but on citizens, the community, and the different organization in societies.
117
The Contemporary World 2020
References:
Global Citizenship
227.Global
education
and
global
citizenship.
(n.d.).
Retrieved
from
https://www.globalization101.org/global-education-and-global-citizenship/
228.https://issues.tigweb.org/globalcitizenship
229.Baraldi, C. (ed.). (2012). What is global citizenship?Participation, facilitatiton, and meditation:
Children and young people in their social contexts. Abingdon, United
Kingdom: Routledge.
230. Schattle, Han. (2007). The Practices of Global Citizenship. Lanham: Rowman and Littlefield
Publishers, Inc.
231.Cohen, D. (2006). Globalization and its enemies. MA: MIT Press.
232.McAleese, D. (2007). Trade Protectionism. In Scholte, J. A. & Robertson, R. (eds.) Encyclopedia of
globalization. New York: MTM Publishing.
233.Nicholls, & Opal, C. (2005). Fair trade: Market-driven ethical consumption. London: Sage.
234.Collier, P. (2007). The bottom billion: Why the poorest countries are failing and what can be done
about it. New York: Oxford University Press
235. Germain, R. D. (2004). Globalising accountability within the International Organization of Credit:
Financial governance and the publish sphere. Global Society 18, (3)
236. Holzner, B. & Holzner, L. (2006). Transparency in global change: The vanguard of the open society.
Pittsburgh: University of Pittsburgh Press.
237. Smith, J. (2008). Social movements for global democracy. Baltimore: John Hopkins University
Press.
238. Della Porta, D., Andretta, M., Mosca, L.,
& Reiter, H. (2006). Globalization from below:
Transnational activists and protest network. Minneapolis: Universityof Minnesota Press.
239.Fisher, W. F. & Ponniah, T. (2003). Another world is possible: Popular alternatives to globalization
at
the World Social Forum. London: Zed Books.
118
The Contemporary World 2020
UNIT VI GLOBAL CITIZENSHIP
Unit Test
A. Multiple Choice. Choose the letter of the correct answer.
___________1. Both rights and obligations link the individual to the
a. family
b. community
c. church
d. state
___________2. Opponents of globalization blame the so-called
a. Westernization
b. human capitalism c. ASEAN integration
d. none of these
___________3. This cyberpublic was formed as a protest against the violence,
discrimination, and hatred experienced by Chinese residents in Indonesia after the 1997
Asian financial crisis
a.World Social Forum
b. Global Huaren
c. Amnesty International
d.Taliban
___________4. Resistance to globalization has the following attributes except
a.democratic
b. complex
c. contradictory
d. ambiguous
___________5. In political organization, increased transparency has been aided by
various mechanism such as the following except
a.transnational justice systems
b. international tribunals
c. civil society
d. human amnesty
___________6.This approach to global economic resistance involves the systematic
government intervention in foreign trade through tariffs and non-tariff barriers.
a. Free trade
b.Trade protectionism
c. Fair trade
d. none of these
___________7. A significant influence on WSF has been that of cyberactivism, which is
based on
a. cultural logic of networking and virtual movements
b. citizen’s intiatives and community action groups
c. transnational justice systems and international tribunals
d. political movements and global alliances
___________8. This approach to global economic resistance aims at a moral and
equitable global economic system whereby price is negotiated transparently by both
producers and consumers.
a. Trade protectionism
b. Free trade
c. Fair trade
d. none of these
119
The Contemporary World 2020
___________9. World Social Forum (WSF) is an annual meeting of civil society
organizations that aims to
a. address lack of democracy in economic and political affairs
b. raise awareness on the condition of those in the marginalized societies
c. proposes alternatives for the anti-globalization and altermundo activists
d. All of these
___________10. According to van Peski, global citizenship is a moral and ethical
disposition that
a.guides the understanding of individuals or groups of local and global contexts
b. provides awareness on the rights and responsibilities of a global citizen
c.reminds individuals or groups of locals of their relative responsibilities within various
communities
d.entails rights and obligations
B. Modified True or False. Identify whether the statement is correct or not. Write
True if it is correct, False if not. Modify the word or phrase that makes it incorrect.
1.Increasing aid is the only measure that is required to help the bottom billion.
2. Increased in trade barriers would reduce the economic marginalization of the bottom
billion and their nations.
3.Trade protectionism involves the systematic government intervention in foreign trade
through tariffs and non-tariff barriers.
4.When it comes to dealing with political globalization, increased accountability and
transparency are the key issues.
5. The diversity of elements involved in WSF allows for the the development of concrete
political proposals.
6. International norms and standards can be adapted to provide the needs of the bottom
billion.
7. The idea of global citizenship demands the creation of rights and obligations.
8. The dynamics of globalization demands the efforts of the whole array of intergovernmental organizations.
9. Fulfilling the promises of globalization and the solution to the
contemporary world lies on single entity or individual.
problems of the
10.Reduction of trade barriers would also reduce the economic marginalization of these
people and their nations.
120
The Contemporary World 2020
B. Essay (10 pts)
1. On a clean sheet of paper, draw your own concept of a global citizen and compare
this with those of your other classmates. In what aspects/features are they similar and
/or different?
121