GLOBALIZATION

Various definitions of globalization

 For the economist
-Increased free trade
-Speed of trade
-Global economic organizations
-Regional economic blocs

 For culture and communication

-Global village
-Communications technology as shrinking our world
-Cultural imperialism

The need for an interdisciplinary approach

“We need to transcend our disciplinary
boundaries”
Working definition of globalization

Steger: “globalization refers to the expansion and intensification of social

relations and consciousness across world-time and world-space.

Expansion and Intensification

Increasing liquidity and growing multi-directional flows as well.

Liquidity Increase ease of movement of people, things,

information, and places in the global age.
Intensification and Acceleration of Social Exchanges and
Activities
1.From snail mail to Facebook
2.Live television
3.Increased travel (cheap flights)

Occurs subjectively
1.We think about the world
2.We associate ourselves with global trends
3.We feel some sense of responsibility (climate change)
(maybe a basis for your own globalization story)
Metaphor of globalization (liquid)

“Liquid phenomena not only move easily, but once they are on the
move they are difficult to stop.”

“Various forms of connectivity”

o They are diverse (can be economic, political, cultural,
etc.)
o They are enabled by various factors, pressures, media,
etc.
o They are uneven (different types of interconnection)

Expansion and Stretching of Social Relations

1.NGOs
2.Friendships/Relationships
3.Government associations
4.MNCs
• Globalization – Interdisciplinary subject
which relates to all branches and fields of
knowledge
• Main objective of the study of Globalization
THINK GLOBALLY AND ACT LOCALLY!
So knowledge about globalization is
important part of your academic
knowledge !
Changed economic activity of the society

• In our days no one sphere of life, including

economic sphere can act independent and
isolated. All processes and events should be
examined and understood in the broad sense of
economic, political, social, ecological and
demographic context, taking into account their
interdependence.

• The area of economic science is already too

narrow to explain all the aspects of the complex
and interdependent world.
 Globalization of Economics and Development –
Two Sites of One Process
WHY?

• The main spheres of life are inseparable;

• Economics is one of these spheres of life;
• The technological development fosters the development
of all other spheres;
• Simultaneousness development of communication
technologies, culture, education and etc.;
• Trends for universality of development;
• Economic activity of the society has changed;
• The universal and national development are tightly
bounded
Our choice is to examine globalization of economics in
the broad context of development !
 The Nature of Globalization

• Till 19th century “global” meant “spherical”;

• At the end of 19th century “global” meant
“the whole world”;
• 20th century “global” meant “definition of
capacity and dissemination of events and
processes”
 Some special features of globalization in
present days
• Growing interdependence of all processes
• Establishing of a global financial-economic
area
• Information technologies
• Change in the state’s functions –
vanishing of the national borders
• Universality of the world – dissemination of
the democratic system and socio – cultural
values
 Some conclusions
• “Global” – a new scientific category, which treats
the processes and events on a global scale
• “Globalization” – an approach which expands
and deepens the economic theory as well as
other scientific fields
• Subjects of globalizations are:
- global companies;
- regional structures;
- the state;
- international economic organizations
 Theoretical discussion about Globalization

• Second half of 20th century – the global idea

emerged in philosophy and political science. Then
it was transferred to communications theory and
finally conquered economic thinking;
• The 90-ties – active discussion on the nature and
essence of globality and globalization as a new
stage of economics and world development.
Influence of Globalization on different spheres
of life
• Economic – the trade roads were built; global
companies started their functions; global economy and
finance system have been created.
• Political – tribes transformed to peoples, nations and
states formed, after that regional unions and finally
international authorities of governance.
• Geographical – the great migration of peoples started,
new lands were founded, empires created.
• Ideological – unified social ideas spread on huge
territories
• Informational – the speech and writing were created,
after that literature, finally massmedia and Internet
 Common Characteristics of the Globalization
Process
• The dynamic development of the globalization
process follows the development of the society.
• As a phenomenon it has two levels – general
civilization and formative ones
• Contradictory process which has its positive and
negative sides
• It is pursued by anti-social phenomena
 The Role of the State
Different statements:
I. Against the State
• Some scholars predict the “end” of national state
power.
• Some argue that the state may only adjust to
globalization, without having an active role in it.
• Some believe that the state will disappear.
Michael Sandel;
Charles Maynes;
Zygmunt Bauman
 The role of the state
Which structures will replace the State?
The answer of the scholars, who share
these statements is:
• The global companies or
• The International organizations, such as
UN, which has instruments for realizing
global governance.
 The role of the state
II. In defense of the State

The facts of practice show that the role of

the state is increasing in all aspects of
social life, including economics. Economic
globalization does not remove the
necessity for functioning of the state.
 The role of the state
Some arguments in defense of the state
• The state has guaranteed internal and external
security;
• The state has underpinned the law;
• The state has funded national welfare systems;
• The state has provided the structures for popular
representation
• The state has built the framework for economic
and social activities.
So the state plays fundamental role in creating of
institutional forms and strategies of globalization
processes and supporting the process of capital
concentration.
Two realities co-exist:
1. The so called borderless virtual world where
geography does not count, and communication
and business transactions can occur in a
matter of seconds.
2. The other world is that of the everyday life of
people in which borders still count, local
realities are still complex and very different
among themselves, and most fundamentally
where social and economic problems still need
to be addressed.
Why have not all countries benefited to the same
extent from globalization?
• Countries that do not have strong
institutional framework, as well as solid
social policies and networks to cope with
negative externalities most suffer the
negative effects of globalization.
• External factors, such as the global trading
environment, are crucial in creating
greater opportunities or in posing
constraints on a country’s economic
growth.
 REGIONALISM
Regionalism originated along with globalization
and approximately at the same time.
Factors leading to the formation of regional
structures during ages:
• Political;
• Geographical;
• Religious;
• Military and defense;
• Economical.
 REGIONALISM
• new wave of regional structures in Europe:
1948 – Organization for European Economic Cooperation;
1950 – European Coal and steel Community;
1957 – European Economic Community;
1959 – European Free Trade Association
1949 – 1991 – Council for Mutual Economic Assistance
(socialist countries)
 REGIONALISM
economic regional structures with mutual political,
social or military and strategic goals:
- EU;
- ASEAN
- NAFTA
these regional structures became even more
closed with very clear mutual economic, social,
cultural & educational relations.

They form the new structure of the world

 REGIONALISM
Economical aspects:
• Similar economic development;
• Common priorities;
• Forming common economic model;
• Regional competitiveness and
comparative advantages in a global arena;
• Common reaction to the risks of the
environment
 REGIONALISM
Some conclusions:
Objective, real, social and historical
movement in which economic reasons
dominate. They reflect and influence on
political, cultural and educational activities.
New international relations appear.
Regionalism does not question the state
and its future role.
 REGIONALISM
Some conclusions:
• The new major integration processes of
the epoch – globalization and regionalism
– established themselves in the 90-ties.
• Regionalism is an instrument of the state
for attaining the further goals of
globalization.
• In present days globalization is realizing
through regional structures.
 Civilization basis of Globalization
The analysis of the globalization should be
made at two levels:
• General civilization level
• Formative level (social system)
There is a clear dependence of globalization
from the civilization model and from the
dominated social system.
 Civilization
• Civilization is a complex society or culture group
developed upon common or similar principles,
with common or similar characteristics and
marks.
• Civilization is a system of nations and states
which have had their own specific historic
destiny in a long period of time.
• Culture is a subsystem of civilization. In one
civilization can develop and exist a lot of similar
cultures with their national specifics.
The engines of the civilization progress are:
• The permanent fight between man and
nature for surviving and satisfying man’s
needs.
• Factors of progress – science, technologies,
labor etc.
• Factors of social conflicts – properties,
capitals, territories.
 Three mechanisms for society’s
integration
In each society the three mechanisms exist, but one of them
dominates!

Culture Ideology
An integrated System of ideas,
Religion which serve the
System of pattern of human
knowledge, belief politics, recommend
values, practices public and political
and norms, and behavior that
depends upon the structure of the
related to the idea society and the
of God. capacity for
symbolic thought type of relations
A composition of between man and
attitudes between and social
learning authorities
God and man.
 These three mechanisms have four main
functions in different societies:
1. Unite the individuals;
2. Create social capital, which makes easier
the achievement of common aims;
3. Establish the authority’s functions and
inequality;
4. Create life aims and ambitions.
When some of the three mechanisms do not
work effectively, the society is in a
condition of DISINTEGRATION!
• Lack of trust;
• Growing criminal activities;
• A lot of anomalies;
• The social processes are not managed;
• The private interests dominate over the
common values
Formative basis of Globalization
Main features of the capitalistic system:
• Intensified and strong competition between
corporations and leading countries;
• Technological contest – new form of competition;
• The corporate secret and informational isolation;
• The market economy and the state set different
conditions for going off the globalization process;
• Models of development – for each country they
determine the aim and the character of the
economic growth
 Conclusions
• Globalization manifests in different way at
civilization and formative level.
• At civilization level it should develop and
enrich the humanity without breaking its
diversity.
• According to the social system of the
country, different social and economic
consequences are shown.
 factors

globalization

contradictions tendencies

GLOBALIZATION EFFECT

Global shaping of
regionalism
economics

Conclusions for Europe

• Globalization is one of the forces of
development putting the other factors of
development and growth on a new basis
and in new relations.

• Globalization effect – the systematic

result of the influence of the globalization
on the other factors and forces of
development
 Systematic result of the influence of
the globalization on the other factors
Globalization
Effect and forces of development

economic General historical

Factors Manifest on
two levels
non economic Formative level
(social system)
• On the general historical level
globalization is affected by several main
factors:
- technical and technological progress;
- quality and content of interaction
between man and nature;
- culture, media and communication;
- organization of public production.
• Within the frames of the social system, in
our case the capitalist system,
globalization takes place under the
influence of the following factors:
- market environment, market mechanisms
- competition;
- state;
- international financial system;
- surrounding natural environment
 Economics

Media and
Technologies
communication

Globalization

Culture Democracy and

politics
 The role of technological factor
• Technologies are a product of science.
• Technologies are materialized reality of science.

The effect of and role of technologies in life

depend on the way of application and the goals
pursued.
 Technologies – the main source for
development
• 17th century – scientific revolution –
scientific knowledge was applied and
machines were invented.
• 18th century – the beginning of the
industrial revolution.
• 19th century - intensive application of
science in the material production.
• 20th century – inventing the computer and
its using, replacing some functions of the
machines
 Technologies – the main source for
development
• 21th century – expansion and
development of the functions of
technology. Technology acquires also
some social characteristics - new
technologies can reproduce biological and
mental functions.
 The effects of technologies are:
• A possibility and necessity for public production
to go out of the national-state frames;
• A possibility and necessity for the management
of the society to be performed by means of
information technologies and communication
networks;
• Acceleration of the synthesis between the
results of R/D and the transfer of technologies;
• Formation of a new type of consumer demand
which can not be shut off within the frames of
national markets
 Industrial revolution
created the global market

Technological revolution
created the global society
and the global economy
Negative tendencies of technologies (5)
• Technological competition;
• Technological dictate;
• Technological determinism;
• Technological imperialism;
• There is no free movement of technology
 Global media and communication
• Modern communications and their basic form –
media are a product of the new technologies
and major circumstances which have given rise
to globalization.
• They ate total global structure with universal
effects.
• They have organizational transformation on a
company level:
– At first a process of uniting in communication and
media complexes began;
– Then their merger into huge industrial and financial
corporations.
• The main economic force of media and
communications is global capital, which
through them turns into a universal force
of society
• Media have become a sub-system of
global corporations and a means of
realizing their global strategies
• Media in itself have turned into a global
and universal factor of development.
 Culture
• In the past years culture and economics
were treated as separated and
independent spheres.
• The importance of culture in the overall
development of society is evidently
increasing, showing itself in economics
too.
 Economics - Culture
• The common feature between them is that both
follow the overall development of the society;
• The development of culture is not always
following the development cycle of economics;
• The cultural specifics of a nation, state or region
is much more clear than their economic or
political specifics;
• Cultural processes are determined by the
national and state differences.
 Culture - Globalization
• The cultural processes gain the importance of
major conditions of life and affect each human
activity;
• Culture is turning into one of the basic factors of
economic growth, while cultural product is
among the new strategic resources of society;
• Culture became a specific sphere of
entrepreneurship;
• Culture, education and science form “new
economy” - knowledge economy
 Is their Global Culture?
• The early 70-ties the French Ministry of
Culture introduced in the scientific space
the concept “cultural imperialism”;
• 80-ties and 90-ties the theses of “war of
cultures”, “conflict of civilizations” were
very popular;
• Later appear the concept of
“Americanization of world culture”
 Some conclusions
• The very globalization of economics,
science and technologies require a very
high degree of development of cultures.
• The concept of “glocalization”, introduced
in Japan in 1996 a combination of “global”
and “local”, expressing the need for
globalization to be carried out in
compliance with the specifics of the
individual countries.
• The main contradictions of culture in the
global world is between its economic form
of realization and its aesthetic and artistic
nature.
 Democracy and politics
• Democracy means that peoples and their
parliaments should be sovereign judges in their
own countries. They should choose the national
model of development and solve the main
problems of organization and functioning of the
national economics.
• In practice – the decisions are taken at the head
offices of the global corporations and are
implemented in the individual countries. This is
how the issues of the structure of production, of
investment and technological policy, of strategic
marketing are solved.
• After 11th September 2001 the world is not the
same:
• Unstable political relations and political systems;
• New “paradoxes of democracy” appear:
– New wave of religion expansion;
– Terrorism;
– Using weapons to solve problems and conflicts
“Economics of war” opposes the humanism and
subordinates the world order to corporative interests.
• Globalization comes in contradiction with
human rights and with the very principle
of individualism, which along with
competition, is the fundamental of
capitalist system.
 Globalization in contemporary conditions is
an asymmetry
• Deepening gap between the economies of
the developed and developing countries;
• Intensified struggle for additional access to
resources and markets;
• Ecological asymmetry;
• Poverty and polarization of men;
• Uneven location of people;
• Continuing international debt crisis
What is being globalized?

The different forms of connectivity and flows are different

facets of globalization.

Different “globalities” represent different forms of

globalization.

Depending on the globality, you see a different dynamic.

Seatwork for the day.

What is your own globalization story? (one whole
sheet of yellow paper)
THANK YOU !!!