03 READINGS #1:

GLOBAL INTERCONNECTEDNESS
THE GLOBAL SOUTH
POVERTY:
oThe shanty represents the tenacity of the local, which is
unable to participate in a cosmopolitan culture
represented by Starbucks
UNDERDEVELOPMENT:
oThis prevents it from being globalized, revealing the inherent
unevenness of the process
oPoverty = backward, not modern, cosmopolitan, global
MECHANISMS THAT ARE GLOBAL IN SCOPE:
oForced liberalization and marketization of developing
economies
oIFI (International Financial Institutions) saddle with
developing economies with debt while making them
more vulnerable to global economic shocks e.g. WB,
WTO, IMF
STANDARD ADJUSTMENTS:
oThe enforcement of neo-liberal consensus which deepens
inequality in the world’s poorest countries
o“SHANTY” is a symbol of globalization as the
“STARBUCKS”
oCONCLUSION: Poverty is also being globalized
OBJECTIVE:
oExplore the dev’t./underdev’t. paradox of globalization as
means to shed light on the term “global south”
oBrief examination of inequalities between countries and how
such necessitate emergence of category like global south
oSituating “global south” and its antecedent like “Third World”
by looking at inequalities produced through political projects
like colonization and neo-liberal globalization
oHow people responded in these projects and in the process,
reshaped the terms of global political engagement
oDiscussion of contemporary global south and how it has shaped
its contours and prefigured its future
GLOBAL SYSTEMS
oDistinctions between the beneficiaries of uneven systems of
global power
oCritics of neo-liberal globalization use global south as a banner
to rally countries victimized by the violent economic “cures” of
institutions like IMF
o“global south,” “third world,” “developing world” are ways to
represent interstate (important in understanding imbalances of
aggregate economic & political power between states)
inequalities
oProcess of globalization places into question geographically-
bound conceptions of poverty and inequality
oThe concentration of power and wealth in the 1% to the
detriment of the other 99% in the global south illustrate that
viewing inequality through a simple interstate lens is
inadequate
oThis means that there is the existence of a global south in the
global north and vice versa
ANALYZING STATE &INTERSTATE INEQUALITY
oThe decolonization process produced states, now recognized as
sovereign under the system of international law promoted by
the United Nations
oThe likelihood of being poor is higher for people who live in
states now considered associated with the global south—Asia,
Africa, Middle East, S America
oThese formerly colonized countries are inadequately
represented in global organizations like WTO & various
international banks
SOLUTIONS TO PROBLEMS OF
GLOBALIZATION
oGlobal institutions have yet to prove that they can diminish
international inequalities
oThe State remains the ‘main mechanism’ for social transfer
(goal of neo-liberal institutions is to dismantle local state
oversight)
oCONTENTION of NEO-LIBERALISTS: dev’t. in the global
south must begin by drawing most of the country’s financial
resources for dev’t. from within rather than becoming dependent
on foreign investments & foreign financial markets
PROTECTION OF ENVIRONMENT:
oRegulating firms working within their borders
oGlobal environmental crisis is a reflection of interstate
inequality
TRANSNATIONAL
oActs of deterritorialization such as labor migration need to be
placed in the context of the state
oIncrease of OFW’s began during Marcos regime to send labor
outside the country = reliance on remittances
oCONCLUSION: global south struggle for autonomous
governance is waged as a struggle to democratize the state in
order to make it responsive to the needs of the people in the
ground rather than the demands of external power
COLONIZATION, MODERNIZATION &
CREATION OF GLOBAL INEQUALITY
oGlobal economic integration – is inevitable given the rise of
new technologies
oIt has become a normative international goal
oColonialism – Socialist Internationalism eventually rose to the
forefront on anti-colonialism
oIt took a more radical and militant reinterpretation of socialism
for these struggles to be recognized
HISTORICAL EVENTS
oBolshevik Revolution – arose the resurgence of international
worker militancy
o1919 – Communist international as an alternative lens of
socialist internationalism
o1920 – USSR focus on gaining allies in Central & East Asia
oEnd of WWII – high point of decolonization
o1945 – UN, 80 ex-colonies have gained independence
oCold War – “3 worlds” interpretation of the global politics
New Forms of Colonialism:
oAgainst first world imperialism
oCommunist colonialism
oMao Tse Tung – Peasant Communism
oFall of Berlin Wall ended the cold war and the withering of the
second world
GLOBAL SOUTH AS NEW INTERNATIONALISM
oIn the global south, while embedded in specific geographic
imaginaries, represent emergent forms of progressive
cosmopolitanism
oIn reconfiguring the global south, depending on contours of
global struggles, has premised the most morally potent ideas of
history: Universal human equality
GREECE
oProving to be the worst hit by the global financial crisis that
began in 2008
oThe birthplace of western democracy is starting to resemble the
“backward” economically underdeveloped countries of the
global south
oWas set to receive 5.9B euros from EU & IMF
oIs Greece becoming a third world country?
GLOBAL ENVIRONMENT
oExistential threat of climate change
oPromotion of swift & decisive action against global warming
oArticulating blueprints for environmentally sustainable growth
oSeeking to manage an environmental catastrophe
CONCLUSIONS
o“Global” in “global south” does not only refer to “South” as in
its location in the globe but also signifies that the south
continues to be globalized
oIt represent emergent forms of progressive cosmopolitanism as
an emergent & provisional internationalism
oCONCLUSION: global movements – seek to redress interstate
inequality