Understanding Globalization: Concepts & Metaphors

• Globalization is a very important change.

Defining Globalization

• Globalization allows people to see themselves as part of the "global age."
• Globalization is an idea not easily pinned down.

Literature

• Broadly, globalization is the onset of the borderless world.
• Narrowly, globalization comprises the internationalizing of production, the new international division of labor, migratory movements from South to North, the new competitive environment, and the internationalizing state.

Positive & Negative Views

• Positively, globalization is a "world shrinkage" where distances become shorter and things move closer.
• Negatively, globalization occurs through regression, colonialism, and destabilization.

Metaphors of Globalization

• Metaphors compare two different things that share something in common which helps in understanding globalization's concept.
• Common metaphors for globalization include "solid" and "liquid."

Solidity / Solid

• Solidity refers to barriers preventing or making the movement of things difficult.
• These barriers can be natural (landforms, bodies of water) or man-made.

Liquidity / Liquid

• Liquidity is the increasing ease of movement of people, things, information, and places in the contemporary world.
• Zygmunt Bauman notes that today's liquid phenomena change quickly, occur temporarily, and are in continuous fluctuation.
• Movement of liquid phenomena is difficult to stop.
• Liquidity is increasing and proliferating and best describes globalization.

Flows

• Flows refer to the movement of people, things, places, and information brought about by the increasing "porosity" and limitations of the globe:
• Trade, of import and export of goods and services, Telecommunication, a complex web of information used for communication and power exchanges, and Migration, concerning people going from one place to another.

Globalization Theories

• Homogeneity refers to the increasing sameness in the world as cultural inputs, economic factors, and political orientations of societies expand to create common practices, economies, and forms of government.
• Homogeneity in culture often links to cultural imperialism, where a given culture influences another.
• Heterogeneity: Pertains to the creation of various cultural practices, new economies, and political groups due to the interaction of elements from different societies.
• Heterogeneity in culture is linked to cultural hybridization.
• The global flow of media is characterized as media imperialism.
• The internet serves as an arena for alternative media.
• Global media is dominated by a small number of large corporations.
• The contemporary world undergoes the process of McDonaldization.
• McDonaldization is the global spread of rational systems like efficiency, calculability, predictability, and control.
• "McWorld" is existing.

McWorld vs. Jihad

• McWorld refers to the globalization of politics, commodification of culture, and the homogenizing power of market, resource, information-technology, and ecological imperatives.
• Jihad (struggle) refers to fierce tribalism, evolution of nationalism (from unification to differentiation), anti-globalism, anti-capitalism, anti-colonialism, and anti-homogenization.

Dynamics of Local and Global Culture

• There are 3 perspectives on global cultural flow:
• Cultural Differentialism emphasizes that cultures are essentially different and only affected by global flows.
• Cultural Hybridization emphasizes the integration of local and global culture.
• Cultural Converge stresses homogeneity introduced by globalization.

Globalization of Religion

• Globalization transforms generic religion into a world-system of competing and conflicting religions.

Globalization and Regionalization

• Globalization and regionalization reemerged in the 1980s and increased after the Cold War in the 1990s.
• The regionalization of the world system and economic activity undermines the potential benefits of a liberalized global economy.
• A 2007 Financial Times survey found that most Europeans consider that globalization brings negative effects to their societies.
• The gradual development of inter-regional relations such as ASEAN, the European Union, and Mercosur is important.
• Regionalization encourages other instances of regionalization and along with increasing developments in interregional cooperation, shows that the regionalization process is global.

Regionalization and Globalization Relationship

• Globalization is a long-term cyclical process, so its origin is hard to define.
• There as sequential epochs:
• Globalization of religion, fourth to seventh centuries
• European colonial conquests, late fifteenth century
• Intra-European wars, late eighteenth to early nineteenth centuries
• Heydey of European imperialism, mid-nineteenth century to 1918
• Post-World War II period
• Post-Cold War period
• Specific events and technological advances in transportation and communication are considered part of the fourth view in explaining the origin of globalization.

Three notable changes

• The emergence of the United States leads to the global power, the emergence of multinational corporations, and the demise of the Soviet Union, which led to the end of the Cold War.
• US became a dominant military/economic power after WWII.
• US outran Germany/Japan industrially.
• US progressed in areas like diplomacy, media, and film.
• Multinational corporations from the USA, Germany, and Great Britain had great corporations and did not remain there as far their production and market are concerned.

Global Demography

• Demographic transition is a historical period where mortality and fertility rates decline from high to low.

Three main demographic processes include:

• Birth, migration, and aging all play vital roles.
• These processes change populations, affect how people inhabit the earth, form nations and societies, and develop culture.

Global Migration

• Migrant Categories: Vagabonds, and Tourist.

Labor migration

• It is the movement of persons from their home State to another State for employment.
• Migration is traditionally governed by "PUSH" factors compelling a person to leave, and "PULL" factors attracting them to resettle somewhere else.

Illegal Immigration:

• It involves people migrating into a country in violation of its immigration laws or residing there without the legal right to do so.

Explore the multifaceted concept of globalization, its definitions, and diverse perspectives. Examine the metaphors used to understand globalization, including the concepts of solidity and liquidity in describing its impact.