READING MATERIAL # 1.

The Contemporary World

Introduction to Globalization

Globalization refers to processes of economic, political, and social integration that have
collectively created ties that make a difference to lives around the planet. It is a process of
economic and cultural integration and unification. Globalization involves many countries and the
majority of huge corporations. Government policies designed to open economies domestically
and internationally to boost development in poorer countries and raise standards of living for
their people are what drive globalization. However, these policies have created an international
free market that has mainly benefited multinational corporations in the Western world to the
detriment of smaller businesses, cultures and common people.

Globalization represents the global integration of international trade, investment, information

technology, and cultures. In a broader perspective, globalization refers to the expansion of global
linkages, the organization of social life on a global scale, and the growth of a global
consciousness, hence to the consolidation of world society. Another way of saying this is that
globalization is the extension, acceleration, and intensification of consequential worldwide
interconnections (Sparke, 2013).

These are interconnections that mean that what happens “here” (like you buying and reading a
book) affects things over “there” (like the logging of trees in faraway forests). Reciprocally, the
interconnections can work the other way around with events over “there” (like an environmental
group’s campaign against deforestation) leading to effects “here” (like you wishing that the book
was made out of recycled paper or available on the internet).

Sociologists and anthropologists usually refer to

globalization as the broad-scale changes and
transformations that have resulted from the impact of
industrialization and the emergence of an interconnected
global economy—with the spread of capital, labor
(migration), and technology across national borders.

One reason for the rising concern with globalization over

the last two decades is that it was only after key
industrial, financial, and technological shifts in the 1960s
and 1970s that the door was opened for different forms of global interdependency to come
together to have a collective globalizing impact. Economic, political, and social
networks – networks of commodity production, of finance, of trade, of migrants, of
communication, of media, of political organizing, and even of new disease vectors – all came
together in the sense of accelerating and intensifying one another. In doing so, they linked more
and more countries and communities to create an interdependent global whole that was greater
than the sum of all the particular component network parts.

Globalization continues to occur today through the increasing spread of industrial technology,
including electronic communications, television, and the internet—and the expansion of
multinational corporations into the non-Western world.
Globalization has various aspects which affect the world in several different
ways. These aspects include:

Industrial globalization – Development of worldwide production markets and broader access to

a range of foreign products for consumers and companies involving particularly movement of
material and goods between and within national boundaries.

Financial globalization – Development of worldwide financial markets and better access to

external financing for borrowers.

Economic globalization – Establishment of a global common market, based on the freedom of

exchange of goods and capital.

Political globalization – Creation of international organizations to regulate the relationships

among governments and to guarantee the rights arising from social and economic globalization.

Informational globalization – Increase in information flows between geographically remote

locations. This can also be seen as a technological change related to the advent of fiber optic
communications, satellites,
and increased availability of telephone and the internet.

Cultural globalization – Sharing of ideas, attitudes, and values across national borders. This
sharing generally leads to an interconnectedness and interaction between peoples of diverse
cultures and ways of life. Mass media and communication technologies are the primary
instruments for cultural globalization.

2
Indicators of Globalization
The jet engine, the internet, e-banking, e-books, the LRT, and other inventions of science and technology are
attributable to the spread of globalization. These are some of the modern offspring of development in our
infrastructure system. These improvements that people enjoy today in this contemporary world have been major
factors in globalization which have generated further interdependence in economic and cultural activities among
nations.

Likewise, environmental challenges such as global warming, air pollution, and over-fishing of the ocean are linked
with globalization. Globalizing processes affect and are affected by business and work organization, economics,
socio-cultural resources, and the natural environment.

Reasons for Globalization

1. Rapid shrinking of time and distance across the globe.

2. Companies and institutions go global to find political and economic stability.
3. To get technical and managerial know-how of other countries due to their advancement in science,
technology, education, health, and other fields of discipline.
4. To reduce high transportation costs if one goes globally using the advanced tools of communication and
information.
5. To be close to raw materials and to markets for their finished products which are not available in the
country of origin.

Brief History of Globalization

Globalization is not a new concept—in ancient times, traders traveled vast distances to buy rare commodities such
as salt, spices and gold, which they would then sell in their home countries. The 19 th century Industrial Revolution
brought advances in communication and transportation that have removed borders and increased cross-border trade.

The many meanings of the word globalization have accumulated very rapidly, and recently, and the verb,
“globalize” is first attested by the Merriam Webster Dictionary in 1944. In considering the history of globalization,
some authors focus on events since 1492, but most scholars and theorists concentrate on the much more recent past.

But, long before 1492, people began to link together disparate locations on the globe into extensive systems of
communication, migration, and interconnections. This formation of systems of interaction between the global and
the local has been a central driving force in world history.

1. 1st century CE: The expansion of Buddhism in Asia makes its first major appearance in China under the Han
dynasty, and consolidates cultural links across the Eurasian Steppe into India – the foundation of the Silk Road
(routes joining China to Europe, wherein silk and many other goods were traded).

2. 650-850: The expansion of Islam from the western Mediterranean to India.

3. 1100: The Rise of Genghis Khan and the integration of overland routes across Eurasia, producing also a military
revolution in technologies of war on horseback and of fighting from military fortifications.

4. 1300: The creation of the Ottoman Empire spanning Europe, North Africa, and Middle East, and connected
politically overland with Safavids and dynasties in Central Asia and India, creating the great imperial arch of
integration that spawned a huge expansion of trade with Europe but also raised the cost for trade in Asia for
Europeans. A side effect of this was the movement of Genoese merchant wealth to Spain to search for a Western Sea
route to the Indies.

5. 1492 / 1400s to 1600s: Christopher Columbus and Vasco da Gama travelled west and east to the Indies,
inaugurating an age of European seaborne empires. Spain and Portugal, two European superpowers at the time,

3
colonized many countries worldwide in order to gain more economic power and spread their religion, which was
Christianity.

6. 1400s to 1500s: As Europeans traversed the Atlantic, they brought with them plants, animals, and diseases that
changed lives and landscapes on both sides of the ocean. These two-way exchanges between the Americas and
Europe/Africa are known collectively as the Columbian Exchange, related to European colonization and trade
following Christopher Columbus’ 1492 voyage.

7. 1650: The expansion of the slave trade expanded was dramatic during the seventeenth century and it sustained the
expansion of Atlantic Economy, giving birth to integrated economic/industrial systems across the ocean, with profits
accumulating in Europe during the heyday of mercantilism and the rise of the Enlightenment.

8. 1776/1789: The US and French Revolutions mark the creation of modern state form based on alliances between
military and business interests and on popular representation in aggressively nationalist governments, which leads
quickly to new imperial expansion under Napoleon and in the Americas. The economic interests of the people and
the drive to acquire and consolidate assets for economic growth also lead to more militarized British, Dutch, and
French imperial growth in Asia.

9. 1700s – 1800s: The Industrial Revolution, which took place from the 18th to 19th centuries, was a period during
which predominantly agrarian, rural societies in Europe and America became industrial and urban. The Industrial
Revolution began in the United Kingdom and eventually spread worldwide. Industrialization marked a shift to
powered, special-purpose machinery, factories, and mass production. The iron and textile industries, along with the
development of the steam engine, played central roles in the Industrial Revolution, which also saw improved
systems of transportation, communication and banking.

10. 1929: The Great Depression was the worst economic downturn in the history of the industrialized world, lasting
from 1929 to 1939. It began after the stock market crash of October 1929, which sent Wall Street into a panic and
wiped out millions of investors. It was preceded by World War I and followed by first really global war, which was
World War II.

11. 1950: Decolonization of European empires in Asia and Africa produces world of national states for the first time
and world of legal-representative-economic institutions in the UN system and Bretton Woods (system of monetary
management established the rules for commercial and financial relations among the United States, Canada, Western
Europe, Australia, and Japan after the 1944 Bretton-Woods Agreement).

4
The Silk Road (around 114 BCE – 1450s) was an ancient network of trade routes, linking China with the West, that
carried goods and ideas between the two great civilizations of Rome and China. Silk went westward, and wools,
gold, and silver went east. China also received Nestorian Christianity and Buddhism (from India) via the Silk Road.