Globalization and localization in the view of technological development
The process, notion and factors of globalization
A book was published in 1946, written by physicists and military officers who
participated in the scientific research or organization concerning the creation of the
atomic bomb. Even the title seems to be important from our aspect: “A world or not
even one..”. It refers to the presumption that the world as a whole has got its future. As
we can not talk about the same Earth if some regions are missing. Every study of the
book reflects the perception that international relations have changed or should be
changed since or together with the birth and use of the atomic bomb. Hostility is not
only unpleasant or condemnable, but it is inadmissible, as well. Similar to this trend, the
forms of relations also are being re-evaluated. For example, besides the dominance of
the valuable liberty of researchers, the authors of the book propose the establishment of
international organizations to control institutions of scientific life and technological
development, furthermore, they think that supra-national alliance should guard military
issues, as well.
The authors of this book write about a crisis filling the world, whose exact meaning is
revealed in an article at the end of the book. This is an article that analyses the nearest
future of the world is attached to the book by the Association of the American Atomic
Physicists. In the first part, this expectable crisis is explained, not as an economic crisis,
but as a long, peculiar process in which all the important principles changed after the
explosion of the atomic bomb. Our values change, as moving over our partial and
regional values, we will take into consideration the aim of global survival, therefore,
this will be the condition for regional life, as well. A moral and cultural crisis, rooted in
the change of values will also occur.
According to the authors, another feature of the nearest future of the world is that its
problems will appear on global level. If any scientific development occurs or a new
technological solution is developed, their results can not be confined within the
boundary of a country (not even for a short time). Results and consequences will expand
rapidly over the world, organizing the events into the lines of unification.
The third feature foreseen for the world concerns the role of politics. In the authors’
opinion, the significance of politics as a special regulating system of society will
definitely increase. This change will mean, on one side, the widening of the operating
area of politics, i.e. regulating principles and methods of politics will operate in a more
clear and general way, even in spheres of society where they had been in the shadow
until now. On the other side, it will mean that politics will seem to be as determinant,
not as regulator on sensitive areas.
50 years after the publication of the book, we can say that this forecast is
unprecedented, because none of the other studies could predict the future of the world
so precisely. These three features briefly described above are interconnected. The
change of politics toward the creation of harmony of regionalization and globalization
can be tolerated only in a global world. The co-operation, mutual or multi-lateral
interconnection introduced by the first feature become a reality, instead of utopia or
idealism only in a global world.
This forecast is of wide scope and now, after 50 years we can say that its envisioned
future is being realized. Many elements have occurred in certain aspects, for instance,
the role of politics has increased, the crisis foreseen has widened and is endures longer
than thought earlier, and the signs of globalization are evident and significant. In other
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aspects, for example in the relationship between globalization and regionalization, the
(little bit sharper) direction can be seen, just as foreseen by the atomic physicists 50
years ago.
In the book “A world or not even one..” a totally new approach appears, namely the
global point of view. People become more and more aware of the fact that the world has
started its way on globalization. However, many things considered to be more important
has covered this fact and globalization has not brought any novelties in everyday life,
yet.
In the middle of the 20th century people had to think deeply about the world as a whole.
They realized that here, under the shadow of the atomic bomb those things are born that
can influence everybody’s life, regardless of where he/she lives on the Earth, whether
he/she has a car or not, or whether he/she hunts for food or gets it served in a restaurant.
Many newer and newer technological and non-technological ideas have been developed
for the improvement of mass production, the great result of the 20th century. New
disciplines have been born, for instance organization of production, theory of
management, work sociology, work psychology, automatization, robotics, ergonomics.
Mass media requires many raw materials, much energy and a large market. This shows
even in a calculable form that world advances on the way of globalization. We do not
want to provide analyses concerning the inflow of raw materials, but it is evident that
raw materials are exploited at one place of the world and products are made at quite a
different place. Just this only fact refers that production can not tolerate or does not
tolerate politically defined borders in our days, as the establishment of conditions of
technology development and production seems to be more important. For this, new
possibilities of energy production have been used – with the construction of nuclear
plants in the USA, Europe and in other parts of the world. A new world has been
created where everyone needs to face the same social, economic and political
consequences of nuclear plants, regardless of the political, cultural, or development state
of his/her country’s. This is a true example of globalization. Waking up from energy
shortage, industry and agriculture, already based on new energy sources, started a rapid
development in the 2nd half of the 20th century. This rate of industrial and agricultural
development and expansion of markets quickly eliminates political borders i.e. it does
not respect them at all.
Let us take another example! Though car driving is more than 100 years old, it has
become a worldwide phenomenon in the last 50 years. What does it mean from the
aspect of globalization? After the phases of proper plan and research, cars produced in a
great number (due to the economics of scale of production) have to be sold; and mainly
not within the borders of the producer country. Logically, cars sold outside the country
carry the infrastructure requirements necessary for their use.
When cars arrive at countries through their international ways, their usage requires
internationally unified conditions, as products work ideally only in conditions suitable
to them. Therefore roads, gas, servicing network, etc. should be of a pre-defined quality.
On these roads, not only cars flow into the target country, but people also arrive here
who have produced them or who use them, and they bring their own needs and habits.
Roads open the country into the world. They work as an information network where
traveling people bring and/or take, or transmit information.
We live the same way, buy the same products and create the same conditions for life in
order to use our tools, just like others do in other countries worldwide.
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Considering the history of cars or any other modern technological tools (computers,
mobile phones, modern office equipment, household appliances, etc.), I think it is very
important to analyze their spread in order to understand that through getting embedded
into society, this specific tool induces changes that was not planned earlier. The logical
process of globalization appears simply if we examine a history of any tool. The
example of cars and the history of their culture shows that even their production links
many countries, due to the following phenomena: planning groups are international, raw
materials arrive from several countries, co-operation in production reaches an
international level, trade (and its routes and methods) penetrates through the world,
infrastructure ensuring suitable operation has to be the same all over the world,
furthermore, none of the places of the world can get rid of problems caused by these
phenomena (pollution, accidents, etc.). And we must survive and live together with the
effects of not only one tool, but the with the accumulated effects of several tools!
We must acknowledge that technological change globalizes the world in the sense that
the same tools are used in all societies, regardless of their political and institutional form
and they get involved with the operating system in the world through these tools.
However, this situation opens the way to other cultures, creating the danger of
uniformity. It is dangerous because uniformity joining to technology is violent, because
it is “well aware” of its overwhelming strength. If we buy cars, we need to build roads
and standards of “uniformity” arrive, putting uniqueness into background. The same
roads have the same services, parking places, gas stations, restaurants, post offices,
shops, benches, trees and grass, etc.
Globalization and sustainability
Tendencies what have been said above draw our attention to the fact that globalization
induced by technological development appears as a complex and natural consequence
and it prepares the ground for all other types of globalization. The existence of
technological globalization provides the basis for political, cultural, even economic
globalization. If technological globalization has been realized, logically, it gives birth to
its consequences. If we want to counteract the uniform effects of globalization, it is not
enough that we fight against political or economic globalization, as they are only
consequences of the former, but we have to seek a different method. During the
selection of the suitable method, we need to take into consideration relations that exist
between technological development and other factors of the society, because they go on
existing.
We have seen that globalization is a process spreading through the whole world in its
events and consequences, but there are no global concepts for the management and
governance of globalization. Violent economic and political globalization relying on the
spread of developed technologies gained support according to the interests of small
groups, but tendencies for deeper understanding or active management of the
consequences of this phenomenon began to appear only at the end of the 80’s.
One of these tendencies is the “discovery”, perception of localization as process and
exploration of the history of localization, in order to understand or to seek present
possibilities. Of course, it is very important to decide on the issues whether localization
as a process should be put as an opposition to globalization, or it should be considered
as a parallel process or as a process exercising its effects together with globalization,
according to current observations.
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A new slogan was born at a Canadian world conference in 1984: “Think globally, act
locally!” A new notion, namely localization appeared in the professional literature,
providing explanations for many processes I have mentioned earlier in the first part of
my paper. These processes are able to defend regions that are autonomous parts of the
world against all forms of uniformity, namely integration, colonization or globalization.
Different interpretations have been born since then, those that put localization efforts as
an opposition to globalization, and those that predict that processes of globalization and
localization will characterize the future of the world together. Easily available
information about the world have made much people inquiring about their own
environment, even they made them active in solving their own problems. It is true, for
example that the pollution of the environment is also a global problem, but it has been
emerged or it is being emerged through concrete processes. Concrete industrial,
agricultural plants deteriorate soil, water, and disturb the healthy structure of the
atmosphere. These buildings exist somewhere close to some people and affect them.
One must not wait until a future World Government counteracts to these problems – as
it will be too late. We must make something now and we must require the
environmental-friendly operation of plants.
The state of the environment appeared as a global factor in the 1st World Model in 1972,
but it was not included in the direct reasons of the near world catastrophe as four
different factors were supposed to induce future crises. However, a great number of
facts have appeared that showed the world different than this perspective, furthermore
these facts became well-known worldwide due to the rapid and easy diffusion of
information. The “hasty” development and its violent diffusion, even naïve beliefs on
the rapid solving of problems (based on scientific and technological results), like
hunger, for instance, lead to serious tragedies. Problems became really “perceivable” in
the process of environmental deterioration. Environment appeared as a really global
factor, at least in the sense that its state is becoming worse and worse everywhere.
Therefore many people think that globalization is primarily related to environmental
issues.
In our visions, the Earth with its deteriorated environment is becoming a more and more
terrible monster, where even the conditions for life may not exist for long. Our fears
were founded (and we could not get rid of them even today), as many books, studies,
periodicals, reports justify this. In order to solve these problems, the 1st World Model
proposed a deliberately retarded, even stagnating development in some aspects, until at
least the time when science works out a better solution. However, as the past 15-20
years have shown, this way was considered to be non-followable by not only less
developed countries, but by developed countries, as well.
Next, the concept of the new expectations is clearly written in the Bruntland report,
namely the needs of the present have to be satisfied through the way that the
possibilities of the future generations can not be endangered. This is the harmonized
development concept, as the report puts it, then it remarks that it includes limitations, as
well.
According to the theory of the research of the future, we have concluded the future
based on tendencies of the past and the present. This is a theoretically right conclusion
and it was necessary. The issue then was that when we received the images of the future
judged to be extremely negative in the 1st World Report, we raised the question: How
we should turn it into an action program? Or putting it in another way: What should we
do and how, in order to avoid this “forecasted” future? For a long time, no programs
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could be worked out that were accepted by everyone. The Bruntland report turned the
problem the way that it described what future should look like, driving the
characteristics of normative forecast into the foreground. It is much easier to develop an
action program for this case.
Globalization and localization
Building upon the statements on “Our future” described in the Bruntland report, the
theory and practice of the “sustainable development” has been born in the last few
years. Sustainable development almost literally used the definition introduced in “Out
future” that was developed to ensure a harmonized development. Basically, two aspects
need to be taken into consideration, one is to respect the interests of the current
generations and the other is not to harm life conditions of the future generations, i.e.
they should have at least the same number of choices as we have now. From the aspect
of environmental issues, one can say that production, distribution and consumption
should be changed in a way that assure protection, not pollution. Now we can see
several regulations that thrive to achieve this, and local solutions came into foreground.
It means we are facing a certain level of pollution all the time. The emergence and
success of new technologies that replace polluting technologies depend on local
conditions.
Besides the problem of the environmental deterioration, another serious issue appears:
while energy supplies are disposable only of limited quantity, the world would need
“unlimited” quantity of energy. This issue got considerable emphasis even in the 1 st
World Model. Energy resources were divided into replaceable and non-replaceable
categories (or primary and secondary, renewable and non-renewable alternative
resources) then. Of course, the problem means that non-replaceable energy resources
will cease to exist at some time. The depletion of non-renewable resources used
primarily to found industrial growth threatened the world with a global crisis. In order
to assure sustainable development, the solution can be the use of alternative (renewable)
energy resources. Their quality and use conditions are also determined locally. In their
actual form, they can be rather applied to produce energy in “small quantities”, so they
can rather be used in their own small surroundings.
One may say that the possibility and the requirement of localization and its strong
scientific and technical foundations start to be formulated. This justifies local economy
and production. World energy problems can not be solved on a global level, and the
state of the environment can not be improved on a global level, either. It can not be
expected from the mankind to undergo an ethical (and global) revolution that could lead
to a more careful, economic and responsible production and economy to preserve the
possibilities of future generations. The solution of the problems is localized. Therefore
not only the deterioration, but the preservation of the environment can be solved on a
one-by-one basis, selecting the most suitable method to avoid local dangers. Actors of
the local economy find it easy to change values, they easily accept, understand and
emotionally prefer the protection of their own environment, the importance and
significance of the sustainable economy. It will be more concrete and easy to take the
responsibility for the results and consequences of production and service provision
within the one’s own environment.
The use of alternative energy resources can be solved in every local economy, of course,
through the adaptation to local conditions. Altogether, we must face several difficulties.
Researches are going on to explore alternative resources, and hopefully scientific
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research will soon bring newer and newer results in this field. The developers of
suitable economic solutions that adapt to the given conditions need to perform much
work. Dealing with systems that ensure “harmonized development” in the future, we
must take into consideration the fact that they will be new in the sense of denying and
exceeding the current large systems, for example the huge over-continental network of
energy producers and service providers. Deep conflicts of interests can be foreseen, but
the most decisive factor in this fight will be that operation of huge networks can be
ensured at a less and less extent. After some time of reaching a certain development
level, forecasted price increase will stimulate local economies to elaborate the
production and provision of alternative energy resources, because the community will
find it more economical than large networks. As we have proved, the process of
globalization is a durable, irreversible, unstoppable and unavoidable process supported
by technological development, and we have also seen that together with globalization,
another similarly strong, irreversible, technologically founded, unavoidable process,
namely localization also exercises its effects.
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