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Bank rate, also referred to as the discount rate, is the rate of interest which a central bank

charges on the loans and advances that it extends to commercial banks and other financial
intermediaries. Changes in the bank rate are often used by central banks to control the money
supply. Bank rate websites such as BanxQuote provide greater efficiency and transparency to the
market creating a centralized gateway for easy side-by-side review and comparison, as well as a
centralized transaction platform that reduces the time and effort required by in-market consumers
who would otherwise need to regularly call and check numerous individual bank and mortgage
websites for interest rate quotes and updates.

Contents
[hide]

 1 Difference between Bank Rate and Repo Rate


 2 Regional Bank Rate
 3 United Kingdom
 4 India
 5 Canada
 6 References

[edit] Difference between Bank Rate and Repo Rate

While repo rate is a short-term measure, i.e. applicable to short-term loans and used for
controlling the amount of money in the market, bank rate is a long-term measure and is governed
by the long-term monetary policies of the governing bank concerned.

Bank rate, also referred to as the discount rate, is the rate of interest which a central bank charges
on the loans and advances that it extends to commercial banks and other financial intermediaries.
Changes in the bank rate are often used by central banks to control the Money supply

Repo rate: Whenever the banks have any shortage of funds they can borrow it from the central
bank. Repo rate is the rate at which our banks borrow currency from the central bank. A
reduction in the repo rate will help banks to get Money at a cheaper rate. When the repo rate
increases borrowing from the central bank becomes more expensive.It is more applicable when
there is a liquidity crunch in the market.In order to increse the liquidity in the market,the central
bank does it.

The Reverse repo rate is the rate at which the banks park surplus funds with reserve bank, while
the Repo rate is the rate at which the banks borrow from the central bank.It is mostly done
then,when there is surplus liquidity in the market by the central bank.
A bank rate is the interest rate that is charged by a country’s central or federal bank on loans
and advances to control money supply in the economy and the banking sector. This is typically
done on a quarterly basis to control inflation and stabilize the country’s exchange rates. A
fluctuation in bank rates triggers a ripple-effect as it impacts every sphere of a country’s
economy. For instance, the prices in stock markets tend to react to interest rate changes. A
change in bank rates affects customers as it influences prime interest rates for personal loans.
Types of Bank Rates

Here are the different types of monetary instruments on which financial institutions offer the
following bank rates:

Savings account bank rate: Modest rates are charged on funds that are deposited in the savings
accounts. However, investors have high flexibility in withdrawing the deposits.

Certificates of deposit (CD) bank rate: These offer comparatively high interest rates compared
to savings accounts. Bank rates on CDs are determined by the term period of a deposit and the
current economic situation. The longer the term of a CD, the higher will be the bank interest rate.

Money-market funds bank rate: The interest rate on money-market funds is relatively low. As
most of the money market accounts are privately insured, it is a secure method of investment.
Deposits in a money market account generate interest through short-term investments.

[edit] Regional Bank Rate

Though influenced heavily by the none Interest rate, all bank rates will vary regionally. It pays to
compare interest rates on a regional or state-wide level.

[edit] United Kingdom


In the UK bank rates are set by the Bank of England's Monetary Policy Committee. The key
interest rate is called the official bank rate[1] which is the lowest rate at which the Bank acts as
lender of last resort to the money markets.

[edit] India
The current repo rate is 6.50% (As on January 2011) (As these rates keep changing to know the
current rates please visit http://www.rbi.org.in/home.aspx and see the Current Rates at right hand
side of the page)

[edit] Canada
In Canada, the bank rate is defined as the upper limit of the overnight rate band announced each
month by the Bank of Canada, (making it the target overnight rate + 0.25%).[2]
As requested by Payal, we are explaining the different rates in monetary policy used by RBI

Repo (Repurchase) Rate

Repo rate is the rate at which banks borrow funds from the RBI to meet the gap between the demand
they are facing for money (loans) and how much they have on hand to lend.

If the RBI wants to make it more expensive for the banks to borrow money, it increases the repo rate;
similarly, if it wants to make it cheaper for banks to borrow money, it reduces the repo rate.

Reverse Repo Rate

This is the exact opposite of repo rate.

The rate at which RBI borrows money from the banks (or banks lend money to the RBI) is termed the
reverse repo rate. The RBI uses this tool when it feels there is too much money floating in the banking
system

If the reverse repo rate is increased, it means the RBI will borrow money from the bank and offer them a
lucrative rate of interest. As a result, banks would prefer to keep their money with the RBI (which is
absolutely risk free) instead of lending it out (this option comes with a certain amount of risk)

Consequently, banks would have lesser funds to lend to their customers. This helps stem the flow of
excess money into the economy

Reverse repo rate signifies the rate at which the central bank absorbs liquidity from the banks, while repo
signifies the rate at which liquidity is injected.

Bank Rate

This is the rate at which RBI lends money to other banks (or financial institutions .

The bank rate signals the central bank’s long-term outlook on interest rates. If the bank rate moves up,
long-term interest rates also tend to move up, and vice-versa.

Banks make a profit by borrowing at a lower rate and lending the same funds at a higher rate of interest. If
the RBI hikes the bank rate (this is currently 6 per cent), the interest that a bank pays for borrowing
money (banks borrow money either from each other or from the RBI) increases. It, in turn, hikes its own
lending rates to ensure it continues to make a profit.

Call Rate

Call rate is the interest rate paid by the banks for lending and borrowing for daily fund requirement. Si nce
banks need funds on a daily basis, they lend to and borrow from other banks according to their daily or
short-term requirements on a regular basis.

CRR

Also called the cash reserve ratio, refers to a portion of deposits (as cash) which banks have to
keep/maintain with the RBI. This serves two purposes. It ensures that a portion of bank deposits is totally
risk-free and secondly it enables that RBI control liquidity in the system, and thereby, inflation by tying
their hands in lending money
SLR

Besides the CRR, banks are required to invest a portion of their deposits in government securities as a
part of their statutory liquidity ratio (SLR) requirements. What SLR does is again restrict the bank’s
leverage in pumping more money into the economy.

also.

  What is Inflation?

Inflation is defined as an increase in the price of bunch of Goods and


services that projects the Indian economy. An increase in inflation figures occurs when there is
an increase in the average level of prices in Goods and services. Inflation happens when there are
less Goods and more buyers, this will result in increase in the price of Goods, since there is more
demand and less supply of the goods.
What is Deflationary Spiral?

It is a situation when decrease in the prices leads to lower production, lower wages and demand,
which can lead to further decrease in the prices. A deflationary spiral is when decrease in prices
lead to a vicious circle (a trouble leads to another that aggravates the

Relation between Inflation and Bank interest Rates

Now a days, you might have heard lot of these terms and usage on inflation and the bank interest
rates. We are trying to make it simple for you to understand the relation between inflation and
bank interest rates in India.

Bank interest rate depends on many other factors, out of that the major one is inflation.
Whenever you see an increase on inflation, there will be an increase of interest rate also.

  What is Inflation?

Inflation is defined as an increase in the price of bunch of Goods and


services that projects the Indian economy. An increase in inflation figures occurs when there is
an increase in the average level of prices in Goods and services. Inflation happens when there are
less Goods and more buyers, this will result in increase in the price of Goods, since there is more
demand and less supply of the goods.

Inflation causes increase of Interest

Inflation can be recognized as a combination of 4 factors :

 The Supply of money goes up


 The Supply of Goods goes down
 Demand for money goes down
 Demand for goods goes up
Our Indian government gets involved in it to control the inflation by adjusting the level of money
in our economical system. The most noticeable way to increase the money flow in the system is
to print more currency, then the rupees will become more relative to goods.

Inflation and Global Liquidity

Factors like rates of import and export, the production cost of farms, value of dollar, price of oil
(crude oil), market movements of other overseas markets cause global liquidity. In India, we can
also feel the effects of global liquidity. We are not isolated from all these issues now. Due to the
remarkable economic growth of India over the recent years, increase in foreign currency inflow
caused the demand in multiples for many Merchandise and services in India. RBI (Reserve Bank
of India) needs to control this excess liquidity in our economic system. For this, RBI increases
the “Repo rates” which makes “Costly Credits” and thus increases the CRR rate (Cash Reserve
Ratio). This kind of measures by RBI can only control the inflation to a certain extent only.

Deflationary Spiral

It is a situation when decrease in the prices leads to lower production,


lower wages and demand, which can lead to further decrease in the
prices. A deflationary spiral is when decrease in prices lead to a
vicious circle (a trouble leads to another that aggravates the first).

What are IIP numbers?


Index of Industrial Production (IIP) -
Indicator for India Inc’s growth

IIP number or IIP data (Index of


Industrial Production) is a measurement
which represents the status of production
in the industrial sector for a given period
of time compared to a reference period of
time. IIp number is one of the best
statistical data, which helps us to measure
the level of industrial activity in Indian
economy. Please note that IIP data is a
short-term indicator of our industrial
growth till the actual results from Annual
Survey of Industries (ASI) is published.
IIP data is a very important indicator to the
Government for planning purposes and is
also used by various organisations like
Industrial Associations, Research
Institutes, Financial Institues and
Academicians.

IIP data and Stock Markets

When are the IIP numbers Published?

Tracking Growth using GDP & IIP data


 
How IIP Data is formed?

IIP data is a simple index which provides


information about the growth of different
sectors of our economy like mining,
electricity, Manufacturing & General. The
IIP index reflects the growth in India’s
industrial activity and excludes all kinds of
services. The base year for the index over the
period of the analysis is 1993-94.

Use-Based Classification

Another classification is use-based


(consumption based), where IIP is classified
on the base of use like Basic Goods, Capital
goods, Intermediate goods & consumer
goods.

Sectors in IIP Data

The weightage of Indian IIP data is broadly divided into three segments –
manufacturing (79.36%), mining & quarrying (10.47%) and electricity (10.17%)...

   

Manufacturing : includes items like food items, machinery, wood furniture etc
Electricity : includes generation and transmission of electricity ( from various
sources like - thermal, hydro, solar etc)
Mining : includes mining of coal, oil other metals etc
Manufacturing is the major sector, which is further divided into 17 industry groups
like
* Food Products
* Beverages,Tobacco and related Products
* Cotton Textiles
* Wool, silk and man made fibre textiles
* Jute and other vegetable fibre textiles
* Textile products including wearing apparel
* Wood and wood products (furniture & fixtures)
* Paper, paper products, printing and allied industries
* Leather and leather and fur products
* Basic Chemicals & Chemical Products (except products of Petroleum & Coal)
* Rubber, Plastic, Petroleum and Coal Products
* Non-Metallic Mineral Products
* Basic Metal and Alloy Industries
* Metal Products and Parts, except Machinery and Equipment
* Machinery and Equipment other than Transport equipment
* Transport Equipment and Parts
* Other Manufacturing Industries
IIP data and Stock
Markets
Impact of IIP Numbers on Indian Stock
Market

Indian stock markets are very sensitive to


IIP Numbers. A better IIP number would
show a positive growth on our Industrial
production and share markets would
possibly cheer.

What are IIP numbers?

Tracking Growth using GDP & IIP Data

When are the IIP numbers Published?


 
How IIP Data is formed?

IIP data is a simple index which provides


information about the growth of different
sectors of our economy like mining,
electricity, Manufacturing & General. The IIP
index reflects the growth in India’s industrial
activity and excludes all kinds of services.
The base year for the index over the period of
the analysis is 1993-94.
Use-Based Classification

Another classification is use-based


(consumption based), where IIP is classified
on the base of use like Basic Goods, Capital
goods, Intermediate goods & consumer
goods.

Sectors in IIP Data

The weightage of Indian IIP data is broadly divided into three segments –
manufacturing (79.36%), mining & quarrying (10.47%) and electricity (10.17%)...

   

Manufacturing : includes items like food items, machinery, wood furniture etc
Electricity : includes generation and transmission of electricity ( from various
sources like - thermal, hydro, solar etc)
Mining : includes mining of coal, oil other metals etc
 
When are the IIP
numbers published?
Publishing Date of IIP data in India

Usually IIP numbers of a particular month


would be published after two months. The
date of publishing IIP numbers are usually
before noon on the 12th of a month. The
dates are indicative based on the previous
publishing dates, it can be anywhere
between 11th to 14th of a month..

What are IIP numbers?

IIP data and Stock Markets

Tracking Growth using GDP & IIP Data

 
How IIP Data is formed?
IIP data is a simple index which provides
information about the growth of different
sectors of our economy like mining,
electricity, Manufacturing & General. The
IIP index reflects the growth in India’s
industrial activity and excludes all kinds of
services. The base year for the index over
the period of the analysis is 1993-94.

Use-Based Classification

Another classification is use-based


(consumption based), where IIP is classified
on the base of use like Basic Goods, Capital
goods, Intermediate goods & consumer
goods.

Sectors in IIP Data

The weightage of Indian IIP data is broadly divided into three segments –
manufacturing (79.36%), mining & quarrying (10.47%) and electricity (10.17%)...

   

Manufacturing : includes items like food items, machinery, wood furniture etc
Electricity : includes generation and transmission of electricity ( from various
sources like - thermal, hydro, solar etc)
Mining : includes mining of coal, oil other metals etc
 

Tracking Growth using GDP & IIP data


GDP and IIP Numbers used by Indian Policy makers to track Growth

A technical advisory group of the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) suggested using quarterly gross
domestic product (GDP) and monthly index of industrial production (IIP) data to track economic
growth. RBI set up Technical Advisory Group on "Development of Leading Economic
Indicators for Indian Economy" in March 2006. This was in view of the need to frequently watch
the movements of the Indian economy based on suitable method and international best practices.
What are IIP numbers?

IIP data and Stock Markets

When are the IIP numbers Published?


 
How IIP Data is formed?

IIP data is a simple index which provides information about the growth of different sectors of our
economy like mining, electricity, Manufacturing & General. The IIP index reflects the growth in
India’s industrial activity and excludes all kinds of services. The base year for the index over the
period of the analysis is 1993-94.

Use-Based Classification

Another classification is use-based (consumption based), where IIP is classified on the base of
use like Basic Goods, Capital goods, Intermediate goods & consumer goods.

Personal Loans vs Mortgage Loans


 
Mortgage loans and personal loans

The following article can help you to identify the simple difference between mortgage loans and
personal loans.  Even though personal law looks very attractive there are some drawbacks for the
personal loan like high interest rates.
Down payment of your home loan

Sometimes you need money for initial down payment of your home loan.  An attractive option
may be personal loan which you can get in a matter of two to three days.  Even though it is
attractive the interest rates for the personal loans are very high compared to other types of loans. 

How to decide on your Home Loan Tenure?  


 
Marketing strategy of banks

One of the major marketing strategy of banks is to show lower Home Loan interest rates than the
prevailing interest rates to attract borrowers to the banks.  As you know a home loan is a Major
financial commitment for us and it can continue with us for more than 10 years.  With every
bank of competing each other to add more customers, it is very important for you to understand
about it.  You should have clear decisions on repayment capacity that type of loan and the rates
involved this loan.  Selecting the right tenure/duration is a major factor that you should decide
before approaching the bank.

If you are taking a loan of rupees 30 lakhs which an interest rate of 11


 
percentage and with a repayment duration of six years, then year net
monthly repayment will come around rupees 57,600.  If you had chosen it tenure of 20 years,
with the same interest rate of 11 percentage the EMI will get reduced to rupees 31,000.

Globalization

lobalization (or globalisation) describes the process by which regional economies, societies,
and cultures have become integrated through a global network of political ideas through
communication, transportation, and trade. The term is most closely associated with the term
economic globalization: the integration of national economies into the international economy
through trade, foreign direct investment, capital flows, migration, the spread of technology, and
military presence.[1] However, globalization is usually recognized as being driven by a
combination of economic, technological, sociocultural, political, and biological factors.[2] The
term can also refer to the transnational circulation of ideas, languages, or popular culture through
acculturation. An aspect of the world which has gone through the process can be said to be
globalized.

Contents
[hide]

 1 Definitions
 2 Effects summary
 3 Cultural effects
o 3.1 The democratizing effect of communications (esp. the internet)
 4 Economic liberalization
o 4.1 Jobs
 4.1.1 Income inequality
 4.1.2 Brain drains
 4.1.3 Sweatshops
o 4.2 Natural resources
 4.2.1 Air
 4.2.2 Forests
 4.2.3 Minerals
 4.2.4 Food
o 4.3 Health
o 4.4 Global market
 4.4.1 Expansion
 4.4.2 Financial interdependency
 4.4.3 Drug and illicit goods trade
 5 The Debate over Globalization
o 5.1 Politicization of the debate in the United States
o 5.2 The debate in other industrialized countries
o 5.3 The debate in the developing world
 6 Alternative ways of interpreting discourse on globalization
o 6.1 The positive frame: Advocates of globalization
o 6.2 The neutral frame: The Practical approach
o 6.3 The negative frame: Critics of globalization
o 6.4 The constructive frame: Finding common ground
 7 The Anti-globalization Movement
 8 History
o 8.1 Post-World War II
 9 Measurement
o 9.1 International social forum
 10 See also
 11 References
 12 Further reading
 13 External links
o 13.1 Multimedia

[edit] Definitions
According to the Oxford English Dictionary, the word 'globalization' was first employed in a
publication entitled Towards New Education in 1952, to denote a holistic view of human
experience in education.[3] An early description of globalization was penned by the founder of the
Bible Student movement Charles Taze Russell who coined the term 'corporate giants' in 1897,[4]
although it was not until the 1960s that the term began to be widely used by economists and
other social scientists. The term has since then achieved widespread use in the mainstream press
by the later half of the 1980s. Since its inception, the concept of globalization has inspired
numerous competing definitions and interpretations, with antecedents dating back to the great
movements of trade and empire across Asia and the Indian Ocean from the 15th century
onwards.[5]

The United Nations ESCWA says globalization "is a widely-used term that can be defined in a
number of different ways. When used in an economic context, it refers to the reduction and
removal of barriers between national borders in order to facilitate the flow of goods, capital,
services and labour... although considerable barriers remain to the flow of labor... Globalization
is not a new phenomenon. It began towards the end of the nineteenth century, but it slowed down
during the period from the start of the First World War until the third quarter of the twentieth
century. This slowdown can be attributed to the inward-looking policies pursued by a number of
countries in order to protect their respective industries... however, the pace of globalization
picked up rapidly during the fourth quarter of the twentieth century..."[6]
HSBC, the world's largest bank, operates across the globe.[7][8] Shown here is the HSBC Global
Technology Centre in Pune, India which develops software for the entire HSBC group.[9]

Tom G. Palmer of the Cato Institute defines globalization as "the diminution or elimination of
state-enforced restrictions on exchanges across borders and the increasingly integrated and
complex global system of production and exchange that has emerged as a result."[10]

Thomas L. Friedman has examined the impact of the "flattening" of the world, and argues that
globalized trade, outsourcing, supply-chaining, and political forces have changed the world
permanently, for both better and worse. He also argues that the pace of globalization is
quickening and will continue to have a growing impact on business organization and practice.[11]

Herman E. Daly argues that sometimes the terms internationalization and globalization are used
interchangeably but there is a significant formal difference. The term "internationalization" (or
internationalisation) refers to the importance of international trade, relations, treaties etc. owing
to the (hypothetical) immobility of labor and capital between or among nations.[citation needed]

Finally, Takis Fotopoulos argues that globalization is the result of systemic trends manifesting
the market economy's grow-or-die dynamic, following the rapid expansion of transnational
corporations. Because these trends have not been offset effectively by counter-tendencies that
could have emanated from trade-union action and other forms of political activity, the outcome
has been globalization. This is a multi-faceted and irreversible phenomenon within the system of
the market economy and it is expressed as: economic globalization, namely, the opening and
deregulation of commodity, capital and labour markets which led to the present form of
neoliberal globalization; political globalization, i.e., the emergence of a transnational elite and
the phasing out of the all powerful nation-state of the statist period; cultural globalization, i.e.,
the worldwide homogenisation of culture; ideological globalization; technological globalization;
social globalization.[12]

[edit] Effects summary


Globalization has various aspects which affect the world in several different ways

 Industrial - emergence of worldwide production markets and broader access to a range of


foreign products for consumers and companies. Particularly movement of material and
goods between and within national boundaries. International trade in manufactured goods
increased more than 100 times (from $95 billion to $12 trillion) in the 50 years since
1955.[13] China's trade with Africa rose sevenfold during 2000-07 alone.[14][15]
 Financial - emergence of worldwide financial markets and better access to external
financing for borrowers. By the early part of the 21st century more than $1.5 trillion in
national currencies were traded daily to support the expanded levels of trade and
investment.[16] As these worldwide structures grew more quickly than any transnational
regulatory regime, the instability of the global financial infrastructure dramatically
increased, as evidenced by the Financial crisis of 2007–2010.[17]

As of 2005–2007, the Port of Shanghai holds the title as the World's busiest port.[18][19][20]

 Economic - realization of a global common market, based on the freedom of exchange of


goods and capital.[21] The interconnectedness of these markets, however, meant that an
economic collapse in one area could impact other areas.[citation needed] With globalization,
companies can produce goods and services in the lowest cost location. This may cause
jobs to be moved to locations that have the lowest wages, least worker protection and
lowest health benefits. For Industrial activities this may cause production to move to
areas with the least pollution regulations or worker safety regulations.

Almost all notable worldwide IT companies have a presence in India. Four Indians were among
the world's top 10 richest in 2008, worth a combined $160 billion.[22] In 2007, China had 415,000
millionaires and India 123,000.[23]

 Job Market- competition in a global job market. In the past, the economic fate of workers
was tied to the fate of national economies. With the advent of the information age and
improvements in communication, this is no longer the case. Because workers compete in
a global market, wages are less dependent on the success or failure of individual
economies. This has had a major effect on wages and income distribution.[24]

 Health Policy - On the global scale, health becomes a commodity. In developing nations
under the demands of Structural Adjustment Programs, health systems are fragmented
and privatized. Global health policy makers have shifted during the 1990s from United
Nations players to financial institutions. The result of this power transition is an increase
in privatization in the health sector. This privatization fragments health policy by
crowding it with many players with many private interests. These fragmented policy
players emphasize partnerships and specific interventions to combat specific problems (as
opposed to comprehensive health strategies). Influenced by global trade and global
economy, health policy is directed by technological advances and innovative medical
trade. Global priorities, in this situation, are sometimes at odds with national priorities
where increased health infrastructure and basic primary care are of more value to the
public than privatized care for the wealthy.[25]
 Political - some use "globalization" to mean the creation of a world government which
regulates the relationships among governments and guarantees the rights arising from
social and economic globalization.[26] Politically, the United States has enjoyed a position
of power among the world powers, in part because of its strong and wealthy economy.
With the influence of globalization and with the help of the United States’ own economy,
the People's Republic of China has experienced some tremendous growth within the past
decade. If China continues to grow at the rate projected by the trends, then it is very
likely that in the next twenty years, there will be a major reallocation of power among the
world leaders. China will have enough wealth, industry, and technology to rival the
United States for the position of leading world power.[27]

Among the political effects some scholars also name the transformation of sovereignty. In their
opinion, 'globalization contributes to the change and reduction of nomenclature and scope of
state sovereign powers, and besides it is a bilateral process: on the one hand, the factors are
strengthening that fairly undermine the countries' sovereignty, on the other – most states
voluntarily and deliberately limit the scope of their sovereignty'.[28]

 Informational - increase in information flows between geographically remote locations.


Arguably this is a technological change with the advent of fibre optic communications,
satellites, and increased availability of telephone and Internet.
 Language - the most popular first language is Mandarin (845 million speakers) followed
by Spanish (329 million speakers) and English (328 million speakers).[29] However the
most popular second language is undoubtedly English, the "lingua franca" of
globalization:
o About 35% of the world's mail, telexes, and cables are in English.
o Approximately 40% of the world's radio programs are in English.
o English is the dominant language on the Internet.[30]
 Competition - Survival in the new global business market calls for improved productivity
and increased competition. Due to the market becoming worldwide, companies in various
industries have to upgrade their products and use technology skillfully in order to face
increased competition.[31]
 Ecological - the advent of global environmental challenges that might be solved with
international cooperation, such as climate change, cross-boundary water and air pollution,
over-fishing of the ocean, and the spread of invasive species. Since many factories are
built in developing countries with less environmental regulation, globalism and free trade
may increase pollution and impact on precious fresh water resources(Hoekstra and
Chapagain 2008).[32] On the other hand, economic development historically required a
"dirty" industrial stage, and it is argued that developing countries should not, via
regulation, be prohibited from increasing their standard of living.

London is a city of considerable diversity. As of 2008, estimates were published that stated that
approximately 30% of London's total population was from an ethnic minority group. The latest
official figures show that in 2008, 590,000 people arrived to live in the UK whilst 427,000 left,
meaning that net inward migration was 163,000.[33]

 Cultural - growth of cross-cultural contacts; advent of new categories of consciousness


and identities which embodies cultural diffusion, the desire to increase one's standard of
living and enjoy foreign products and ideas, adopt new technology and practices, and
participate in a "world culture".[34] Some bemoan the resulting consumerism and loss of
languages. Also see Transformation of culture.
o Spreading of multiculturalism, and better individual access to cultural diversity
(e.g. through the export of Hollywood). Some consider such "imported" culture a
danger, since it may supplant the local culture, causing reduction in diversity or
even assimilation. Others consider multiculturalism to promote peace and
understanding between people. A third position that gained popularity is the
notion that multiculturalism to a new form of monoculture in which no
distinctions exist and everyone just shift between various lifestyles in terms of
music, cloth and other aspects once more firmly attached to a single culture. Thus
not mere cultural assimilation as mentioned above but the obliteration of culture
as we know it today.[35][36] In reality, as it happens in countries like the United
Kingdom, Canada, Australia or New Zealand, people who always lived in their
native countries maintain their cultures without feeling forced by any reason to
accept another and are proud of it even when they're acceptive of immigrants,
while people who are newly arrived simply keep their own culture or part of it
despite some minimum amount of assimilation, although aspects of their culture
often become a curiosity and a daily aspect of the lives of the people of the
welcoming countries.
o Greater international travel and tourism. WHO estimates that up to 500,000
people are on planes at any one time.[citation needed][37] In 2008, there were over 922
million international tourist arrivals, with a growth of 1.9% as compared to 2007.
[38]

o Greater immigration,[39] including illegal immigration.[40] The IOM estimates there


are more than 200 million migrants around the world today.[41] Newly available
data show that remittance flows to developing countries reached $328 billion in
2008.[42]
o Spread of local consumer products (e.g., food) to other countries (often adapted to
their culture).
o Worldwide fads and pop culture such as Pokémon, Sudoku, Numa Numa,
Origami, Idol series, YouTube, Orkut, Facebook, and MySpace; accessible only
to those who have Internet or Television, leaving out a substantial portion of the
Earth's population.

The construction of continental hotels is a major consequence of globalization process in


affiliation with tourism and travel industry, Dariush Grand Hotel, Kish, Iran


o Worldwide sporting events such as FIFA World Cup and the Olympic Games.
o Incorporation of multinational corporations into new media. As the sponsors of
the All-Blacks rugby team, Adidas had created a parallel website with a
downloadable interactive rugby game for its fans to play and compete.[43]
 Social - development of the system of non-governmental organisations as main agents of
global public policy, including humanitarian aid and developmental efforts.[44]
 Technical
o Development of a Global Information System, global telecommunications
infrastructure and greater transborder data flow, using such technologies as the
Internet, communication satellites, submarine fiber optic cable, and wireless
telephones
o Increase in the number of standards applied globally; e.g., copyright laws, patents
and world trade agreements.
 Legal/Ethical
o The creation of the international criminal court and international justice
movements.
o Crime importation and raising awareness of global crime-fighting efforts and
cooperation.
o The emergence of Global administrative law.
 Religious
o The spread and increased interrelations of various religious groups, ideas, and
practices and their ideas of the meanings and values of particular spaces.[45]

[edit] Cultural effects

Globalization has influenced the use of language across the world. This street in Hong Kong, a
former British colony, shows various signs, a few of which incorporate both Chinese and British
English.

Japanese McDonald's fast food as evidence of corporate globalization and the integration of the
same into different cultures.

"Culture" is defined as patterns of human activity and the symbols that give these activities
significance. Culture is what people eat, how they dress, the beliefs they hold, and the activities
they practice. Globalization has joined different cultures and made it into something different.[46]

Culinary culture has become extensively globalized. For example, Japanese noodles, Swedish
meatballs, Indian curry, French cheese, and American burgers and fries have become popular
outside their countries of origin. Two American companies, McDonald's and Starbucks, are often
cited as examples of globalization, with over 31,000 and 18,000 locations operating worldwide,
respectively.

Another common practice brought about by globalization is the usage of Chinese characters in
tattoos. These tattoos are popular with today's youth despite the lack of social acceptance of
tattoos in China.[47] Also, there is a lack of comprehension in the meaning of Chinese characters
that people get,[48] making this an example of cultural appropriation.

The internet breaks down cultural boundaries across the world by enabling easy, near-
instantaneous communication between people anywhere in a variety of digital forms and media.
The Internet is associated with the process of cultural globalization because it allows interaction
and communication between people with very different lifestyles and from very different
cultures. Photo sharing websites allow interaction even where language would otherwise be a
barrier.

[edit] The democratizing effect of communications (esp. the internet)

Exchange of information via the internet is playing a major role in the democratization of many
countries.[49]

Virtualization of industries since the dawn of ecommerce has transferred the power to the buyer,
and the same effect has transitioned into voting systems by the groupin[50] effect of social media.

[edit] Economic liberalization


Further information: Neoliberalism

According to Jagdish Bhagwati, a former adviser to the U.N. on globalization, although there are
obvious problems with overly-rapid development, globalization is a very positive force that lifts
countries out of poverty. According to him, it causes a virtuous economic cycle associated with
faster economic growth.[51]

Workers in developing countries now have more occupational choices then ever before.
Educated workers in developing countries are able to compete on the global job market for high
paying jobs. Production workers in developing countries are not only able to compete, they have
a strong advantage over their counterparts in the industrialized world.[52] This translates into
increased opportunity. Workers have the choice of emigrating and taking jobs in industrial
countries or staying at home to work in outsourced industries. In addition, the global economy
provides a market for the products of cottage industry, providing more opportunities.[51]

Globalization has generated significant international opposition over concerns that it has
increased inequality and environmental degradation.[53] In the Midwestern United States,
globalization has eaten away at its competitive edge in industry and agriculture, lowering the
quality of life.[54]

Some also view the effect of globalization on culture as a rising concern. Along with
globalization of economies and trade, culture is being imported and exported as well. The
concern is that the stronger, bigger countries such as the United States, may overrun the other,
smaller countries' cultures, leading to those customs and values fading away. This process is also
sometimes referred to as Americanization or McDonaldization. [55]
[edit] Jobs

[edit] Income inequality

The globalization of the job market has had negative consequences in developed countries.
“Mind workers” (engineers, attorneys, scientists, professors, executives, journalists, consultants)
are able to compete successfully in the world market and command high wages. Conversely,
production workers and service workers in industrialized nations are unable to compete with
workers in third world countries and either lose their jobs through outsourcing or are forced to
accept wage cuts.[24]

This has resulted in a growing gap between the incomes of the rich and poor. This trend seems to
be greater in the United States than other industrial countries. Income inequality in the United
States started to rise in the late 1970,’s, however the rate of increase rose sharply in the 21st
century; it has now reached a level comparable with that found in developing countries.[56] (Cf.
The impact of the information age on the workforce)

[edit] Brain drains

Opportunities in rich countries drives talent away from poor countries, leading to brain drains.
Brain drain has cost the African continent over $4.1 billion in the employment of 150,000
expatriate professionals annually.[57] Indian students going abroad for their higher studies costs
India a foreign exchange outflow of $10 billion annually.[58]

A maquila in Mexico

[edit] Sweatshops

In many poorer nations, globalization is the result of foreign businesses utilizing workers in a
country to take advantage of the lower wage rates.

One example used by anti-globalization protestors is the use of sweatshops by manufacturers.


According to Global Exchange these "Sweat Shops" are widely used by sports shoe
manufacturers and mentions one company in particular – Nike.[59] There are factories set up in
the poor countries where employees agree to work for low wages. Then if labour laws alter in
those countries and stricter rules govern the manufacturing process the factories are closed down
and relocated to other nations with more business favorable policies, such as Cambodia or
Bangladesh.[citation needed]

There are several agencies that have been set up worldwide specifically designed to focus on
anti-sweatshop campaigns and education of such. In the USA, the National Labor Committee has
proposed a number of bills as part of Decent Working Conditions and Fair Competition Act,
which have thus far failed in Congress. The legislation would legally require companies to
respect human and worker rights by prohibiting the import, sale, or export of sweatshop goods.[60]

Specifically, these core standards include no child labor, no forced labor, freedom of association,
right to organize and bargain collectively, as well as the right to decent working conditions.[61]

There are also concerns about the emergence of "electronic sweatshops." Shehzad Nadeem
writes that the outsourcing of service work, such as customer service and Information
Technology work, to India has resulted in “longer work hours, an intense work pace, and
temporal displacement manifested in health problems and alienation from family and friends.”[62]

[edit] Natural resources

[edit] Air

The Worldwatch Institute said the booming economies of China and India are planetary powers
that are shaping the global biosphere. In 2007, China overtook the United States as the world's
biggest producer of CO2.[63] Only 1 percent of the country’s 560 million city inhabitants (2007)
breathe air deemed safe by the European Union.

Burning forest in Brazil. The removal of forest to make way for cattle ranching was the leading
cause of deforestation in the Brazilian Amazon from the mid 1960s. Recently,[when?] soybeans
have become one of the most important contributors to deforestation in the Brazilian Amazon.[64]

[edit] Forests

A major source of deforestation is the logging industry, driven spectacularly by China and Japan.
[65]
China and India are quickly becoming large oil consumers.[66][67] China has seen oil
consumption grow by 8% yearly since 2002, doubling from 1996–2006.[68] State of the World
2006 report said the two countries' high economic growth hid a reality of severe pollution. The
report states:
The world's ecological capacity is simply insufficient to satisfy the ambitions of China,
India, Japan, Europe and the United States as well as the aspirations of the rest of the
world in a sustainable way[69]

At present rates, tropical rainforests in Indonesia would be logged out in 10 years, Papua New
Guinea in 13 to 16 years.[70]

[edit] Minerals

Without more recycling, zinc could be used up by 2037, both indium and hafnium could run out
by 2017, and terbium could be gone before 2012.[71] It is said that if China and India were to
consume as much resources per capita as United States or Japan in 2030 together they would
require a full planet Earth to meet their needs.[72] In the longterm these effects can lead to
increased conflict over dwindling resources[73] and in the worst case a Malthusian catastrophe.

[edit] Food

The head of the International Food Policy Research Institute, stated in 2008 that the gradual
change in diet among newly prosperous populations is the most important factor underpinning
the rise in global food prices.[74] From 1950 to 1984, as the Green Revolution transformed
agriculture around the world, grain production increased by over 250%.[75] The world population
has grown by about 4 billion since the beginning of the Green Revolution and most believe that,
without the Revolution, there would be greater famine and malnutrition than the UN presently
documents (approximately 850 million people suffering from chronic malnutrition in 2005).[76][77]

It is becoming increasingly difficult to maintain food security in a world beset by a confluence of


"peak" phenomena, namely peak oil, peak water, peak phosphorus, peak grain and peak fish.
Growing populations, falling energy sources and food shortages will create the "perfect storm"
by 2030, according to the UK government chief scientist. He said food reserves are at a 50-year
low but the world requires 50% more energy, food and water by 2030.[78][79] The world will have
to produce 70% more food by 2050 to feed a projected extra 2.3 billion people and as incomes
rise, the United Nations' Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) warned.[80] Social scientists
have warned of the possibility that global civilization is due for a period of contraction and
economic re-localization, due to the decline in fossil fuels and resulting crisis in transportation
and food production.[81][82][83] One paper even suggested that the future might even bring about a
restoration of sustainable local economic activities based on hunting and gathering, shifting
horticulture, and pastoralism.[84]

In 2003, 29% of open sea fisheries were in a state of collapse.[85] The journal Science published a
four-year study in November 2006, which predicted that, at prevailing trends, the world would
run out of wild-caught seafood in 2048.[86]

[edit] Health

Further information: Globalization and disease


Globalization has also helped to spread some of the deadliest infectious diseases known to
humans.[87] Starting in Asia, the Black Death killed at least one-third of Europe's population in
the 14th century.[88] Even worse devastation was inflicted on the American supercontinent by
European arrivals. 90% of the populations of the civilizations of the "New World" such as the
Aztec, Maya, and Inca were killed by small pox brought by European colonization. Modern
modes of transportation allow more people and products to travel around the world at a faster
pace, but they also open the airways to the transcontinental movement of infectious disease
vectors.[89] One example of this occurring is AIDS/HIV.[90] Due to immigration, approximately
500,000 people in the United States are believed to be infected with Chagas disease.[91] In 2006,
the tuberculosis (TB) rate among foreign-born persons in the United States was 9.5 times that of
U.S.-born persons.[92]

[edit] Global market

[edit] Expansion

A flood of consumer goods such as televisions, radios, bicycles, and textiles into the United
States, Europe, and Japan has helped fuel the economic expansion of Asian tiger economies in
recent decades.[93] However, Chinese textile and clothing exports have recently[when?] encountered
criticism from Europe, the United States and some African countries.[94][95] In South Africa, some
300,000 textile workers have lost their jobs due to the influx of Chinese goods.[96] The increasing
U.S. trade deficit with China has cost 2.4 million American jobs between 2001 and 2008,
according to a study by the Economic Policy Institute (EPI).[97] A total of 3.2 million – one in six
U.S. factory jobs – have disappeared between 2000 and 2007.[98]

A report issued in 2007 by PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP predicted that by 2050 the economies
of the E7 emerging economies (the BRIC countries: China, India, Brazil, and Russia, plus
Indonesia and Turkey) will be around 50% larger than the current G7 (US, Japan, Germany, UK,
France, Italy and Canada). China is expected to overtake the US as the largest economy around
2025, while India will overtake the US in 2050.[99] A more recent report isued by Goldman Sachs
that was compiled after China released their GDP growth figures for 2009 predicted that China is
about to overtake Japan and may become the world's largest economy by 2020.[100] (See the entry
on BRIC for more details)

[edit] Financial interdependency

The world today is so interconnected that the collapse of the subprime mortgage market in the
U.S. has led to a global financial crisis and recession on a scale not seen since the Great
Depression.[101] According to critics, government deregulation and failed regulation of Wall
Street's investment banks were important contributors to the subprime mortgage crisis.[102][103]

Since the mid-1970s, it has been argued that geographic diversification would eventually
generate superior risk-adjusted returns for long-term global investors by reducing overall
portfolio risk while capturing some of the higher rates of return offered by emerging markets.[104]
By doing so, these institutional investors have contributed to the financial and economic
development of key nations in Asia, Eastern Europe and Latin America. Typically, for global
investors, India and China constitute both large-scale production platforms and reservoirs of new
consumers, whereas Russia is viewed essentially as an exporter of oil and commodities- Brazil
and Latin America being somehow "in the middle".

[edit] Drug and illicit goods trade

The United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) issued a report that the global drug
trade generates more than $320 billion a year in revenues.[105] Worldwide, the UN estimates there
are more than 50 million regular users of heroin, cocaine and synthetic drugs.[106] The
international trade of endangered species is second only to drug trafficking.[107] Traditional
Chinese medicine often incorporates ingredients from all parts of plants, the leaf, stem, flower,
root, and also ingredients from animals and minerals. The use of parts of endangered species
(such as seahorses, rhinoceros horns, saiga antelope horns, and tiger bones and claws) has
created controversy and resulted in a black market of poachers who hunt restricted animals.[108]
[109]

[edit] The Debate over Globalization


See also: Alter-globalization, Participatory economics, and Global Justice Movement

In recent years, debates about globalization have tended to descend into polemics and confusion
as opinions have become increasingly politicized. There is little common ground between
proponents and opponents of globalization.[110]

[edit] Politicization of the debate in the United States

The study by Peer Fiss and Paul Hirsch suggests that the politicization of this discourse has
emerged largely in response to greater US involvement with the international economy. For
example, their survey shows that in 1993 more than 40% of respondents were unfamiliar with the
concept of globalization. When the survey was repeated in 1998, 89% of the respondents had a
polarized view of globalization as being either good or bad.[111] At the same time, discourse on
globalization, which was at first confined largely to the financial community, started to focus
instead on an increasingly heated debate between proponents of globalization and a dipartite
group of disenchanted students and workers. Polarization increased dramatically after the
establishment of the WTO in 1995; this event and subsequent protests led to a large-scale anti-
globalization movement.[112]

Their study shows that, the neutral frame was the dominant frame in newspapers articles and
corporate press releases prior to 1989. Both media depicted globalization as a natural
development that related to technological advancement. In 1986, for example, nearly 90% of
newspaper articles exhibited neutral framing. The situation started to change after the collapse of
the stock market in Oct.19, 1987 and the subsequent recession. Newspapers began to voice
concerns about the trend toward “globalization” and the interconnectedness of international
financial markets. By 1989, the number of positively and negatively framed articles had eclipsed
the number of neutrally framed articles. By 1998, neutrally framed articles had been reduced to
25% of the total.
The study also shows an especially large increase in the number of negatively framed articles.
Prior to 1995, positively framed articles were more common than negatively framed articles,
however, by 1998, the number of negatively framed articles was double that of positively framed
articles.[113] A recent article in the Wall Street Journal[114] suggests that this rise in opposition to
globalization can be explained, at least in part, by economic self-interest.

Initially, college educated workers were the most likely to support globalization. Less educated
workers, who were more likely to compete with immigrants and workers in developing
countries, tended to oppose globalization. The situation changed radically when white collar
workers started to blame immigration and globalization for their own increased economic
insecurity. According to a poll conducted for the Wall Street Journal and NBC News, in 1997,
58% of college graduates said globalization had been good for the U.S. while 30% said it had
been bad. When the poll asked a similar question in 2008 (after the financial crisis of 2007), 47%
of graduates thought globalization was bad and only 33% thought it was good. Respondents with
high school education, who were always opposed to globalization, became more opposed.[115]

[edit] The debate in other industrialized countries

Philip Gordon, in a recent article in Yale Global, states that “(as of 2004) a clear majority of
Europeans believe that globalization can enrich their lives, while believing the European Union
can help them take advantage of globalization’s benefits while shielding them from its negative
effects.” [116] The main opposition consists of left-wing socialists, environmental groups, and
right-wing nationalists.

Part of the reason for the difference in response to globalization in US and EU lies in the fact that
workers in the US have been more strongly impacted by factors like automation and outsourcing
than their European counterparts. Income Inequality in the US, for example, is now much higher
than in the EU.[117] Gordon points out that workers in the EU feel less threatened by
globalization. First, the job market in the EU is more stable than that of the US, and workers in
the EU are less likely to accept wage cuts or loss of benefits. Second, social spending by
governments in the EU is much higher than in the US. The situation is very different in the US,
where there is a strong sense of individualism.[118]

In Japan, the debate takes a different form. According to Takenaka Heizo and Chida Ryokichi,
there is a perception that the economy is “Small and Frail”, which seems ironic in a country that
accounts for one-quarter of all production. However Japan is resource poor and must promote
exports in order to import the raw materials it needs. Anxiety over their position has caused
terms like internationalization and globalization to become part of everyday language in Japan.
The Japanese accept that internationalization and globalization cannot be avoided. However,
their resource dependency requires them to be as self-sufficient as possible in sectors like
agriculture. Most discourse, therefore, centers on the notion of self-sufficiency.[119]

The situation may have changed after the financial crisis of 2007. A recent BBC World
Public Poll taken between October 31, 2007 and January 25, 2008, suggests that opposition to
globalization in industrialized countries may be increasing. Unfortunately, it is difficult to
compare the results with the polls mentioned above; those polls asked whether the overall effect
of globalization was good or bad, whereas the BBC poll asked whether globalization was
growing too rapidly. The countries where people are most likely say that globalization is
growing too fast are France, Spain, Japan, South Korea, and Germany. There is even the
suggestion that the trend in these countries is even stronger than in the United States.[120] The poll
also correlates the tendency to view globalization as proceeding too rapidly with a perception of
growing economic insecurity and social inequality.

[edit] The debate in the developing world

A number of international polls have shown that residents of developing countries tend to view
globalization more favorably than residents of the US or the EU[121] However, a recent poll
undertaken by the BBC indicates that there is a growing feeling in the Third World that
globalization is proceeding too rapidly. There are only a few countries, including Mexico, the
countries of Central America, Indonesia, Brazil and Kenya, where a majority felt that
globalization is growing too slowly.[122]

Many in the Third World see globalization is a positive force that lifts countries out of poverty.
[123]
The opposition often combines environmental concerns with nationalism. Governments are
often seen as agents of neo-colonialism that open the doors to an invasion of multinational
corporations.[124] Much of this criticism comes from the established middle class; a report from
the Brookings Institute suggests this is because the middle class perceive upwardly-mobile low-
income groups to be a threat to their economic security.[125]

Although many critics blame globalization for a decline of the middle class in industrialized
countries, a recent report in The Economist suggests that the middle class is growing rapidly in
the Third World.[126] Unfortunately, this growth, coupled with growing urbanization, has led to
increasing disparities in wealth between urban and rural areas.[127] This leads to a situation where
those who have gained the least economically have the most to lose from the negative
environmental impact of globalization. For example, in India 70% of the population lives in
rural areas and depend directly on access to natural resources for their livelihood.[124] As a result,
anti-globalization often takes the form of mass movements in the countryside.[128]

The situation is critical in China, where rapid growth has led to a situation where 0.4% of the
population possess 70% of the nation’s wealth.[129] An 2007 article in The Economist blamed
increaing unrest in rural China on the growing gap in wealth between rural and urban areas.[130]
This, plus growing worker discontent in industrialized areas,.[131] has caused a great deal of
concern among the nation's leadership

[edit] Alternative ways of interpreting discourse on


globalization
The analysis presented above focuses on the politicization of discourse and the way politically
motivated actors represent globalization to the public; it is more interested in the process of
politicization than in the meanings of globalization. It is also possible to examine discourse on
globalization in terms of these meanings and their implications for the understanding issues like
national autonomy and sovereignty.

For example, David Held and Anthony McGrew, in an article in The Oxford Companion to
Politics of the World, have suggested that this discourse can be separated into three frames. 1)
Hyperglobalists hold that autonomy and sovereignty of nation-states have been eclipsed by
contemporary processes of economic globalization. 2) Sceptics hold that intensity of
contemporary global interdependence is considerably exaggerated and that the hyperglobalists
ignore the continued primacy of national power and sovereignty. 3) Transformationalists
emphasize the way in which globalization has brought about the spatial re-organization and re-
articulation of economic, political, military and cultural power.[132]

Peer Fiss and Paul Hirsch, in an article on the discourse of globalization, suggested using the
notion of framing as a way to study this polarization. By framing, they mean the way “interested
actors and entrepreneurs articulate particular versions of reality to potential supporters…” [133]
They identified three main frames:

1) The positive frame points to the potential gains and benefits of globalization.

2) The neutral frame portrays globalization as a natural, evolutionary, and largely inevitable
development. This discourse, which is associated with the financial community, avoids making
moral judgments.

3) The negative frame points out the increasing potential for economic crisis, the threat to the
livelihoods of workers, and the growing income inequality caused by globalization. This frame
also includes discourse which is primarily concerned with the negative impact of globalization in
the Third World.

To which we should add a fourth, newly emergent frame:

4) The constructive frame is an emerging frame that is more positive and constructive than the
negative frame. This discourse supports global cooperation and interaction while opposing some
of the negative effects of globalization

[edit] The positive frame: Advocates of globalization

1) Neo-Liberalism

The majority of books, newspaper articles and press releases in this frame represent the neo-
liberal view of globalization. Supporters of free trade claim that it increases economic prosperity
as well as opportunity, especially among developing nations, enhances civil liberties and leads to
a more efficient allocation of resources. Economic theories of comparative advantage suggest
that free trade leads to a more efficient allocation of resources, with all countries involved in the
trade benefiting. In general, this leads to lower prices, more employment, higher output and a
higher standard of living for those in developing countries.[134][135]
Proponents of laissez-faire capitalism, and some libertarians, say that higher degrees of political
and economic freedom in the form of democracy and capitalism in the developed world are ends
in themselves and also produce higher levels of material wealth. They see globalization as the
beneficial spread of liberty and capitalism.[134]

Supporters of democratic globalization are sometimes called pro-globalists. They believe that the
first phase of globalization, which was market-oriented, should be followed by a phase of
building global political institutions representing the will of world citizens. The difference from
other globalists is that they do not define in advance any ideology to orient this will, but would
leave it to the free choice of those citizens via a democratic process.[citation needed]

2) The Global Village

An optimistic view of globalism is suggested by Marshall McLuhan’s of the Global Village [136]
This view suggests that globalization will lead to a world where people from all countries will
become more integrated and aware of common interests and shared humanity.[137]

3) The importance of international cooperation

A third body of literature points out the value of international cooperation in solving problems of
mutual concern ranging from human-rights issues to environmental concerns such as global
warming. This view is similar to that represented by the constructive frame.

4) World Government

Dr. Francesco Stipo, Director of the United States Association of the Club of Rome, writes in
favor of political globalization in the form of a world government, suggests that it "should reflect
the political and economic balances of world nations. A world confederation would not
supersede the authority of the State governments but rather complement it, as both the States and
the world authority would have power within their sphere of competence".[138]

Some, such as former Canadian Senator Douglas Roche, O.C., simply view globalization as
inevitable and advocate creating institutions such as a directly elected United Nations
Parliamentary Assembly to exercise oversight over unelected international bodies.

[edit] The neutral frame: The Practical approach

This involves a form of discourse that portrays globalization as a natural, evolutionary, and
largely inevitable development. This type of discourse, which is characteristic of the financial
community, has become less prominent as the issue of globalization has become increasingly
politicized. For example, a study of newspaper articles has shown that the percentage of articles
exhibiting neutral framing decreased from nearly 90% in 1986 to around 25% in 1998.[133] It
should be noted, however, that the number of newspaper articles dealing with globalization
increased almost tenfold during that period.[139] Therefore, the total number of neutral articles has
probably increased.
Examples of literature associated with this frame would include textbooks, books on
international finance, and articles on globalization found in financial journals like the Wall Street
Journal.

[edit] The negative frame: Critics of globalization

Since 1991, this discourse has been increasing rapidly in importance in the United states; the
number of newspaper articles showing negative framing rose from about 10% of the total in
1991 to 55% of the total in 1999. This increase occurred during a period when the total number
of articles concerning globalization nearly doubled. [113] This discourse takes two very different
forms:

1) Concern over economic well being in developed countries

In industrialized countries discourse about globalization centers on economic self-interest.


Newspaper articles about globalization typically express concerns involve the interconnectedness
of international financial markets and the potential for economic crisis, as well as threats to the
livelihood of workers\.[133]

2) Concern over the impact of globalization in developing countries

The establishment of the WTO in 1995 and subsequent protests led to a large-scale anti-
globalization movement that is primarily concerned with the negative impact of globalization in
developing countries. Their concerns range from environmental issues to issues like democracy,
national sovereignty and the exploitation of workers. (See the following discussion on the anti-
globalization movement).

Individuals who associate themselves with the anti-globalization movement in industrialized


countries comprise a relatively small but vocal minority. They are overwhelmingly upper
middle-class, college-educated elites. This contrasts sharply with the situation in developing
countries, where the anti-globalization movement has been more successful in achieving a
broader, more balanced social class composition, with millions of workers and farmers getting
actively involved.[140]

[edit] The constructive frame: Finding common ground

This discourse involves a synthesis combining elements of all three of the above forms. It is
practical, insofar as it accepts the reality of international integration and attempts to work within
it. It is positive in that it believes that international cooperation can provide solutions to
important problems. At the same time, it recognizes the negative aspects of globalization and
proposes ways to mitigate their impact.

Beginning in 2001 with the World Social Forum (WSF), there has been a movement consisting
of individuals trying to bring about this type of synthesis. It is associated with the term Alter-
globalization (or altermondialization), a positive spin on the term anti-globalization. Members
of this movement support the international integration of globalization, but demand that values of
democracy, economic justice, environmental protection, and human rights be put ahead of purely
economic concerns. This movement is discussed at length in the section Alter-globalization.

[edit] The Anti-globalization Movement


Main article: Anti-globalization movement
See also: Alter-globalization, Participatory economics, and Global Justice Movement

"Anti-globalization" can involve the process or actions taken by a state or its people in order to
demonstrate its sovereignty and practice democratic decision-making. Anti-globalization may
occur in order to maintain barriers to the international transfer of people, goods and beliefs,
particularly free market deregulation, encouraged by business organizations and organizations
such as the International Monetary Fund or the World Trade Organization. Moreover, as Naomi
Klein argues in her book No Logo, anti-globalism can denote either a single social movement or
an umbrella term that encompasses a number of separate social movements[141] such as
nationalists and socialists. In either case, participants stand in opposition to the unregulated
political power of large, multi-national corporations, as the corporations exercise power through
leveraging trade agreements which in some instances create unemployment, and damage the
democratic rights of citizens[citation needed], the environment particularly air quality index and rain
forests[citation needed], as well as national government's sovereignty to determine labor rights,[citation
needed]
including the right to form a union, and health and safety legislation, or laws as they may
otherwise infringe on cultural practices and traditions of developing countries.[citation needed]

Some people who are labeled "anti-globalist" or "sceptics" (Hirst and Thompson)[142] consider the
term to be too vague and inaccurate.[143][144] Podobnik states that "the vast majority of groups that
participate in these protests draw on international networks of support, and they generally call for
forms of globalization that enhance democratic representation, human rights, and
egalitarianism."

Joseph Stiglitz and Andrew Charlton write:[145]

The anti-globalization movement developed in opposition to the perceived negative


“ aspects of globalization. The term 'anti-globalization' is in many ways a misnomer,
since the group represents a wide range of interests and issues and many of the
people involved in the anti-globalization movement do support closer ties between
the various peoples and cultures of the world through, for example, aid, assistance for
refugees, and global environmental issues. ”
Some members aligned with this viewpoint prefer instead to describe themselves as the "Global
Justice Movement", the "Anti-Corporate-Globalization Movement", the "Movement of
Movements" (a popular term in Italy), the "Alter-globalization" movement (popular in France),
the "Counter-Globalization" movement, and a number of other terms.

Critiques of the current wave of economic globalization typically look at both the damage to the
planet, in terms of the perceived unsustainable harm done to the biosphere, as well as the
perceived human costs, such as poverty, inequality, miscegenation, injustice and the erosion of
traditional culture which, the critics contend, all occur as a result of the economic
transformations related to globalization. They challenge directly the metrics, such as GDP, used
to measure progress promulgated by institutions such as the World Bank, and look to other
measures, such as the Happy Planet Index,[146] created by the New Economics Foundation.[147]
They point to a "multitude of interconnected fatal consequences–social disintegration, a
breakdown of democracy, more rapid and extensive deterioration of the environment, the spread
of new diseases, increasing poverty and alienation"[148] which they claim are the unintended but
very real consequences of globalization.

The terms globalization and anti-globalization are used in various ways. Noam Chomsky
believes that[149][150]

The term "globalization" has been appropriated by the powerful to refer to a specific
“ form of international economic integration, one based on investor rights, with the
interests of people incidental. That is why the business press, in its more honest
moments, refers to the "free trade agreements" as "free investment agreements"
(Wall St. Journal). Accordingly, advocates of other forms of globalization are
described as "anti-globalization"; and some, unfortunately, even accept this term,
though it is a term of propaganda that should be dismissed with ridicule. No sane
person is opposed to globalization, that is, international integration. Surely not the
left and the workers movements, which were founded on the principle of
international solidarity — that is, globalization in a form that attends to the rights of
people, not private power systems. ”
The dominant propaganda systems have appropriated the term "globalization" to
“ refer to the specific version of international economic integration that they favor,
which privileges the rights of investors and lenders, those of people being incidental.
In accord with this usage, those who favor a different form of international
integration, which privileges the rights of human beings, become "anti-globalist."
This is simply vulgar propaganda, like the term "anti-Soviet" used by the most
disgusting commissars to refer to dissidents. It is not only vulgar, but idiotic. Take
the World Social Forum, called "anti-globalization" in the propaganda system –
which happens to include the media, the educated classes, etc., with rare exceptions.
The WSF is a paradigm example of globalization. It is a gathering of huge numbers
of people from all over the world, from just about every corner of life one can think
of, apart from the extremely narrow highly privileged elites who meet at the
competing World Economic Forum, and are called "pro-globalization" by the
propaganda system. An observer watching this farce from Mars would collapse in
hysterical laughter at the antics of the educated classes. ”
Critics argue that globalization results in:

 Poorer countries suffering disadvantages: While it is true that globalization encourages


free trade among countries, there are also negative consequences because some countries
try to save their national markets. The main export of poorer countries is usually
agricultural goods. Larger countries often subsidise their farmers (like the EU Common
Agricultural Policy), which lowers the market price for the poor farmer's crops compared
to what it would be under free trade.[151] (See Agricultural subsidy for more information.)
 The exploitation of foreign impoverished workers: The deterioration of protections for
weaker nations by stronger industrialized powers has resulted in the exploitation of the
people in those nations to become cheap labor. Due to the lack of protections, companies
from powerful industrialized nations are able to offer workers enough salary to entice
them to endure extremely long hours and unsafe working conditions, though economists
question if consenting workers in a competitive employers' market can be decried as
"exploited". It is true that the workers are free to leave their jobs, but in many poorer
countries, this would mean starvation for the worker, and possible even his/her family if
their previous jobs were unavailable.[152]
 The shift to outsourcing: Globalization has allowed corporations to move manufacturing
and service jobs from high cost locations to locations with the lowest wages and worker
benefits. This results in loss of jobs in the high cost locations.[citation needed] This has
contributed to the deterioration of the middle class[citation needed] which is a major factor in
the increasing economic inequality in the United States .[citation needed] Families that were
once part of the middle class are forced into lower positions by massive layoffs and
outsourcing to another country. This also means that people in the lower class have a
much harder time climbing out of poverty because of the absence of the middle class as a
stepping stone.[153]
 Weak labor unions: The surplus in cheap labor coupled with an ever growing number of
companies in transition has caused a weakening of labor unions in the United States.
Unions lose their effectiveness when their membership begins to decline. As a result
unions hold less power over corporations that are able to easily replace workers, often for
lower wages, and have the option to not offer unionized jobs anymore.[151]
 An increase in exploitation of child labor: for example, a country that experiencing
increases in labor demand because of globalization and an increase the demand for goods
produced by children, will experience greater a demand for child labor. This can be
"hazardous" or "exploitive", e.g., quarrying, salvage, cash cropping but also includes the
trafficking of children, children in bondage or forced labor, prostitution, pornography and
other illicit activities.[154]

In December 2007, World Bank economist Branko Milanovic has called much previous
empirical research on global poverty and inequality into question because, according to him,
improved estimates of purchasing power parity indicate that developing countries are worse off
than previously believed. Milanovic remarks that "literally hundreds of scholarly papers on
convergence or divergence of countries’ incomes have been published in the last decade based
on what we know now were faulty numbers." With the new data, possibly economists will revise
calculations, and he also believed that there are considerable implications estimates of global
inequality and poverty levels. Global inequality was estimated at around 65 Gini points, whereas
the new numbers indicate global inequality to be at 70 on the Gini scale.[155]

The critics of globalization typically emphasize that globalization is a process that is mediated
according to corporate interests, and typically raise the possibility of alternative global
institutions and policies, which they believe address the moral claims of poor and working
classes throughout the globe, as well as environmental concerns in a more equitable way.[156]

The movement is very broad[citation needed], including church groups, national liberation factions,
peasant unionists, intellectuals, artists, protectionists, anarchists, those in support of
relocalization and others. Some are reformist, (arguing for a more moderate form of capitalism)
while others are more revolutionary (arguing for what they believe is a more humane system
than capitalism) and others are reactionary, believing globalization destroys national industry and
jobs.

One of the key points made by critics of recent economic globalization is that income inequality,
both between and within nations, is increasing as a result of these processes. One article from
2001 found that significantly, in 7 out of 8 metrics, income inequality has increased in the twenty
years ending 2001. Also, "incomes in the lower deciles of world income distribution have
probably fallen absolutely since the 1980s". Furthermore, the World Bank's figures on absolute
poverty were challenged. The article was skeptical of the World Bank's claim that the number of
people living on less than $1 a day has held steady at 1.2 billion from 1987 to 1998, because of
biased methodology.[157]

A chart that gave the inequality a very visible and comprehensible form, the so-called
'champagne glass' effect,[158] was contained in the 1992 United Nations Development Program
Report, which showed the distribution of global income to be very uneven, with the richest 20%
of the world's population controlling 82.7% of the world's income.[159]

Distribution of world GDP, 1989


Quintile of Population Income
Richest 20% 82.7%
Second 20% 11.7%
Third 20% 2.3%
Fourth 20% 2.4%
Poorest 20% 0.2%

Source: United Nations Development Program. 1992 Human Development Report[160]

Economic arguments by fair trade theorists claim that unrestricted free trade benefits those with
more financial leverage (i.e. the rich) at the expense of the poor.[161]

Americanization related to a period of high political American clout and of significant growth of
America's shops, markets and object being brought into other countries. So globalization, a much
more diversified phenomenon, relates to a multilateral political world and to the increase of
objects, markets and so on into each others countries.

Critics of globalization talk of Westernization. A 2005 UNESCO report[162] showed that cultural
exchange is becoming more frequent from Eastern Asia but Western countries are still the main
exporters of cultural goods. In 2002, China was the third largest exporter of cultural goods, after
the UK and US. Between 1994 and 2002, both North America's and the European Union's shares
of cultural exports declined, while Asia's cultural exports grew to surpass North America.
Related factors are the fact that Asia's population and area are several times that of North
America.

Some opponents of globalization see the phenomenon as the promotion of corporatist interests.
[163]
They also claim that the increasing autonomy and strength of corporate entities shapes the
political policy of countries.[164][165]

[edit] History

Extent of the Silk Road and Spice trade routes blocked by the Ottoman Empire in 1453 spurring
exploration

The historical origins of globalization are the subject of on-going debate. Though some scholars
situate the origins of globalization in the modern era, others regard it as a phenomenon with a
long history.

Thomas L Friedman divides the history of globalization into three periods: Globalization 1
(1492-1800), Globalization 2 (1800-2000) and Globalization 3 (2000-present). He states that
Globalization 1 involved the globalization of countries, Globalization 2 involved the
globalization of companies and Globalization 3 involves the globalization of individuals. [166]

Perhaps the most extreme proponent of a deep historical origin for globalization was Andre
Gunder Frank, an economist associated with dependency theory. Frank argued that a form of
globalization has been in existence since the rise of trade links between Sumer and the Indus
Valley Civilization in the third millennium B.C.[167] Critics of this idea contend that it rests upon
an over-broad definition of globalization.

An early form of globalized economics and culture existed during the Hellenistic Age, when
commercialized urban centers were focused around the axis of Greek culture over a wide range
that stretched from India to Spain, with such cities as Alexandria, Athens, and Antioch at its
center. Trade was widespread during that period, and it is the first time the idea of a
cosmopolitan culture (from Greek "Cosmopolis", meaning "world city") emerged. Others have
perceived an early form of globalization in the trade links between the Roman Empire, the
Parthian Empire, and the Han Dynasty. The increasing articulation of commercial links between
these powers inspired the development of the Silk Road, which started in western China, reached
the boundaries of the Parthian empire, and continued onwards towards Rome.[168] With 300
Greek ships a year sailing between the Greco-Roman world and India, the annual trade may have
reached 300,000 tons.[169]

The Islamic Golden Age was also an important early stage of globalization, when Jewish and
Muslim traders and explorers established a sustained economy across the Old World resulting in
a globalization of crops, trade, knowledge and technology. Globally significant crops such as
sugar and cotton became widely cultivated across the Muslim world in this period, while the
necessity of learning Arabic and completing the Hajj created a cosmopolitan culture.[170]

Portuguese carrack in Nagasaki, 17th century Japanese Nanban art

Native New World crops exchanged globally: Maize, Tomato, Potato, Vanilla, Rubber, Cacao,
Tobacco

The advent of the Mongol Empire, though destabilizing to the commercial centers of the Middle
East and China, greatly facilitated travel along the Silk Road. This permitted travelers and
missionaries such as Marco Polo to journey successfully (and profitably) from one end of
Eurasia to the other. The so-called Pax Mongolica of the thirteenth century had several other
notable globalizing effects. It witnessed the creation of the first international postal service, as
well as the rapid transmission of epidemic diseases such as bubonic plague across the newly
unified regions of Central Asia.[171] These pre-modern phases of global or hemispheric exchange
are sometimes known as archaic globalization. Up to the sixteenth century, however, even the
largest systems of international exchange were limited to the Old World.

The Age of Discovery brought a broad change in globalization, being the first period in which
Eurasia and Africa engaged in substantial cultural, material and biologic exchange with the New
World.[172] It began in the late 15th century, when the two Kingdoms of the Iberian Peninsula -
Portugal and Castile - sent the first exploratory voyages[173] around the Horn of Africa and to the
Americas, "discovered" in 1492 by Christopher Columbus. Shortly before the turn of the 16th
century, Portuguese started establishing trading posts (factories) from Africa to Asia and Brazil,
to deal with the trade of local products like gold, spices and timber, introducing an international
business center under a royal monopoly, the House of India.[174]

Global integration continued with the European colonization of the Americas initiating the
Columbian Exchange,[175] the enormous widespread exchange of plants, animals, foods, human
populations (including slaves), communicable diseases, and culture between the Eastern and
Western hemispheres. It was one of the most significant global events concerning ecology,
agriculture, and culture in history. New crops that had come from the Americas via the European
seafarers in the 16th century significantly contributed to the world's population growth.[176]

This phase is sometimes known as proto-globalization. It was characterized by the rise of


maritime European empires, in the 16th and 17th centuries, first the Portuguese and Spanish
Empires, and later the Dutch and British Empires. In the 17th century, globalization became also
a private business phenomenon when chartered companies like British East India Company
(founded in 1600), often described as the first multinational corporation, as well as the Dutch
East India Company (founded in 1602) were established. The issuance of shares of stock
(starting with the Dutch East India Company, the first after the Middle Ages) became an
important mechanism to raise capital funds for and share the risk of international trade by ship.
[citation needed]

Animated map showing Colonial empires evolution from 1492 to present

19th century Great Britain become the first global economic superpower, because of superior
manufacturing technology and improved global communications such as steamships and
railroads.

The 19th century witnessed the advent of globalization approaching its modern form.
Industrialization allowed cheap production of household items using economies of scale, while
rapid population growth created sustained demand for commodities. Globalization in this period
was decisively shaped by nineteenth-century imperialism. After the Opium Wars and the
completion of British conquest of India, vast populations of these regions became ready
consumers of European exports. It was in this period that areas of sub-Saharan Africa and the
Pacific islands were incorporated into the world system. Meanwhile, the conquest of new parts of
the globe, notably sub-Saharan Africa, by Europeans yielded valuable natural resources such as
rubber, diamonds and coal and helped fuel trade and investment between the European imperial
powers, their colonies, and the United States.[citation needed] Said John Maynard Keynes,[177]

The inhabitant of London could order by telephone, sipping his morning tea, the
“ various products of the whole earth, and reasonably expect their early delivery upon
his doorstep. Militarism and imperialism of racial and cultural rivalries were little
more than the amusements of his daily newspaper. What an extraordinary episode in
the economic progress of man was that age which came to an end in August 1914. ”
The first phase of "modern globalization" began to break down at the beginning of the 20th
century, with World War I. The novelist VM Yeates criticised the financial forces of
globalization as a factor in creating World War I.[178] The final death knell for this phase came
during the gold standard crisis and Great Depression in the late 1920s and early 1930s.[citation needed]

[edit] Post-World War II

Globalization, since World War II, is partly the result of planning by politicians to break down
borders hampering trade. Their work led to the Bretton Woods conference, an agreement by the
world's leading politicians to lay down the framework for international commerce and finance,
and the founding of several international institutions intended to oversee the processes of
globalization. Globalization was also driven by the global expansion of multinational
corporations based in the United States and Europe, and worldwide exchange of new
developments in science, technology and products, with most significant inventions of this time
having their origins in the Western world according to Encyclopedia Britannica.[179] Worldwide
export of western culture went through the new mass media: film, radio and television and
recorded music. Development and growth of international transport and telecommunication
played a decisive role in modern globalization.

These institutions include the International Bank for Reconstruction and Development (the
World Bank), and the International Monetary Fund. Globalization has been facilitated by
advances in technology which have reduced the costs of trade, and trade negotiation rounds,
originally under the auspices of the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT), which led
to a series of agreements to remove restrictions on free trade.

Since World War II, barriers to international trade have been considerably lowered through
international agreements — GATT. Particular initiatives carried out as a result of GATT and the
World Trade Organization (WTO), for which GATT is the foundation, have included:

 Promotion of free trade:


o elimination of tariffs; creation of free trade zones with small or no tariffs
o Reduced transportation costs, especially resulting from development of
containerization for ocean shipping.
o Reduction or elimination of capital controls
o Reduction, elimination, or harmonization of subsidies for local businesses
o Creation of subsidies for global corporations
o Harmonization of intellectual property laws across the majority of states, with
more restrictions
o Supranational recognition of intellectual property restrictions (e.g. patents granted
by China would be recognized in the United States)

Cultural globalization, driven by communication technology and the worldwide marketing of


Western cultural industries, was understood at first as a process of homogenization, as the global
domination of American culture at the expense of traditional diversity. However, a contrasting
trend soon became evident in the emergence of movements protesting against globalization and
giving new momentum to the defense of local uniqueness, individuality, and identity.[180]

The Uruguay Round (1986 to 1994)[181] led to a treaty to create the WTO to mediate trade
disputes and set up a uniform platform of trading. Other bilateral and multilateral trade
agreements, including sections of Europe's Maastricht Treaty and the North American Free
Trade Agreement (NAFTA) have also been signed in pursuit of the goal of reducing tariffs and
barriers to trade.

World exports rose from 8.5% in 1970, to 16.2% of total gross world product in 2001.[182]

In the 1990s, the growth of low cost communication networks allowed work done using a
computer to be moved to low wage locations for many job types. This included accounting,
software development, and engineering design.

In late 2000s, much of the industrialized world entered into a deep recession.[183] Some analysts
say the world is going through a period of deglobalization after years of increasing economic
integration.[184][185] China has recently[when?] become the world's largest exporter surpassing
Germany.[186]

[edit] Measurement
Economic globalization can be measured in different ways. These center around the four main
economic flows that characterize globalization:

 Goods and services, e.g., exports plus imports as a proportion of national income or per
capita of population
 Labor/people, e.g., net migration rates; inward or outward migration flows, weighted by
population
 Capital, e.g., inward or outward direct investment as a proportion of national income or
per head of population
 Technology, e.g., international research & development flows; proportion of populations
(and rates of change thereof) using particular inventions (especially 'factor-neutral'
technological advances such as the telephone, motorcar, broadband)

As globalization is not only an economic phenomenon, a multivariate approach to measuring


globalization is the recent index calculated by the Swiss think tank KOF. The index measures the
three main dimensions of globalization: economic, social, and political. In addition to three
indices measuring these dimensions, an overall index of globalization and sub-indices referring
to actual economic flows, economic restrictions, data on personal contact, data on information
flows, and data on cultural proximity is calculated. Data is available on a yearly basis for 122
countries, as detailed in Dreher, Gaston and Martens (2008).[187] According to the index, the
world's most globalized country is Belgium, followed by Austria, Sweden, the United Kingdom
and the Netherlands. The least globalized countries according to the KOF-index are Haiti,
Myanmar, the Central African Republic and Burundi.[188]

A.T. Kearney and Foreign Policy Magazine jointly publish another Globalization Index.
According to the 2006 index, Singapore, Ireland, Switzerland, the Netherlands, Canada and
Denmark are the most globalized, while Indonesia, India and Iran are the least globalized among
countries listed.

[edit] International social forum

See also: European Social Forum, Asian Social Forum, and World Social Forum
World Social Forum in 2001 was an initiative of the administration of Porto
Alegre, Brazil.

The slogan of the forum was "Another World Is Possible". It was here that the WSF's Charter of
Principles was adopted to provide a framework for the fora.

The WSF became a periodic meeting: in 2002 and 2003 it was held again in Porto Alegre and
became a rallying point for worldwide protest against the American invasion of Iraq. In 2004 it
was moved to Mumbai, India, to make it more accessible to the populations of Asia and Africa.
This last appointment saw the participation of 75,000 delegates.

Regional fora took place following the example of the WSF, adopting its Charter of Principles.
The first European Social Forum was held in November 2002 in Florence. The slogan was
"Against the war, against racism and against neo-liberalism". It saw the participation of 60,000
delegates and ended with a huge demonstration against the war of 1,000,000 people according to
the organizers. The other two ESFs took place in Paris and London, in 2003 and 2004
respectively.

Recently[when?] there has been some discussion behind the movement about the role of the social
forums. Some see them as a "popular university", an occasion to make many people aware of the
problems of globalization. Others would prefer that delegates concentrate their efforts on the
coordination and organization of the movement and on the planning of new campaigns. However
it has often been argued that in the dominated countries (most of the world) the WSF is little
more than an 'NGO fair' driven by Northern NGOs and donors most of which are hostile to
popular movements of the poor.[189]

bank
A bank is a financial intermediary that accepts deposits and channels those deposits into lending
activities, either directly or through capital markets. A bank connects customers with capital
deficits to customers with capital surpluses.

Banking is generally a highly regulated industry, and government restrictions on financial


activities by banks have varied over time and location. The current set of global bank capital
standards are called Basel II. In some countries such as Germany, banks have historically owned
major stakes in industrial corporations while in other countries such as the United States banks
are prohibited from owning non-financial companies. In Japan, banks are usually the nexus of a
cross-share holding entity known as the keiretsu. In Iceland banks had very light regulation prior
to the 2008 collapse.

The oldest bank still in existence is Monte dei Paschi di Siena, headquartered in Siena, Italy, and
has been operating continuously since

What Does Reserve Bank Of India - RBI Mean?


The central bank of India, which was established on April 1, 1935, under the Reserve Bank of India Act.
The RBI uses monetary policy to create financial stability in India and is charged with regulating the
country's currency and credit systems.

Core banking
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Jump to: navigation, search

This article does not cite any references or sources.


Please help improve this article by adding citations to reliable sources. Unsourced material may be
challenged and removed. (April 2007)

Core banking is a general term used to describe the services provided by a group of networked
bank branches. Bank customers may access their funds and other simple transactions from any of
the member branch offices.

Contents
[hide]

 1 Core Banking
 2 Core Banking Solutions
 3 Select Core banking application package vendors (ISVs)
 4 References

[edit] Core Banking


Core Banking is normally defined as the business conducted by a banking institution with its
retail and small business customers. Many banks treat the retail customers as their core banking
customers, and have a separate line of business to manage small businesses. Larger businesses
are managed via the Corporate Banking division of the institution. Core banking basically is
depositing and lending of money.

Nowadays, most banks use core banking applications to support their operations where CORE
stands for "Centralized Online Real-time Exchange". This basically means that all the bank's
branches access applications from centralized datacenters. This means that the deposits made are
reflected immediately on the bank's servers and the customer can withdraw the deposited money
from any of the bank's branches throughout the world. These applications now also have the
capability to address the needs of corporate customers, providing a comprehensive banking
solution. A few decades ago it used to take at least a day for a transaction to reflect in the
account because each branch had their local servers, and the data from the server in each branch
was sent in a batch to the servers in the datacenter only at the end of the day (EoD).

Normal core banking functions will include deposit accounts, loans, mortgages and payments.
Banks make these services available across multiple channels like ATMs, Internet banking, and
branches.

[edit] Core Banking Solutions


Core banking solutions are banking applications on a platform enabling a phased, strategic
approach that is intended to allow banks to improve operations, reduce costs, and be prepared for
growth. Implementing a modular, component-based enterprise solution facilitates integration
with a bank's existing technologies. An overall service-oriented-architecture (SOA) helps banks
reduce the risk that can result from manual data entry and out-of-date information, increases
management information and review, and avoids the potential disruption to business caused by
replacing entire systems.

Core Banking Solutions is new jargon frequently used in banking circles. The advancement in
technology, especially internet and information technology has led to new ways of doing
business in banking. These technologies have cut down time, working simultaneously on
different issues and increasing efficiency. The platform where communication technology and
information technology are merged to suit core needs of banking is known as Core Banking
Solutions. Here, computer software is developed to perform core operations of banking like
recording of transactions, passbook maintenance, interest calculations on loans and deposits,
customer records, balance of payments and withdrawal. This software is installed at different
branches of bank and then interconnected by means of communication lines like telephones,
satellite, internet etc. It allows the user (customers) to operate accounts from any branch if it has
installed core banking solutions. This new platform has changed the way banks are working.

Gartner defines a core banking system as a back-end system that processes daily banking
transactions, and posts updates to accounts and other financial records. Core banking systems
typically include deposit, loan and credit-processing capabilities, with interfaces to general
ledger systems and reporting tools. Strategic spending on these systems is based on a
combination of service-oriented architecture and supporting technologies that create extensible,
agile architectures.[1]

[edit] Select Core banking application package vendors


(ISVs)
While many Banks implement custom (bespoke) applications for core banking, others
implement/customize commercial ISV packages. Here are a few prominent ones, in alphabetical
order (but sortable)...

Overview of Core Banking Solutions and their providers

Package Provider

Avaloq Banking System Avaloq Group

BankFusion Universal Banking Misys

Misys Equation Misys

Misys Midas Plus Misys

Finacle Infosys

CFT-Bank Center of Financial Technologies (CFT)

Lending Solutions Indus, a business unit of R Systems International Ltd.

Alnova Financial Solutions Accenture / Alnova

COBIS (Cooperative Open Banking


COBISCORP
Information System)

TCS BaNCS Tata Consultancy Services (TCS)

Bankway Fidelity National Information Services (FIS)


Corebank Fidelity National Information Services (FIS)

SAP Transactional Banking SAP AG

FLEXCUBE Oracle Financial Services Software

Hogan Computer Sciences Corporation

Insite Banking System Automated Systems, Inc.

Intellect Core Polaris Software Lab Limited

ICBA Infopro Sdn Bhd

Profile (software) (formerly Sanchez Profile) Fidelity National Information Services (FIS)

SAB / SAMIC SAB

Signature (software) Fiserv

Fidelity National Information Services (FIS) (formerly


Systematics
Systematics, Inc/ Alltel)

TEMENOS T24 Temenos Group

CoreSoft, SuVikas VSoft Corporation

Retail banking refers to banking in which banking institutions execute transactions directly with
consumers, rather than corporations or other banks. Services offered include: savings and
transactional accounts, mortgages, personal loans, debit cards, credit cards, and so forth.

Contents
[hide]

 1 Types of banking
 2 See also
 3 References
 4 External links

[edit] Types of banking


 Commercial bank has two meanings:
o Commercial bank is the term used for a normal bank to distinguish it from an
investment bank. (After the great depression, the U.S. Congress required that
banks only engage in banking activities, whereas investment banks were limited
to capital markets activities. This separation is no longer mandatory.)
o Commercial bank can also refer to a bank or a division of a bank that mostly deals
with deposits and loans from corporations or large businesses, as opposed to
normal individual members of the public (retail banking). It is the most successful
department of banking.
 Community development bank are regulated banks that provide financial services and
credit to underserved markets or populations.
 Private banks manage the assets of high net worth individuals.
o Offshore banks are banks located in jurisdictions with low taxation and
regulation. Many offshore banks are essentially private banks.
 Savings banks accept savings deposits.
o Postal savings banks are savings banks associated with national postal systems.

Retail Banking services are also termed as Personal Banking services

Hegemony (UK: /hɨˈdʒɛməni/ or US: /ˈhɛdʒɨmoʊni/; Greek: ἡγεμονία hēgemonía, "leadership"


or "hegemon" for "leader") [1] is the political, economic, ideological or cultural power exerted by
a dominant group over other groups. It requires the consent of the majority to keep the dominant
group in power. While initially referring to the political dominance of certain ancient Greek city-
states over their neighbors, the term has come to be used in a variety of other contexts, in
particular Marxist philosopher Antonio Gramsci's theory of cultural hegemony. The term is often
mistakenly used to suggest brute power or dominance, when it is better defined as emphasizing
how control is achieved through consensus not force.[2]

Contents
[hide]

 1 In politics
 2 Historical hegemony
 3 Geographic hegemony
 4 Sociological aspect
 5 See also
 6 References
 7 Further reading
 8 External links

[edit] In politics
Examples include a province within a federation (Prussia in the German Empire) or one person
among a committee (Napoleon Bonaparte in the Consulate).[3]
Since the 19th century, especially in historical writing, hegemony describes one state's
predominance over other states (e.g. Napoleonic France's European hegemony, the United States'
NATO hegemony). By extension, hegemonism denotes the policies the great powers practice in
seeking predominance, leading, then, to a definition of imperialism.[4]

In the early 20th century, Italian political scientist Antonio Gramsci developed the concept of
cultural hegemony by extending political hegemony beyond international relations to the
structure of social class, arguing that cultural hegemony showed how a social class exerts
cultural "leadership" or dominance over other classes in maintaining the socio-political status
quo.[5] Cultural hegemony identifies and explains domination and the maintenance of power and
how the (hegemon) leader class "persuades" the subordinated social classes to accept and adopt
the ruling-class values of bourgeois hegemony.[citation needed]

In Hegemony and Socialist Strategy (1985), political theorists Ernesto Laclau and Chantal
Mouffe define hegemony as a type or form of political relation in which a given collectivity
performs some kind of social task which is not "natural" to them, i.e., the task is one that serves
the interests of some other collectivity or system; this relation always occurs as an articulation
within a field of discursivity, and is a result of both the polysemy of that field (and the elements
within it) and the presence of equivalential chains of identity and difference, which in turn create
social antagonisms and "frontier effects" (the sense of a society being divided, which Laclau and
Mouffe argue would be impossible, since society never fully constitutes itself).[6] Similarly, critic
Jennifer Daryl Slack further defines hegemony as "a process, by which a hegemonic class
articulates (or co-ordinates) the interests of social groups, such that those groups actively
'consent' to their subordinated status".[7]

[edit] Historical hegemony


Hegemony, or the hegemon, dictates the politics of the hegemony's constituent subordinate states
via cultural imperialism — the imposition of its way of life, i.e. its language (the imperial lingua
franca) and bureaucracies (social, economic, educational, governing), to make formal its
dominance — thus transforming external domination into an abstraction, because power is in the
status quo ("the way things are") not in any leader(s). In the event, rebellion (social, political,
economic, armed) is eliminated — either by co-optation of the rebel(s) or by police and military
suppression, all without the hegemon's direct intervention, e.g. the Spanish and the British
empires, and the united Germany (extant 1871–1945).[8]

In the Ancient World, Sparta was the hegemon (leader) city-state of the Peloponnesian League,
in the 6th century BC, and King Philip II of Macedon was the hegemon of the League of Corinth,
in 337 BC, (a kingship he willed to his son, Alexander the Great); in Eastern Asia, it occurred in
China, during the Spring and Autumn Period (ca. 770–480 BC), when the weakened rule of the
Zhou Dynasty lead to the relative autonomy of the Five Hegemons ("Ba" in Chinese [霸]) who
were appointed, by feudal lord conferences, and were nominally obliged to uphold the Zhou
dynastic imperium over the subordinate states. In late 16th- and early 17th-century-Japan,
hegemon applies to its "Three Unifiers" — Oda Nobunaga, Toyotomi Hideyoshi, and Tokugawa
Ieyasu — who exercised hegemony over most of the country.[citation needed]
As a universal, politico-cultural practice, the hegemon's cultural institutions maintain the
hegemony (cf. cultural imperialism); in Italy, the Medici maintained their mediæval Tuscan
hegemony, by controlling the Arte della Lana guild, in the Florentine city-state; in Holland, the
Dutch Republic's 17th-century (1609–1672) mercantilist dominion was a first instance of global,
commercial hegemony, made feasible with its technological development of wind power and
sophisticated "Four Great Fleets" for the efficient production and delivery of goods and services,
which, in turn, made possible its Amsterdam stock market and concomitant dominance of world
trade; in France, Louis XIV (1638–1715) established French economic, cultural, and military
domination of most of continental Europe; other monarchies (e.g. Russia) adopted French as
their court language, and imitated the French style.[citation needed]

In the 20th century, many countries, including the USSR, Nazi Germany, and the USA, among
others, sought global hegemony. Nazi Germany would launch WWII in its attempt to gain it
while the USA and the USSR, fought the Cold War (1945–91) after the Second World War
(1939–45) broke the old European empires. The Warsaw Pact and NATO were the opposed
alliances in a struggle of communism versus capitalism. Fighting directly (the arms race) and
indirectly (proxy wars) against any country whose internal, national actions might destabilise its
hegemony, the USSR defeated the nationalist Hungarian Revolution of 1956, and the USA
precipitated the US–Vietnam War (1965–75) by participating in the Vietnamese Civil War
(1955–65) the National Liberation Front fought against the Republic of Vietnam, the US's client
state.[9]

In the post–Cold War world of the 21st century, the French Socialist politician Hubert Védrine
(among others) describes the USA as a hegemonic hyperpower, while the US political scientists
John Mearsheimer and Joseph Nye counter that the USA is not a "true" hegemony because it
does not have the resources to impose a proper, formal, global rule despite its political and
military strength.[10] Several other countries are either emerging or re-emerging as powers, such
as China, Russia, India, and countries within the European Union.[citation needed]

[edit] Geographic hegemony


In The Production of Space (1992), Henri Lefebvre posits that geographic space is not a passive
locus of social relations, but that it is trialectical — constituted by mental space, social space,
and physical space — hence, hegemony is a spatial process influenced by geopolitics. In the
ancient world, hydraulic despotism was established in the fertile river valleys of Egypt, China,
and Mesopotamia. In China, during the Warring States Era, the Qin State created the Chengkuo
Canal for geopolitical advantage over its local rivals. In Eurasia, successor state hegemonies
were established in the Middle East, using the sea (Greece) and the fringe lands (Persia, Arabia).
European hegemony moved west-wards, to Rome, then north-wards, to the Holy Roman Empire
of the Franks. At the Atlantic Ocean, Portugal, Spain, the Netherlands, France, and the United
Kingdom established their hegemonic centres; in due course, geography dictated that the
political poles then moved to the United States and the Soviet Union; to wit, geography can
determine the long- and short-life of an hegemony, e.g. China's, Pax Sinica and the Roman
Empire's Pax Romana in contrast to those of the Mongol Empire and Imperial Japan's Greater
East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere; (see Edward Soja, David Harvey, and Chantal Mouffe).[citation
needed]
[edit] Sociological aspect
The use of language can serve as a means of creating and applying hegemony. Any source that
disseminates information is, intentionally or not, part of hegemony in that the source can only
contain a finite amount of information. Therefore, in the selection of the information it chooses
to display, the source is limiting and framing the information that the recipient gets. In this way,
the source is practising its influence over the recipient. Examples of the societal aspect of
hegemony are churches and media organizations that constantly distribute information to the
public. These influential institutions can subtly use language to frame their message and thereby
valuate it, helping to further disseminate the adoption of their message. This phenomenon of
language influencing thought within a society is an important tie to the idea of cultural
hegemony.[citation n

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