Globalization

Globalization (or globalisation) is the process of international integration arising from the interchange of world views, products, ideas and other aspects of culture. Advances in transportation and telecommunications infrastructure, including the rise of the telegraph and its development the Internet, are major factors in globalization, generating further interdependence of economic and cultural activities.

Though scholars place the origins of globalization in modern times, others trace its history long before the European Age of Discovery and voyages to the New World. Some even trace the origins to the third millennium BCE. Large-scale globalization began in the 19th century. In the late 19th century and early 20th century, the connectedness of the world's economies and cultures grew very quickly.

The term globalization has been increasingly used since the mid-1980s and especially since the mid-1990s. The concept of globalization 'emerged from the intersection of four interrelated sets of "communities of practice": academics, journalists, publishers/editors, and librarians.' Economists were central in this early stage. In 2000, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) identified four basic aspects of globalization: trade and transactions, capital and investment movements, migration and movement of people, and the dissemination of knowledge. Further, environmental challenges such as global warming, cross-boundary water and air pollution, and over-fishing of the ocean are linked with globalization. Globalizing processes affect and are affected by business and work organization, economics, socio-cultural resources, and the natural environment.

Overview

Humans have interacted over long distances for thousands of years. The overland Silk Road that connected Asia, Africa, and Europe is a good example of the transformative power of translocal exchange that existed in the "Old World". Philosophy, religion, language, the arts, and other aspects of culture spread and mixed as nations exchanged products and ideas. In both the 15th and 16th centuries, Europeans made important discoveries in their exploration of the oceans, including the start of transatlantic travel to the "New World" of the Americas. Global movement of people, goods, and ideas expanded significantly in the following centuries. Early on in the 19th century, the development of new forms of transportation (such as the steamship and railroads) and telecommunications that "compressed" time and space allowed for increasingly rapid rates of global interchange. In the 20th century, road vehicles, intermodal transport, and airlines made transportation even faster. The advent of electronic communications, most notably mobile phones and the Internet, connected billions of people in new ways by the year 2010.

Etymology and usage

The term globalization is derived from the word globalize, which refers to the emergence of an international network of economic systems. One of the earliest known usages of the term as a noun was in a 1930 publication entitled, Towards New Education, where it denoted a holistic view of human experience in education. A related term, corporate giants, was coined by Charles Taze Russell in 1897 to refer to the largely national trusts and other large enterprises of the time. By the 1960s, both terms began to be used as synonyms by economists and other social scientists. Economist Theodore Levitt is widely credited with coining the term in an article entitled "Globalization of Markets", which appeared in the Mayâ€"June 1983 issue of Harvard Business Review. However, the term 'globalization' was in use well before (at least as early as 1944) and had been used by other scholars as early as 1981. Levitt can be credited with popularizing the term and bringing it into the mainstream business audience in the later half of the 1980s. Since its inception, the concept of globalization has inspired 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. Due to the complexity of the concept, research projects, articles, and discussions often remain focused on a single aspect of globalization.

In 2000, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) identified four basic aspects of globalization: trade and transactions, capital and investment movements, migration and movement of people and the dissemination of knowledge. With regards to trade and transactions, developing countries increased their share of world trade, from 19 percent in 1971 to 29 percent in 1999. However, there is great variation among the major regions. For instance, the newly industrialized economies (NIEs) of Asia prospered, while African countries as a whole performed poorly. The makeup of a country's exports is an important indicator for success. Manufactured goods exports soared, dominated by developed countries and NIEs. Commodity exports, such as food and raw materials were often produced by developing countries: commodities' share of total exports declined over the period.

Roland Robertson, professor of sociology at University of Aberdeen, an early writer in the field, defined globalization in 1992 as:

...the compression of the world and the intensification of the consciousness of the world as a whole.

Sociologists Martin Albrow and Elizabeth King define globalization as:

...all those processes by which the peoples of the world are incorporated into a single world society.

Lechner and Boli (2012) define it as more people across large distances becoming connected in more and different ways.

In The Consequences of Modernity, Anthony Giddens uses the following definition:

Globalization can thus be defined as the intensification of worldwide social relations which link distant localities in such a way that local happenings are shaped by events occurring many miles away and vice versa.

In Global Transformations David Held, et al., study the definition of globalization:

Although in its simplistic sense globalization refers to the widening, deepening and speeding up of global interconnection, such a definition begs further elaboration. ... Globalization can be located on a continuum with the local, national and regional. At one end of the continuum lie social and economic relations and networks which are organized on a local and/or national basis; at the other end lie social and economic relations and networks which crystallize on the wider scale of regional and global interactions. Globalization can refer to those spatial-temporal processes of change which underpin a transformation in the organization of human affairs by linking together and expanding human activity across regions and continents. Without reference to such expansive spatial connections, there can be no clear or coherent formulation of this term. ... A satisfactory definition of globalization must capture each of these elements: extensity (stretching), intensity, velocity and impact.

Held et al.'s definition of globalization as "transformation in the spatial organization of social relations and transactions," described in terms of the four elements (extensity, intensity, velocity, and impact), was called "probably the most widely-cited definition" in the 2014 DHL Global Connectiveness Index.

Swedish journalist Thomas Larsson, in his book The Race to the Top: The Real Story of Globalization, states that globalization:

is the process of world shrinkage, of distances getting shorter, things moving closer. It pertains to the increasing ease with which somebody on one side of the world can interact, to mutual benefit, with somebody on the other side of the world.

Responding to the many problems with existing definitions of globalization, including the tendencies to give the impression that spatial distance is being overcome, the world is getting smaller or globalization has always been the same kind of process across human history, Paul James defines globalization with a more direct and historically contextualized emphasis:

Globalization is the extension of social relations across world-space, defining that world-space in terms of the historically variable ways that it has been practised and socially understood through changing world-time.

The journalist Thomas L. Friedman popularized the term "flat world", arguing that globalized trade, outsourcing, supply-chaining, and political forces had permanently changed the world, for better and worse. He asserted that the pace of globalization was quickening and that its impact on business organization and practice would continue to grow.

Economist Takis Fotopoulos defined "economic globalization" as the opening and deregulation of commodity, capital and labor markets that led toward present neoliberal globalization. He used "political globalization" to refer to the emergence of a transnational elite and a phasing out of the nation-state. "Cultural globalization", he used to reference the worldwide homogenization of culture. Other of his usages included "ideological globalization", "technological globalization" and "social globalization".

Manfred Steger, professor of Global Studies and research leader in the Global Cities Institute at RMIT University, identifies four main empirical dimensions of globalization: economic, political, cultural, and ecological, with a fifth dimension - the ideological - cutting across the other four. The ideological dimension, according to Steger, is filled with a range of norms, claims, beliefs, and narratives about the phenomenon itself.

Paul James argues that four different forms of globalization can also be distinguished that complement and cut across the solely empirical dimensions. According to James, the oldest dominant form of globalization is embodied globalization, the movement of people. A second form is agency-extended globalization, the circulation of agents of different institutions, organizations, and polities, including imperial agents. Object-extended globalization, a third form, is the movement of commodities and other objects of exchange. The transmission of ideas, images, knowledge and information across world-space he calls disembodied globalization, maintaining that it is currently the dominant form of globalization. James holds that this series of distinctions allows for an understanding of how, today, the most embodied forms of globalization such as the movement of refugees and migrants are increasingly restricted, while the most disembodied forms such as the circulation of financial instruments and codes are the most deregulated.

Globophobia has been used incorrectly to refer to the fear of globalization.

History

There are both distal and proximate causes which can be traced in the historical factors affecting globalization. Large-scale globalization began in the 19th century.

Archaic

Archaic globalization is seen as a phase in the history of globalization conventionally referring to globalizing events and developments from the time of the earliest civilizations until roughly the 1600s. This term is used to describe the relationships between communities and states and how they were created by the geographical spread of ideas and social norms at both local and regional levels.

In this schema, three main prerequisites are posited for globalization to occur. The first is the idea of Eastern Origins, which shows how Western states have adapted and implemented learned principals from the East. Without the traditional ideas from the East, Western globalization would not have emerged the way it did. The second is distance. The interactions amongst states were not on a global scale and most often were confined to Asia, North Africa, the Middle East and certain parts of Europe. With early globalization it was difficult for states to interact with others that were not within close proximity. Eventually, technological advances allowed states to learn of others existence and another phase of globalization was able to occur. The third has to do with interdependency, stability and regularity. If a state is not depended on another then there is no way for them to be mutually affected by one another. This is one of the driving forces behind global connections and trade; without either globalization would not have emerged the way it did and states would still be dependent on their own production and resources to function. This is one of the arguments surrounding the idea of early globalization. It is argued that archaic globalization did not function in a similar manner to modern globalization because states were not as interdependent on others as they are today.

Also posited is a 'multi-polar' nature to archaic globalization, which involved the active participation of non-Europeans. Because it predated the Great Divergence of the nineteenth century, in which Western Europe pulled ahead of the rest of the world in terms of industrial production and economic output, archaic globalization was a phenomenon that was driven not only by Europe but also by other economically developed Old World centers such as Gujurat, Bengal, coastal China and Japan.

The German historical economist and sociologist Andre Gunder Frank argues that a form of globalization began with the rise of trade links between Sumer and the Indus Valley Civilization in the third millennium B.C.E. This archaic globalization existed during the Hellenistic Age, when commercialized urban centers enveloped the axis of Greek culture that reached from India to Spain, including Alexandria and the other Alexandrine cities. Early on, the geographic position of Greece and the necessity of importing wheat forced the Greeks to engage in maritime trade. Trade in ancient Greece was largely unrestricted: the state controlled only the supply of grain.

Trade on the Silk Road was a significant factor in the development of the civilizations of China, the Indian subcontinent, Persia, Europe, and Arabia, opening long-distance, political and economic interactions between the civilizations. Though silk was certainly the major trade item from China, many other goods were traded, and religions, syncretic philosophies, and various technologies, as well as diseases, also travelled along the Silk Routes. In addition to economic trade, the Silk Road served as a means of carrying out cultural trade among the civilizations along its network. The movement of people, such as refugees, artists, craftsmen, missionaries, robbers and envoys, resulted in the exchange of religions, art, languages and new technologies.

Early modern

'Early modern-' or 'proto-globalization' covers a period of the history of globalization roughly spanning the years between 1600 and 1800. The concept of 'proto-globalization' was first introduced by historians A. G. Hopkins and Christopher Bayly. The term describes the phase of increasing trade links and cultural exchange that characterized the period immediately preceding the advent of high 'modern globalization' in the late 19th century. This phase of globalization 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, world trade developed further when chartered companies like the British East India Company (founded in 1600) and the Dutch East India Company (founded in 1602, often described as the first multinational corporation in which stock was offered) were established.

Early modern globalization is distinguished from modern globalization on the basis of expansionism, the method of managing global trade, and the level of information exchange. The period is marked by such trade arrangements as the East India Company, the shift of hegemony to Western Europe, the rise of larger-scale conflicts between powerful nations such as the Thirty Year War, and a rise of new commodities â€" most particularly slave trade. The Triangular Trade made it possible for Europe to take advantage of resources within the western hemisphere. The transfer of animal stocks, plant crops and epidemic diseases associated with Alfred Crosby's concept of The Columbian Exchange also played a central role in this process. Early modern trade and communications involved a vast group including European, Muslim, Indian, Southeast Asian and Chinese merchants, particularly in the Indian Ocean region.

Modern

During the 19th century, globalization approached its modern form as a direct result of the industrial revolution. Industrialization allowed standardized 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. In the 19th century, steamships reduced the cost of international transport significantly and railroads made inland transport cheaper. The transport revolution occurred some time between 1820 and 1850. More nations embraced international trade. Globalization in this period was decisively shaped by nineteenth-century imperialism such as in Africa and Asia. The invention of shipping containers in 1956 helped advance the globalization of commerce.

After the Second World War, work by politicians led to the Bretton Woods conference, an agreement by major governments to lay down the framework for international monetary policy, commerce and finance, and the founding of several international institutions intended to facilitate economic growth multiple rounds of trade opening simplified and lowered trade barriers. Initially, the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT), led to a series of agreements to remove trade restrictions. GATT's successor was the World Trade Organization (WTO), which provided a framework for negotiating and formalizing trade agreements and a dispute resolution process. Exports nearly doubled from 8.5% of total gross world product in 1970 to 16.2% in 2001. The approach of using global agreements to advance trade stumbled with the failure of the Doha round of trade negotiation. Many countries then shifted to bilateral or smaller multilateral agreements, such as the 2011 South Koreaâ€"United States Free Trade Agreement.

Since the 1970s, aviation has become increasingly affordable to middle classes in developed countries. Open skies policies and low-cost carriers have helped to bring competition to the market. In the 1990s, the growth of low-cost communication networks cut the cost of communicating between different countries. More work can be performed using a computer without regard to location. This included accounting, software development, and engineering design.

In the late 19th and early 20th century, the connectedness of the world's economies and cultures grew very quickly. This slowed down from the 1910s onward due to the World Wars and the Cold War but picked up again in the 1980s and 1990s. The revolutions of 1989 and subsequent liberalisation in many parts of the world resulted in a significant expansion of global interconnectedness. The migration and movement of people can also be highlighted as a prominent feature of the globalization process. In the period between 1965â€"90, the proportion of the labor force migrating approximately doubled. Most migration occurred between the developing countries and least developed countries (LDCs). The Internet has become influential in connecting people across the world. As of June 2012, more than 2.4 billion peopleâ€"over a third of the world's human populationâ€"have used the services of the Internet.

Growth of globalization has never been smooth. One influential event was the late 2000s recession, which was associated with lower growth (such as cross-border phone calls and Skype usage) or even temporarily negative growth (such as trade) of global interconnectedness. The DHL Global Connectedness Index studies four main types of cross-border flow: trade (in both goods and services), information, people (including tourists, students and migrants) and capital. It shows that the depth of global integration fell by about one-tenth after 2008, but by 2013 had recovered well above its pre-crash peak. The report also found a shift of economic activity to emerging economies.

Globalized society offers a complex web of forces and factors that bring people, cultures, markets, beliefs and practices into increasingly greater proximity to one another.

Global business organization

With improvements in transportation and communication, international business grew rapidly after the beginning of the 20th century. International business includes all commercial transactions (private sales, investments, logistics, and transportation) that take place between two or more regions, countries and nations beyond their political boundaries. Such international diversification is tied with firm performance and innovation, positively in the case of the former and often negatively in the case of the latter. Usually, private companies undertake such transactions for profit. These business transactions involve economic resources such as capital, natural and human resources used for international production of physical goods and services such as finance, banking, insurance, construction and other productive activities.

International business arrangements have led to the formation of multinational enterprises (MNE), companies that have a worldwide approach to markets and production or one with operations in more than one country. A MNE may also be called a multinational corporation (MNC) or transnational company (TNC). Well known MNCs include fast food companies such as McDonald's and Yum Brands, vehicle manufacturers such as General Motors, Ford Motor Company and Toyota, consumer electronics companies like Samsung, LG and Sony, and energy companies such as ExxonMobil, Shell and BP. Most of the largest corporations operate in multiple national markets.

Businesses generally argue that survival in the new global marketplace requires companies to source goods, services, labor and materials overseas to continuously upgrade their products and technology in order to survive increased competition. According to a recent McKinsey Global Institute report, flows of goods, services, and finance reached $26 trillion in 2012, or 36 percent of global GDP, 1.5 times the level in 1990.

International trade

International trade is the exchange of capital, goods, and services across international borders or territories. In most countries, such trade represents a significant share of gross domestic product (GDP). Industrialization, advanced transportation, multinational corporations, offshoring and outsourcing all have a major impact on world trade. The growth of international trade is a fundamental component of globalization.

An absolute trade advantage exists when countries can produce a commodity with less costs per unit produced than could its trading partner. By the same reasoning, it should import commodities in which it has an absolute disadvantage. While there are possible gains from trade with absolute advantage, comparative advantage â€" that is, the ability to offer goods and services at a lower marginal and opportunity cost â€" extends the range of possible mutually beneficial exchanges. In a globalized business environment, companies argue that the comparative advantages offered by international trade have become essential to remaining competitive.

Trade agreements, economic blocs and special trade zones

Establishment of free trade areas has become an essential feature of modern governments to handle preferential trading arrangements with foreign and multinational entities.

A special economic zone (SEZ) is a region in which laws such as taxes and customs regulations are more financially libertarian than a country's typical laws. Types of SEZs include free trade zones (FTZ), free zones (FZ), industrial parks, and free ports. The goal of a SEZ is usually to increase foreign direct investment by foreign investors.

A FTZ is an area within which goods may be landed, handled, manufactured or reconfigured, and reexported without intervention by the customs authorities. Only if the goods are moved into the rest of the country do they become subject to customs duties. Free trade zones are organized around areas with geographical advantages for trade, such as major seaports, international airports, and national frontiers. It is a region where a group of countries has agreed to reduce or eliminate trade barriers.

A free trade area is a trade bloc whose member countries have signed a free-trade agreement, which eliminates tariffs, import quotas, and preferences on most (if not all) goods and services traded between them. If people are also free to move between the countries, in addition to a free-trade area, it would also be considered an open border. For example, the European Union provides both a free trade area and an open border.

Qualifying Industrial Zones (QIZ) are industrial parks in Jordan and Egypt that allow these countries to take advantage of the free trade agreements between the United States and Israel.

The Asia-Pacific has been described as "the most integrated trading region on the planet" because its intra-regional trade accounts probably for as much as 50-60% of the region's total imports and exports. It has also extra-regional trade: consumer goods exports such as televisions, radios, bicycles, and textiles into the United States, Europe, and Japan fueled the economic expansion. The ASEAN Free Trade Area is a trade bloc agreement by the Association of Southeast Asian Nations supporting local manufacturing in all ASEAN countries.

Tax havens

A tax haven is a state, country or territory where certain taxes are levied at a low rate or not at all, which are used by businesses for tax avoidance and tax evasion. Individuals and/or corporate entities can find it attractive to establish shell subsidiaries or move themselves to areas with reduced or nil taxation levels. This creates a situation of tax competition among governments. Different jurisdictions tend to be havens for different types of taxes and for different categories of people and companies. The central feature of a tax haven is that its laws and other measures can be used to evade or avoid the tax laws or regulations of other jurisdictions. A 2012 report from the Tax Justice Network estimated that between USD $21 trillion and $32 trillion is sheltered from taxes in unreported tax havens worldwide.

Tax havens have been criticized because they often result in the accumulation of idle cash that is expensive and inefficient for companies to repatriate. The tax shelter benefits result in a tax incidence disadvantaging the poor. Many tax havens are thought to have connections to fraud, money laundering and terrorism. While investigations of illegal tax haven abuse have been ongoing, especially in light of the 2015 HSBC files revelations, there have been few convictions.

Illicit international trade

"Black markets" and organized crime often operate on a transnational basis, with global sales totaling almost US$2 trillion annually as of 2013. In 2010, the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) reported that the global drug trade generated more than US$320 billion a year in revenues. The UN estimated that as of 2000 there were more than 50 million regular users of heroin, cocaine, and synthetic drugs worldwide. The international trade of endangered species was second only to drug trafficking among smuggling "industries". 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) resulted in a black market of poachers who hunt restricted animals.

Economic globalization

Economic globalization is the increasing economic interdependence of national economies across the world through a rapid increase in cross-border movement of goods, service, technology and capital. Whereas the globalization of business is centered around the diminution of international trade regulations as well as tariffs, taxes, and other impediments that suppresses global trade, economic globalization is the process of increasing economic integration between countries, leading to the emergence of a global marketplace or a single world market. Depending on the paradigm, economic globalization can be viewed as either a positive or a negative phenomenon. Economic globalization comprises the globalization of production, markets, competition, technology, and corporations and industries. Current globalization trends can be largely accounted for by developed economies integrating with less developed economies by means of foreign direct investment, the reduction of trade barriers as well as other economic reforms and, in many cases, immigration.

In 1944, 44 nations attended the Bretton Woods Conference with a purpose of stabilizing world currencies and establishing credit for international trade in the post World War II era. While the international economic order envisioned by the conference gave way to the neo-liberal economic order prevalent today, the conference established many of the organizations essential to advancement towards a close-knit global economy and global financial system, such as the World Bank, the International Monetary Fund, and the International Trade Organization.

As an example, Chinese economic reform began to open China to globalization in the 1980s. Scholars find that China has attained a degree of openness that is unprecedented among large and populous nations, with competition from foreign goods in almost every sector of the economy. Foreign investment helped to greatly increase product quality and knowledge and standards, especially in heavy industry. China's experience supports the assertion that globalization greatly increases wealth for poor countries. As of 2005â€"2007, the Port of Shanghai holds the title as the world's busiest port.

In India, business process outsourcing has been described as the "primary engine of the country's development over the next few decades, contributing broadly to GDP growth, employment growth, and poverty alleviation".

Global economy

The global economy, or world economy, is the economy of the world, considered as an international exchange of goods and services. In some contexts, the two terms are distinguished: the "international" or "global economy" being measured separately and distinguished from national economies while the "world economy" is simply an aggregate of the separate countries' measurements. It is common to limit questions of the world economy exclusively to human economic activity, and the world economy is typically judged in monetary terms, even if there is no efficient market to help valuate certain goods or services, or if establishing figures is difficult. Typical examples are illegal drugs and other black market goods, which are a part of the world economy, but for which there is by definition no legal market of any kind. Market valuations in local currencies are typically translated to a single monetary unit using the idea of purchasing power. In 2013, the largest economies in the world with more than $2 trillion, €1.25 trillion by nominal GDP were the United States, China, Japan, Germany, France, the United Kingdom, Brazil, Russia, Italy and India.

Global financial system

By the early 21st century, a worldwide framework of legal agreements, institutions, and both formal and informal economic actors came together to facilitate international flows of financial capital for purposes of investment and trade financing. This global financial system emerged during the first modern wave of economic globalization, marked by the establishment of central banks, multilateral treaties, and intergovernmental organizations aimed at improving the transparency, regulation, and effectiveness of international markets. The world economy became increasingly financially integrated throughout the 20th century as nations liberalized capital accounts and deregulated financial sectors. With greater exposure to volatile capital flows, a series of financial crises in Europe, Asia, and Latin America had contagious effects on other countries. By the early 21st century, financial institutions had become increasingly large with a more sophisticated and interconnected range of investment activities. Thus, when the United States experienced a financial crisis early in that century, it quickly propagated among other nations. It became known as the global financial crisis and is recognized as the catalyst for the worldwide Great Recession.

Inequality

While within-country income inequality has increased throughout the globalization period, globally inequality has lessened as developing countries have experienced much more rapid growth. Economic inequality varies between societies, historical periods, economic structures or systems (for example, capitalism or socialism), ongoing or past wars, between genders, and between differences in individuals' abilities to create wealth. There are various numerical indices for measuring economic inequality. A prominent one is the Gini coefficient, but there are also many other methods.

Economic inequality affects equity, equality of outcome and subsequent equality of opportunity. Although earlier studies considered economic inequality as necessary and beneficial, some economists see it as an important social problem. Early studies suggesting that greater equality inhibits economic growth did not account for lags between inequality changes and growth changes. Later studies claimed that one of the most robust determinants of sustained economic growth is the level of income inequality.

International inequality is inequality between countries. Income differences between rich and poor countries are very large, although they are changing rapidly. Per capita incomes in China and India doubled in the prior twenty years, a feat that required 150 years in the US. According to the United Nations Human Development Report for 2013, for countries at varying levels of the UN Human Development Index the GNP per capita grew between 2004 and 2013 from 24,806 to 33,391 or 35% (very high human development), 4,269 to 5,428 or 27% (medium) and 1,184 to 1,633 or 38% (low) PPP$, respectively (PPP$ = purchasing power parity measured in United States dollars).

Certain demographic changes in the developing world after active economic liberalization and international integration resulted in rising welfare and hence, reduced inequality. According to Martin Wolf, in the developing world as a whole, life expectancy rose by four months each year after 1970 and infant mortality rate declined from 107 per thousand in 1970 to 58 in 2000 due to improvements in standards of living and health conditions. Also, adult literacy in developing countries rose from 53% in 1970 to 74% in 1998 and much lower illiteracy rate among the young guarantees that rates will continue to fall as time passes. Furthermore, the reduction in fertility rates in the developing world as a whole from 4.1 births per woman in 1980 to 2.8 in 2000 indicates improved education level of women on fertility, and control of fewer children with more parental attention and investment. Consequentially, more prosperous and educated parents with fewer children have chosen to withdraw their children from the labor force to give them opportunities to be educated at school improving the issue of child labor. Thus, despite seemingly unequal distribution of income within these developing countries, their economic growth and development have brought about improved standards of living and welfare for the population as a whole.

Capital flight

Capital flight occurs when assets or money rapidly flow out of a country because of that country's recent increase in taxes, tariffs, labor costs, or other unfavorable financial conditions such as government debt defaulting, which disturb investors. This leads to a sometimes very rapid disappearance of wealth and is usually accompanied by a sharp drop in the exchange rate of the affected country, leading in turn to depreciation in a variable currency exchange rate regime or a forced devaluation under fixed exchange rates. This can be particularly damaging when the capital belongs to the people of the affected country, because not only are the citizens now burdened by the loss of faith in the economy and devaluation of their currency, but probably also their assets have lost much of their nominal value. This leads to dramatic decreases in the purchasing power of the country's assets and makes it increasingly expensive to import goods.

Capital flight can cause liquidity crises in the affected countries from which capital is flowing, the countries in which investors are trying to liquidate their assets, and other countries involved in international commerce such as shipping and finance. A 2008 paper published by Global Financial Integrity estimated capital flight or illicit financial flows out of developing countries to be at a rate of "some US$850 billion to $1 trillion a year." Market participants in need of cash find it hard to locate potential trading partners to sell their assets. This may result as a consequence of limited market participation or because of a decrease in cash held by financial market participants. Thus, asset holders may be forced to sell their assets at a price below the long term fundamental price. Borrowers typically face higher loan costs and collateral requirements, compared to periods of ample liquidity, and unsecured debt is nearly impossible to obtain. Typically, during a liquidity crisis, the interbank lending market does not function smoothly either.

A 2009 article in The Times reported that hundreds of wealthy financiers and entrepreneurs had fled the United Kingdom in response to tax increases, relocating in low-tax destinations such as Jersey, Guernsey, the Isle of Man, and the British Virgin Islands. In May 2012, the scale of Greek capital flight in the wake of the first "undecided" legislative election was estimated at €4 billion a week, and later that month the Spanish Central Bank revealed €97 billion in capital flight from the Spanish economy for the first quarter of 2012.

Measuring globalization

Indices

Globalization Index

Measurement of economic globalization focuses on variables such as trade, Foreign Direct Investment (FDI), portfolio investment, and income. However, newer indices attempt to measure globalization in more general terms, including variables related to political, social, cultural, and even environmental aspects of globalization.

One index of globalization is the KOF Index, which measures three important dimensions of globalization: economic, social, and political. Another is the A.T. Kearney / Foreign Policy Magazine Globalization Index.

The Good Country Index

The Index is a composite statistic of 35 data points which are mostly generated by the United Nations. These data points are combined into a common measure which gives an overall ranking and a ranking in seven categories such as Science and Technology, Culture, International Peace and Security, World Order, Planet and Climate, Prosperity and Equality, Health and Wellbeing.

2014 Top 10 Overall Rank

Free trade policies

The Enabling Trade Index measures the factors, policies and services that facilitate the trade in goods across borders and to destinations. It is made up of four sub-indexes: market access; border administration; transport and communications infrastructure; and business environment. The top 20 countries are listed below.

Global Enabling Trade Report 2010

Global Enabling Trade Report 2014

Sociocultural globalization

Culture

Cultural globalization refers to the transmission of ideas, meanings and values around the world in such a way as to extend and intensify social relations. This process is marked by the common consumption of cultures that have been diffused by the Internet, popular culture media, and international travel. This has added to processes of commodity exchange and colonization which have a longer history of carrying cultural meaning around the globe. The circulation of cultures enables individuals to partake in extended social relations that cross national and regional borders. The creation and expansion of such social relations is not merely observed on a material level. Cultural globalization involves the formation of shared norms and knowledge with which people associate their individual and collective cultural identities. It brings increasing interconnectedness among different populations and cultures.

Cultural globalization has increased cross-cultural contacts but may be accompanied by a decrease in the uniqueness of once-isolated communities. For example, sushi is available in Germany as well as Japan but Euro-Disney outdraws the city of Paris, potentially reducing demand for "authentic" French pastry. Globalization's contribution to the alienation of individuals from their traditions may be modest compared to the impact of modernity itself, as alleged by existentialists such as Jean-Paul Sartre and Albert Camus. Globalization has expanded recreational opportunities by spreading pop culture, particularly via the Internet and satellite television.

Religious movements were among the earliest cultural elements to globalize, being spread by force, migration, evangelists, imperialists and traders. Christianity, Islam, Buddhism and more recently sects such as Mormonism, which have taken root and influenced endemic cultures in places far from their origins.

The diffusion of certain cuisines such as American fast food chains is a visible aspect of cultural globalization. The two most successful global food and beverage outlets, McDonald's and Starbucks, are American companies often cited as examples of globalization, with over 32,000 and 18,000 locations operating worldwide, respectively as of 2008. The Big Mac Index is an informal measure of purchasing power parity among world currencies. Scholarly opinion typically states that globalization and Americanisation are different phenomena. Daniele Conversi says that the two have similarities and often overlap, but differentiates them in several ways.

The term globalization implies transformation. Cultural practices including traditional music can be lost or turned into a fusion of traditions. Globalization can trigger a state of emergency for the preservation of musical heritage. Archivists must attempt to collect, record or transcribe repertoires before melodies are assimilated or modified. Local musicians struggle for authenticity and to preserve local musical traditions. Globalization can lead performers to discard traditional instruments. Fusion genres can become interesting fields of analysis.

Music has an important role in economic and cultural development during globalization. Music genres such as jazz and reggae began locally and later became international phenomena. Globalization gave support to the World Music phenomenon by allowing music from developing countries to reach broader audiences. The term "World Music" was originally intended for ethnic-specific music. Now, globalization is expanding its scope such that the term often includes hybrid subgenres such as "World fusion", "Global fusion", "Ethnic fusion", and Worldbeat.

Bourdieu claimed that the perception of consumption can be seen as self-identification and the formation of identity. Musically, this translates into each being having his own musical identity based on likes and tastes. These likes and tastes are greatly influenced by culture as this is the most basic cause for a person's wants and behavior. The concept of one's own culture is now in a period of change due to globalization. Also, globalization has increased the interdependency of political, personal, cultural and economic factors.

A 2005 UNESCO report 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. Americanization is related to a period of high political American clout and of significant growth of America's shops, markets and objects being brought into other countries.

Some critics of globalization argue that it harms the diversity of cultures. As a dominating country’s culture is introduced into a receiving country through globalization, it can become a threat to the diversity of local culture. Some argue that globalization may ultimately lead to Westernization or Americanization of culture, where the dominating cultural concepts of economically and politically powerful Western countries spread and cause harm on local cultures.

So, globalization, a diverse phenomenon, relates to a multilateral political world and to the increase of cultural objects and markets between countries. The Indian experience particularly reveals the plurality of the impact of cultural globalization.

Multilingualism and the emergence of lingua francas

Most people in the world are multilingual. Language contact occurs when two or more languages or varieties interact. Language contact occurs in a variety of phenomena, including language convergence, borrowing, and relexification. The most common products are pidgins, creoles, code-switching, and mixed languages.

Multilingualism is becoming a social phenomenon governed by the needs of globalization and cultural openness. Thanks to the ease of access to information facilitated by the Internet, individuals' exposure to multiple languages is becoming more and more frequent, triggering, therefore, the need to acquire more and more languages.

A lingua franca is a language systematically used to make communication possible between people not sharing a mother tongue, in particular when it is a third language, distinct from both mother tongues. Today, the most popular second language is English. Some 3.5 billion people have some acquaintance of the language. English is the dominant language on the Internet. About 35% of the world's mail, telexes, and cables are in English; approximately 40% of the world's radio programs are in English.

While multilingualism is common among individuals, globally the number of spoken languages is decreasing. The top 20 languages spoken by more than 50 million speakers each are spoken by some 50% of the world's population, whereas many of the other languages are spoken in small communities, most with less than 10,000 speakers. Historically, these less widespread languages were afforded protection through geographical isolation. Today, speakers of regional and minority languages are increasingly unable to compete with those who speak dominant languages such that these languages are now considered endangered languages. The total number of languages in the world is not precisely known and estimates vary depending on many factors. The current estimate is that there are between 6000 and 7000 languages spoken and between 50â€"90% of those will have become extinct by the year 2100.

Politics

In general, globalization may ultimately reduce the importance of nation states. Supranational institutions such as the European Union, the WTO, the G8 or the International Criminal Court replace or extend national functions to facilitate international agreement. Some observers attribute the relative decline in US power to globalization, particularly due to the country's high trade deficit. This led to a global power shift towards Asian states, particularly China, which unleashed market forces and achieved tremendous growth rates. As of 2011, the Chinese economy was on track to overtake the United States by 2025.

Increasingly, non-governmental organizations influence public policy across national boundaries, including humanitarian aid and developmental efforts. Philanthropic organizations with global missions are also coming to the forefront of humanitarian efforts; charities such as the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, Accion International, the Acumen Fund (now Acumen) and the Echoing Green have combined the business model with philanthropy, giving rise to business organizations such as the Global Philanthropy Group and new associations of philanthropists such as the Global Philanthropy Forum. The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation projects include a current multi-billion dollar commitment to funding immunizations in some of the world's more impoverished but rapidly growing countries. and hundreds of millions of dollars in the next few years to programs aimed at encouraging saving by the world's poor. The Hudson Institute estimates total private philanthropic flows to developing countries at US$59 billion in 2010.

As a response to globalization, some countries have embraced isolationist policies. For example, the North Korean government makes it very difficult for foreigners to enter the country and strictly monitors their activities when they do. Aid workers are subject to considerable scrutiny and excluded from places and regions the government does not wish them to enter. Citizens cannot freely leave the country.

Media and public opinion

A 2005 study by Peer Fiss and Paul Hirsch found a large increase in articles negative towards globalization in the years prior. In 1998, negative articles outpaced positive articles by two to one. In 2008 Greg Ip claimed this rise in opposition to globalization can be explained, at least in part, by economic self-interest. 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.

A number of international polls have shown that residents of Africa and Asia tend to view globalization more favorably than residents of Europe or North America. In Africa, a Gallup poll found that 70% of the population views globalization favorably. The BBC found that 50% of people believed that economic globalization was proceeding too rapidly, while 35% believed it was proceeding too slowly.

In 2004, Philip Gordon stated that "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." The main opposition consisted of socialists, environmental groups, and nationalists. Residents of the EU did not appear to feel threatened by globalization in 2004. The EU job market was more stable and workers were less likely to accept wage/benefit cuts. Social spending was much higher than in the US. In a Danish poll in 2007, 76% responded that globalisation is a good thing.

Fiss, et al., surveyed U.S. opinion in 1993. Their survey showed 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. At the same time, discourse on globalization, which began in the financial community before shifting to a heated debate between proponents and 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. Initially, college educated workers were likely to support globalization. Less educated workers, who were more likely to compete with immigrants and workers in developing countries, tended to be opponents. The situation changed after the financial crisis of 2007. According to a 1997 poll 58% of college graduates said globalization had been good for the U.S. By 2008 only 33% thought it was good. Respondents with high school education also became more opposed.

According to Takenaka Heizo and Chida Ryokichi, as of 1998 there was a perception in Japan that the economy was "Small and Frail". However, Japan was resource-poor and used exports to pay for its raw materials. Anxiety over their position caused terms such as internationalization and globalization to enter everyday language. However, Japanese tradition was to be as self-sufficient as possible, particularly in agriculture.

Many in developing countries see globalization as a positive force that lifts them out of poverty. Those opposing globalization typically combine environmental concerns with nationalism. Opponents consider governments as agents of neo-colonialism that are subservient to multinational corporations. Much of this criticism comes from the middle class; the Brookings Institute suggested this was because the middle class perceived upwardly mobile low-income groups as threatening to their economic security.

The nonprofit Reporters Without Borders publishes a Press Freedom Index, an annual ranking of countries based upon the organization's assessment of the countries' press freedom records in the previous year. It reflects the degree of freedom that journalists, news organizations, and netizens enjoy in each country, and the efforts made by the authorities to respect and ensure respect for this freedom.

Internet

Both a product of globalization as well as a catalyst, the Internet connects computer users around the world. From 2000 to 2009, the number of Internet users globally rose from 394 million to 1.858 billion. By 2010, 22 percent of the world's population had access to computers, 1 billion Google searches every day, 300 million Internet users reading blogs, and 2 billion videos viewed daily on YouTube. According to research firm IDC, the size of total worldwide e-commerce, when global business-to-business and -consumer transactions are added together, will equate to US$16 trillion in 2013. A report by Oxford Economics adds those two together to estimate the total size of the digital economy at $20.4 trillion, equivalent to roughly 13.8% of global sales.

While much has been written of the economic advantages of Internet-enabled commerce, there is also evidence that some aspects of the internet such as maps and location-aware services may serve to reinforce economic inequality and the digital divide. Electronic commerce may be partly responsible for consolidation and the decline of mom-and-pop, brick and mortar businesses resulting in increases in income inequality.

An online community is a virtual community that exists online and whose members enable its existence through taking part in membership ritual. Significant socio-technical change may have resulted from the proliferation of such Internet-based social networking services.

Population growth

The world population has experienced continuous growth since the end of the Great Famine and the Black Death in 1350, when it stood at around 370 million. The highest rates of growth â€" global population increases above 1.8% per year â€" were seen briefly during the 1950s, and for a longer period during the 1960s and 1970s. The growth rate peaked at 2.2% in 1963, and had declined to 1.1% by 2011. Total annual births were highest in the late 1980s at about 138 million, and are now expected to remain essentially constant at their 2011 level of 134 million, while deaths number 56 million per year, and are expected to increase to 80 million per year by 2040. Current projections show a continued increase in population (but a steady decline in the population growth rate), with the global population expected to reach 7.5 and 10.5 billion by 2050.

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. From 1950 to 1984, as the Green Revolution transformed agriculture around the world, grain production increased by over 250%. World population has grown by about 4 billion since the beginning of the Green Revolution and without it, there would be greater famine and malnutrition than the UN presently documents (approximately 850 million people suffering from chronic malnutrition in 2005). There is concern about increasing rates of soil erosion due to ever larger square hectares worked with mechanized equipment and chemical fertilizer and other inputs. With human consumption of seafood having doubled in the last 30 years, seriously depleting multiple seafood fisheries and destroying the marine ecosystem as a result, awareness is prompting steps to be taken to create a more sustainable seafood supply.

Growing populations, falling energy sources and food shortages will create a "perfect storm" by 2030, according to UK chief government scientist John Beddington, who noted that food reserves were at a 50-year low and the world would require 50% more energy, food and water by 2030. The situation in the Sahel region south of the Sahara, in terms of ongoing deforestation and soil erosion, is very serious.

The world will have to produce 70% more food by 2050 to feed a projected extra 2.3 billion people and as incomes rise, according to the United Nations' Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO). Social scientists have warned of the possibility that global civilization is due for a period of contraction and economic re-localization due to a decline in fossil fuels and resulting crises in transportation and food production. Helga Vierich has predicted a restoration of sustainable local economic activities based on hunting and gathering, shifting horticulture, and pastoralism.

Urbanization

Growth in population during the period of rapid industrialization and globalization in the 20th century was accompanied by increased urbanization on a global basis. Although many critics blame globalization for a decline of the middle class in industrialized countries, the middle class has been growing rapidly in developing countries. This has led to increasing disparities in wealth between urban and rural areas. As a result, mass movements in the countryside at times have expressed objections to globalizing processes.

For example, in 2002, in India, 70% of the population lived in rural areas and depended directly on natural resources for their livelihood. By 2011, the majority of the world's population lived in industrialized urban areas featuring nearby factories and business offices rather than in traditional rural areas where agricultural activities predominate. Certain cities began to emerge as global cities generally considered to be important centers of global economic activities. Megacities, cities having a population in excess of 10 million, grew in number from 3 in 1973 to 24 by 2013, with estimates of up to 27 by 2025.

Health

Global health is the health of populations in a global context that transcends the perspectives and concerns of individual nations. Health problems that transcend national borders or have a global political and economic impact are emphasized. It has been defined as 'the area of study, research and practice that places a priority on improving health and achieving equity in health for all people worldwide'. Thus, global health is about worldwide improvement of health, reduction of disparities, and protection against global threats that disregard national borders. The application of these principles to the domain of mental health is called Global Mental Health.

The major international agency for health is the World Health Organization (WHO). Other important agencies with impact on global health activities include UNICEF, World Food Programme (WFP), United Nations University International Institute for Global Health and the World Bank. A major initiative for improved global health is the United Nations Millennium Declaration and the globally endorsed Millennium Development Goals.

International travel has helped to spread some of the deadliest infectious diseases. One example of this occurring is AIDS/HIV. Due to immigration, approximately 500,000 people in the United States are believed to be infected with Chagas disease. The rate of tuberculosis (TB) among foreign-born persons in the United States was 9.5 times that of U.S.-born persons in 2006. Starting in Asia, the Black Death killed at least one-third of Europe's population in the 14th century. 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 smallpox brought by European colonization.

International tourism

Globalization has made tourism a popular global leisure activity. The World Tourism Organization defines tourists as people "traveling to and staying in places outside their usual environment for not more than one consecutive year for leisure, business and other purposes". The World Health Organization (WHO) estimates that up to 500,000 people are in flight at any one time.

As a result of the late-2000s recession, international travel demand suffered a strong slowdown from the second half of 2008 through the end of 2009. This negative trend intensified during 2009, exacerbated in some countries due to the outbreak of the H1N1 influenza virus, resulting in a worldwide decline of 4.2% in 2009 to 880 million international tourists arrivals, and a 5.7% decline in international tourism receipts. In 2010, international tourism reached US$919B, growing 6.5% over 2009, corresponding to an increase in real terms of 4.7%. In 2010, there were over 940 million international tourist arrivals worldwide.

International sports

Modern international sports events can be big business for as well as influencing the political, economical, and other cultural aspects of countries around the world. Especially with politics and sports, sports can affect countries, their identities, and in consequence, the world.

The ancient Olympic Games were a series of competitions held between representatives of several city-states and kingdoms from Ancient Greece, which featured mainly athletic but also combat and chariot racing events. During the Olympic games, all struggles between the participating city-states were postponed until the games were finished. The origin of the Olympics is shrouded in mystery and legend. During the 19th century, the Olympic Games became a popular global event.

While some economists are skeptical about the economic benefits of hosting the Olympic Games, emphasizing that such "mega-events" often have large costs, hosting (or even bidding for) the Olympics appears to increase the host country's exports, as the host or candidate country sends a signal about trade openness when bidding to host the Games. Moreover, research suggests that hosting the Summer Olympics has a strong positive effect on the philanthropic contributions of corporations headquartered in the host city, which seems to benefit the local nonprofit sector. This positive effect begins in the years leading up to the Games and might persist for several years afterwards, although not permanently. This finding suggests that hosting the Olympics might create opportunities for cities to influence local corporations in ways that benefit the local nonprofit sector and civil society. The Games have also had significant negative effects on host communities; for example, the Centre on Housing Rights and Evictions reports that the Olympics displaced more than two million people over two decades, often disproportionately affecting disadvantaged groups.

Globalization has continually increased international competition in sports. The FIFA World Cup, for example, is the world's most widely viewed sporting event; an estimated 700 million people watched the final match of the 2010 FIFA World Cup held in South Africa.

According to a 2011 A.T. Kearney study of sports teams, leagues and federations, the global sports industry is worth between €350 billion and €450 billion (US$480-$620 billion). This includes infrastructure construction, sporting goods, licensed products and live sports events.

International education

According to the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) in their 2009 World Conference on Higher Education report, Over 2.5 million students were studying outside their home country. UNESCO also predicted that the number of international students might rise approximately to 7 million by the year 2020. The main destinations preferred by international students are the United States, United Kingdom, Germany, France, Canada and Australia. Overall, the number of international students more than doubled to over 2 million between 2000 and 2007.
However the sharpest percentage increases of international students have occurred in New Zealand, Korea, the Netherlands, Greece, Spain, Italy and Ireland.

Global natural environment

The natural environment encompasses all living and non-living things occurring naturally on Earth or some region thereof. It is an environment that encompasses the interaction of all living species. The natural environment is contrasted with the built environment, which comprises the areas and components that are strongly influenced by humans. It is difficult to find absolutely natural environments; it is common that the naturalness varies in a continuum, from ideally 100% natural in one extreme to 0% natural in the other. More precisely, we can consider the different aspects or components of an environment and see that their degree of naturalness is not uniform but, instead, there exists a coupled humanâ€"environment system.

Human challenges to the natural environment, such as climate change, cross-boundary water and air pollution, over-fishing of the ocean, and the spread of invasive species require at least transnational and, often, global solutions. Since factories in developing countries increased global output and experienced less environmental regulation, globally there have been substantial increases in pollution and its impact on water resources.

The State of the World 2006 report said that India's and China's high economic growth was not sustainable. 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. In a 2006 news story, BBC reported, "...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." In the longterm these effects can lead to increased conflict over dwindling resources and in the worst case a Malthusian catastrophe. International foreign investment in developing countries could lead to a "race to the bottom" as countries lower their environmental and resource protection laws to attract foreign capital. The reverse of this theory is true, however, when developed countries maintain positive environmental practices, imparting them to countries they are investing in and creating a "race to the top" phenomenon.

The time between distances is shrinking between continents and countries due to globalization, causing developing and developed countries to find new ways to solve problems on a global rather than regional scale. Agencies like the United Nations now must be the global regulators of pollution, whereas before, regional governance was enough. Action has been taken by the United Nations to monitor and reduce atmospheric pollutants through the Kyoto Protocol, the UN Clean Air Initiative, and studies of air pollution and public policy. Global traffic, production, and consumption are causing increased global levels of air pollutants. The northern hemisphere has been the leading producer of carbon monoxide and sulfur oxides.

Changes in natural capital are beginning to erode the economic logic of one major aspect of economic globalization: an international division of labor and production based on global supply chains. Planetary boundaries for several key environmental resources have been reached and others are near their limits. Over time, peak oil and climate change may result in "peak globalization," measured in terms of decreasing ton-miles of freight transported, particularly across oceans and continents. The economic logic of the comparative advantage of global supply chains could be overcome by both increasing transportation costs and interruptions and delays in the transit of freight.

China and India substantially increased their fossil fuel consumption as their economies switched from subsistence farming to industry and urbanization. Chinese oil consumption grew by 8% yearly between 2002 and 2006, doubling from 1996â€"2006. In 2007, China surpassed the United States as the top emitter of CO
2. Only 1 percent of the country's 560 million city inhabitants (2007) breathe air deemed safe by the European Union. In effect, this means that developed countries may "outsource" some of the pollution associated with consumption in countries where pollution-intensive industries have been moved.

Societies utilize forest resources in order to reach a sustainable level of economic development. Historically, forests in earlier developing nations experience "forest transitions", a period of deforestation and reforestation as a surrounding society becomes more developed, industrialized and shift their primary resource extraction to other nations via imports. For nations at the periphery of the globalized system however, there are no others to shift their extraction onto, and forest degradation continues unabated. Forest transitions can have an effect on the hydrology, climate change, and biodiversity of an area by impacting water quality and the accumulation of greenhouse gases through the re-growth of new forest into second and third growth forests. A major source of deforestation is the logging industry, driven by China and Japan. The global marketing of palm oil has led to such a degree of deforestation in Southeast Asia that many species are critically endangered, especially rhinoceros, tigers and orang-utans.

Without more recycling, zinc could be used up by 2037, both indium and hafnium could run out by 2017, and terbium could be gone by 2012. Other "peak" phenomena, such as peak oil, peak coal, peak gas, peak water, and peak wheat, also affect the availability and sustainability of natural capital.

In 2003, 29% of open sea fisheries were in a state of collapse. The journal Science published a four-year study in November 2006, which predicted that, at the current rate of consumption, supplies of wild seafood will be totally depleted by 2048. Conversely, globalization created a global market for farm-raised fish and seafood, which as of 2009 was providing 38% of global output, potentially reducing fishing pressure.

The global trade in goods depends upon reliable, inexpensive transportation of freight along complex and long-distance supply chains. Global warming and peak oil undermine globalization by their effects on both transportation costs and the reliable movement of freight. Countering the current geographic pattern of comparative advantage with higher transportation costs, climate change and peak oil would thus result in peak globalization, after which the volume of exports will decline as measured by ton-miles of freight.

Global workforce

The global workforce is the international labor pool of workers, including those employed by multinational companies and connected through a global system of networking and production, immigrant workers, transient migrant workers, telecommuting workers, and those in export-oriented employment or contingent work and other precarious employment. As of 2012, the global labor pool consisted of approximately 3 billion workers, with around 200 million unemployed.

The global workforce, or international labor, reflects a new international division of labor that has been emerging since the late 1970s in the wake of other forces of globalization. The global economic factors driving the rise of multinational corporations â€" namely, cross-border movement of goods, services, technology and capital â€" are changing ways of thinking about labor and the structure of today's workforce. With roots in the social processes surrounding the shift to standardization and industrialization, post-industrial society in the Western world has been accompanied by industrialization in other parts of the world, particularly in Asia. As industrialization takes hold worldwide and more cultures move away from traditional practices in respect to work and labor, the ways in which employers think about and utilize labor are changing.

The global workforce is competitive and has been described as "a war for talent." This competitiveness is due, in part, to communications technologies that assist companies to attain multinational status. Communication technologies also allow companies to find workers without limiting their search locally, a process known as global labor arbitrage. An example of this war for talent is the phenomenon of foreign executives appointed into headquarter positions of local organisations.

However, production workers and service workers in advanced economies have been unable to compete directly with much lower-cost workers in developing countries. Low-wage countries gained the low-value-added element of work formerly done in rich countries, while higher-value work remained; for instance, the total number of people employed in manufacturing in the US declined, but value added per worker increased.

There are many examples of this movement of labor into developing economies. Two examples can be found in China and South Africa. Chinese success cost jobs in other developing countries as well as in the West. From 2000 to 2007, the U.S. lost a total of 3.2 million manufacturing jobs. As of 26 April 2005 "In regional giant South Africa, some 300,000 textile workers have lost their jobs in the past two years due to the influx of Chinese goods".

Nobel Prizeâ€"winning economist Michael Spence writes, "The massive changes in the global economy since World War II have had overwhelmingly positive effects. Hundreds of millions of people in the developing world have escaped poverty, and more will in the future. The global economy will continue to grow â€" probably at least threefold over the next 30 years. One person's gain is not necessarily another's loss; global growth is not even close to a zero-sum game. But globalization hurts some subgroups within some countries, including the advanced economies."

Not everyone is so sanguine about the continuation of economic growth into the future. In Indonesia, for instance, "Agustinus Karlo Lumban Raja, head of the Environment and Policy Initiative Department of Indonesian NGO Sawit Watch, notes, “The proliferation and intensification of horizontal social conflicts over customary land boundaries testifies to the vulnerability of indigenous Malind people whose customary lands are being targeted and developed by the private sector without adequate and fully representative prior consultation with the various clans and tribes who lay claims to these lands.”"

International migration

Many countries have some form of guest worker program with policies similar to those found in the U.S. that permit U.S. employers to sponsor non-U.S. citizens as laborers for approximately three years, to be deported afterwards if they have not yet obtained a green card. As of 2009, over 1,000,000 guest workers reside in the US; the largest program, the H-1B visa, has 650,000 workers in the U.S. and the second-largest, the L-1 visa, has 350,000. Many other United States visas exist for guest workers as well, including the H-2A visa, which allows farmers to bring in an unlimited number of agricultural guest workers. The United States ran a Mexican guest-worker program in the period 1942â€"1964, known as the Bracero Program.

An article in The New Republic criticized such guest worker programs by equating the visiting workers to second-class citizens, who would never be able to gain citizenship and would have less residential rights than Americans.

Migration of educated and skilled workers is called brain drain. For example, the U.S. welcomes many nurses to come work in the country. The brain drain from Europe to the United States means that some 400,000 European science and technology graduates now live in the U.S. and most have no intention to return to Europe. Nearly 14 million immigrants came to the United States from 2000 to 2010.

Immigrants to the United States and their children founded more than 40 percent of the 2010 Fortune 500 companies. They founded seven of the ten most valuable brands in the world.

Reverse brain drain is the movement of human capital from a more developed country to a less developed country. It is considered a logical outcome of a calculated strategy where migrants accumulate savings and develop skills overseas that can be used in their home country.

Reverse brain drain can occur when scientists, engineers, or other intellectual elites migrate to a less developed country to learn in its universities, perform research, or gain working experience in areas where education and employment opportunities are limited in their home country. These professionals then return to their home country after several years of experience to start a related business, teach in a university, or work for a multi-national in their home country.

Remittances

There are three main types of financial flows to developing countries: investment by foreign companies, remittances from foreign workers, and international aid (also called official development assistance, or ODA). Investment by foreign companies is the largest of these, followed by remittances.

A remittance is a transfer of money by a foreign worker to his or her home country. Remittances are playing an increasingly large role in the economies of many countries, contributing to economic growth and to the livelihoods of less prosperous people (though generally not the poorest of the poor). Remittances reduce poverty and promote human development, and are associated with increased spending on education, health and entrepreneurship. According to World Bank estimates, remittances totaled US$414 billion in 2009, of which US$316 billion went to developing countries that involved 192 million migrant workers. Unrecorded remittances could add up to 50 percent to the official records. For some individual recipient countries, remittances can be as high as a third of their GDP. For example, in 2009, Tajikistan’s remittance intake, in terms of the percentage of its GDP, was ranked the highest globally at 35%, while in Lebanon, the largest remittance-receiving Arab country, remittances made up around 22% of the GDP.

Remittance inflows have risen substantially since 2009. By 2013, global remittances had increased to $542 billion, $404 billion of which were sent solely to developing countries. Furthermore, the World Bank’s Migration and Development Brief is estimating that by 2016, remittances to developing countries alone will be over $516 billion.

A transnational marriage is a marriage between two people from different countries. A variety of special issues arise in marriages between people from different countries, including those related to citizenship and culture, which add complexity and challenges to these kinds of relationships. In an age of increasing globalization, where a growing number of people have ties to networks of people and places across the globe, rather than to a current geographic location, people are increasingly marrying across national boundaries. Transnational marriage is a by-product of the movement and migration of people.

Support and criticism

Reactions to processes contributing to globalization have varied widely with a history as long as extraterritorial contact and trade. Philosophical differences regarding the costs and benefits of such processes give rise to a broad-range of ideologies and social movements. Proponents of economic growth, expansion and development, in general, view globalizing processes as desirable or necessary to the well-being of human society.

Antagonists view one or more globalizing processes as detrimental to social well-being on a global or local scale; this includes those who question either the social or natural sustainability of long-term and continuous economic expansion, the social structural inequality caused by these processes, and the colonial, imperialistic, or hegemonic ethnocentrism, cultural assimilation and cultural appropriation that underlie such processes.

Critiques of globalization generally stem from discussions surrounding the impact of such processes on the planet as well as the human costs. They challenge directly traditional metrics, such as GDP, and look to other measures, such as the Gini coefficient or the Happy Planet Index, and point to a "multitude of interconnected fatal consequencesâ€"social disintegration, a breakdown of democracy, more rapid and extensive deterioration of the environment, the spread of new diseases, increasing poverty and alienation" which they claim are the unintended consequences of globalization. Others point out that, while the forces of globalization have led to the spread of western-style democracy, this has been accompanied by an increase in inter-ethnic tension and violence as free market economic policies combine with democratic processes of universal suffrage as well as an escalation in militarization to impose democratic principles and as a means to conflict resolution .

Economic liberalism and free trade

Economic liberals and neoliberals generally argue that higher degrees of political and economic freedom in the form of free trade in the developed world are ends in themselves, producing higher levels of overall material wealth. Globalization is seen as the beneficial spread of liberty and capitalism. Jagdish Bhagwati, a former adviser to the U.N. on globalization, holds that, although there are obvious problems with overly rapid development, globalization is a very positive force that lifts countries out of poverty by causing a virtuous economic cycle associated with faster economic growth. Economist Paul Krugman is another staunch supporter of globalization and free trade with a record of disagreeing with many critics of globalization. He argues that many of them lack a basic understanding of comparative advantage and its importance in today's world.

The flow of migrants to advanced economic countries has been claimed to provide a means through which global wages converge. An IMF study noted a potential for skills to be transferred back to developing countries as wages in those a countries rise. Lastly, the dissemination of knowledge has been an integral aspect of globalization. Technological innovations (or technological transfer) is conjectured to benefit most the developing and least developing countries (LDCs), as for example in the adoption of mobile phones.

There has been a rapid economic growth in Asia after embracing market orientation-based economic policies that encourage private property rights, free enterprise and competition. In particular, in East Asian developing countries, GDP per head rose at 5.9% a year from 1975 to 2001 (according to 2003 Human Development Report of UNDP). Like this, the British economic journalist Martin Wolf says that incomes of poor developing countries, with more than half the world’s population, grew substantially faster than those of the world’s richest countries that remained relatively stable in its growth, leading to reduced international inequality and the incidence of poverty.

Certain demographic changes in the developing world after active economic liberalization and international integration resulted in rising general welfare and, hence, reduced inequality. According to Wolf, in the developing world as a whole, life expectancy rose by four months each year after 1970 and infant mortality rate declined from 107 per thousand in 1970 to 58 in 2000 due to improvements in standards of living and health conditions. Also, adult literacy in developing countries rose from 53% in 1970 to 74% in 1998 and much lower illiteracy rate among the young guarantees that rates will continue to fall as time passes. Furthermore, the reduction in fertility rate in the developing world as a whole from 4.1 births per woman in 1980 to 2.8 in 2000 indicates improved education level of women on fertility, and control of fewer children with more parental attention and investment. Consequently, more prosperous and educated parents with fewer children have chosen to withdraw their children from the labor force to give them opportunities to be educated at school improving the issue of child labor. Thus, despite seemingly unequal distribution of income within these developing countries, their economic growth and development have brought about improved standards of living and welfare for the population as a whole.

In general, corporate businesses, particularly in the area of finance, see globalization as a positive force in the world. Many economists cite statistics that seem to support such positive impact. For example, per capita Gross Domestic Product (GDP) growth among post-1980 globalizing countries accelerated from 1.4 percent a year in the 1960s and 2.9 percent a year in the 1970s to 3.5 percent in the 1980s and 5.0 percent in the 1990s. This acceleration in growth seems even more remarkable given that the rich countries saw steady declines in growth from a high of 4.7 percent in the 1960s to 2.2 percent in the 1990s. Also, the non-globalizing developing countries seem to fare worse than the globalizers, with the former's annual growth rates falling from highs of 3.3 percent during the 1970s to only 1.4 percent during the 1990s. This rapid growth among the globalizers is not simply due to the strong performances of China and India in the 1980s and 1990s â€" 18 out of the 24 globalizers experienced increases in growth, many of them quite substantial.

The globalization of the late 20th and early 21st centuries has led to the resurfacing of the idea that the growth of economic interdependence promotes peace. This idea had been very powerful during the globalization of the late 19th and early 20th centuries, and was a central doctrine of classical liberals of that era, such as the young John Maynard Keynes (1883-1946).

Some opponents of globalization see the phenomenon as a promotion of corporatist interests. They also claim that the increasing autonomy and strength of corporate entities shapes the political policy of countries. They advocate global institutions and policies that they believe better address the moral claims of poor and working classes as well as environmental concerns. 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.

Globalization allows corporations to outsource manufacturing and service jobs from high cost locations, creating economic opportunities with the most competitive wages and worker benefits. Critics of globalization say that it disadvantages poorer countries. While it is true that free trade encourages globalization among countries, some countries try to protect their domestic suppliers. The main export of poorer countries is usually agricultural productions. Larger countries often subsidize their farmers (e.g., the EU's Common Agricultural Policy), which lowers the market price for foreign crops.

Global democracy

Democratic globalization is a movement towards an institutional system of global democracy that would give world citizens a say in political organizations. This would, in their view, bypass nation-states, corporate oligopolies, ideological Non-governmental organizations (NGO), political cults and mafias. One of its most prolific proponents is the British political thinker David Held. Advocates of democratic globalization argue that economic expansion and development should be the first phase of democratic globalization, which is to be followed by a phase of building global political institutions. Dr. Francesco Stipo, Director of the United States Association of the Club of Rome, advocates unifying nations under a world government, suggesting 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". Former Canadian Senator Douglas Roche, O.C., viewed globalization as inevitable and advocated creating institutions such as a directly elected United Nations Parliamentary Assembly to exercise oversight over unelected international bodies.

Global civics

Global civics suggests that civics can be understood, in a global sense, as a social contract between global citizens in the age of interdependence and interaction. The disseminators of the concept define it as the notion that we have certain rights and responsibilities towards each other by the mere fact of being human on Earth. World citizen has a variety of similar meanings, often referring to a person who disapproves of traditional geopolitical divisions derived from national citizenship. An early incarnation of this sentiment can be found in Socrates, who Plutarch quoted as saying: "I am not an Athenian, or a Greek, but a citizen of the world." In an increasingly interdependent world, world citizens need a compass to frame their mindsets and create a shared consciousness and sense of global responsibility in world issues such as environmental problems and nuclear proliferation.

Cosmopolitanism is the proposal that all human ethnic groups belong to a single community based on a shared morality. A person who adheres to the idea of cosmopolitanism in any of its forms is called a cosmopolitan or cosmopolite. A cosmopolitan community might be based on an inclusive morality, a shared economic relationship, or a political structure that encompasses different nations. The cosmopolitan community is one in which individuals from different places (e.g. nation-states) form relationships based on mutual respect. For instance, Kwame Anthony Appiah suggests the possibility of a cosmopolitan community in which individuals from varying locations (physical, economic, etc.) enter relationships of mutual respect despite their differing beliefs (religious, political, etc.).

Canadian philosopher Marshall McLuhan popularized the term Global Village beginning in 1962. His view suggested that globalization would lead to a world where people from all countries will become more integrated and aware of common interests and shared humanity.

International cooperation

Military cooperation â€" Past examples of international cooperation exist. One example is the security cooperation between the United States and the former Soviet Union after the end of the Cold War, which astonished international society. Arms control and disarmament agreements, including the Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (see START I, START II, START III, and New START) and the establishment of NATO’s Partnership for Peace, the Russia NATO Council, and the G8 Global Partnership against the Spread of Weapons and Materials of Mass Destruction, constitute concrete initiatives of arms control and de-nuclearization. The U.S.â€"Russian cooperation was further strengthened by anti-terrorism agreements enacted in the wake of 9/11.

Environmental cooperation â€" One of the biggest successes of environmental cooperation has been the agreement to reduce chlorofluorocarbon (CFC) emissions, as specified in the Montreal Protocol, in order to stop ozone depletion. The most recent debate around nuclear energy and the non-alternative coal-burning power plants constitutes one more consensus on what not to do. Thirdly, significant achievements in IC can be observed through development studies.

Anti-globalization movement

Anti-globalization, or counter-globalisation, consists of a number of criticisms of globalization but, in general, is critical of the globalization of corporate capitalism. The movement is also commonly referred to as the alter-globalization movement, anti-globalist movement, anti-corporate globalization movement, or movement against neoliberal globalization. It can be explained as encompassing the ideologies present in the following other "movements", which will be discussed below: opposition to capital market integration, social justice and inequality, anti-consumerism, anti-global governance and environmentalist opposition. Each of these ideologies can be framed around a specific strand of the anti-globalization movement, but in general the movement gears their efforts towards all of these primary principles. It is considered a rather new and modern day social movement, as the issues it is fighting against are relevant in today’s time. However, the events that occurred which fuels the movement can be traced back through the lineage of the movement of a 500-year old history of resistance against European colonialism and U.S. imperialism. This refers to the continent of Africa being colonized and stripped of their resources by the Europeans in the 19th century. It is also related closely with the anti-Vietnam war mobilizations between 1960 and 1970, with worldwide protests against the adjustment of structure in Africa, Asia, and Latin America.

In general, opponents of globalization in developed countries are disproportionately middle-class and college-educated. This contrasts sharply with the situation in developing countries, where the anti-globalization movement has been more successful in enlisting a broader group, including millions of workers and farmers.

These supporters of the movement are aware of the unequal power and respect in terms of international trade between the developed and underdeveloped countries of the world. The activists that support the AGM, as mentioned previously before, can range in terms of the specific issue(s) that they oppose. Again, there are a few different dimensions of globalization: economic, political, cultural, ecological and ideological. The diverse subgroups that make up this movement include some of the following: trade unionists, environmentalists, anarchists, land rights and indigenous rights activists, organizations promoting human rights and sustainable development, opponents of privatization, and anti-sweatshop campaigners.

As summarized by Noam Chomsky:

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 (WSF), called "anti-globalization" in the propaganda system â€" 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.

Movement tactics

D.A. Snow et al. contend that the anti-globalization movement is an example of a new social movement, which uses tactics that are unique and use different resources than previously used before in other social movements. Actors of the movement participate in things such as disruptive tactics. These include flash mobs for example, which work extremely well in catching the attention of others and spreading awareness about the issue of globalization. There is also the spreading of information about the social movement through social media and word of mouth about NGOs, organizations and movement groups working to help alleviate the effects of globalization. Websites such as Twitter and Facebook have become a useful outlet for people to become aware of what is going on around the globe, any protests or tactics taking place and the progress of non-governmental organizations aiding in these impoverished countries.

One of the most infamous tactics of the movement is the Battle of Seattle in 1999, where there were protests against the World Trade Organization's Third Ministerial Meeting. It can be described as being a massive group of passionate, grass roots people within the anti-globalization movement protesting against the WTO’s corporate rule. All over the world, the movement has held protests outside meetings of institutions such as the WTO, the International Monetary Fund (IMF), the World Bank, the World Economic Forum, and the Group of Eight (G8). Within the Seattle demonstrations the protesters that participated used both creative and violent tactics to gain the attention towards the issue of globalization. It is still one of the most significant and memorable social movement protests in the past 20 years.

Opposition to capital market integration

Capital markets have to do with raising and investing moneys in various human enterprises. Increasing integration of these financial markets between countries leads to the emergence of a global capital marketplace or a single world market. In the long run, increased movement of capital between countries tends to favor owners of capital more than any other group; in the short run, owners and workers in specific sectors in capital-exporting countries bear much of the burden of adjusting to increased movement of capital. It is not surprising that these conditions lead to political divisions about whether or not to encourage or increase international capital market integration.

Those opposed to capital market integration on the basis of human rights issues are especially disturbed by the various abuses which they think are perpetuated by global and international institutions that, they say, promote neoliberalism without regard to ethical standards. This can also be referred to as "corporate capitalism", as previous mentioned, which are money driven organizations such as the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund, along with many of the popular and competitive multinational corporations, like Nike and other institutions. Common targets include the World Bank (WB), International Monetary Fund (IMF), the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) and the World Trade Organization (WTO) and free trade treaties like the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), Free Trade Area of the Americas (FTAA), the Multilateral Agreement on Investment (MAI) and the General Agreement on Trade in Services (GATS). In light of the economic gap between rich and poor countries, movement adherents claim "free trade" without measures in place to protect the under-capitalized will contribute only to the strengthening the power of industrialized nations (often termed the "North" in opposition to the developing world's "South"). Some of the powerful Northern corporations have implemented policies like privatizing public industry and reducing tariffs. By doing this it has created a growth in sweatshops in the developing world, where wages are minimal and unfair, and conditions are unsafe to the workers’ health and psychological state. The global North can benefit from this by getting goods for a cheaper monetary amount. However, this is at the expense of these impoverished people and the community or country as a whole. Now, fair trade has been introduced in order to attempt to rebuild the economies of third world countries by paying employees, who work to produce goods to be exported, a fair price for their efforts.

Anti-corporatism and anti-consumerism

Corporatist ideology, which privileges the rights of corporations (artificial or juridical persons) over those of natural persons, is an underlying factor in the recent rapid expansion of global commerce. In recent years, there have been an increasing number of books (Naomi Klein's 2000 No Logo, for example) and films (e.g. The Corporation & Surplus) popularizing an anti-corporate ideology to the public.

A related contemporary ideology, consumerism, which encourages the personal acquisition of goods and services, also drives globalization. Anti-consumerism is a social movement against equating personal happiness with consumption and the purchase of material possessions. Concern over the treatment of consumers by large corporations has spawned substantial activism, and the incorporation of consumer education into school curricula. Social activists hold materialism is connected to global retail merchandizing and supplier convergence, war, greed, anomie, crime, environmental degradation, and general social malaise and discontent. One variation on this topic is activism by postconsumers, with the strategic emphasis on moving beyond addictive consumerism.

Global justice and inequality

Global justice

The global justice movement is the loose collection of individuals and groupsâ€"often referred to as a "movement of movements"â€"who advocate fair trade rules and perceive current institutions of global economic integration as problems. The movement is often labeled an anti-globalization movement by the mainstream media. Those involved, however, frequently deny that they are anti-globalization, insisting that they support the globalization of communication and people and oppose only the global expansion of corporate power. The movement is based in the idea of social justice, desiring the creation of a society or institution based on the principles of equality and solidarity, the values of human rights, and the dignity of every human being. Social inequality within and between nations, including a growing global digital divide, is a focal point of the movement. Many nongovernmental organizations have now arisen to fight these inequalities that many in Latin America, Africa and Asia face. A few very popular and well known non-governmental organizations (NGOs) include: War Child, Red Cross, Free The Children and CARE International. They often create partnerships where they work towards improving the lives of those who live in developing countries by building schools, fixing infrastructure, cleaning water supplies, purchasing equipment and supplies for hospitals, and other aid efforts.

Social inequality

The economies of the world have developed unevenly, historically, such that entire geographical regions were left mired in poverty and disease while others began to reduce poverty and disease on a wholesale basis. From around 1980 through at least 2011, the GDP gap, while still wide, appeared to be closing and, in some more rapidly developing countries, life expectancies began to rise. If we look at the Gini coefficient for world income, since the late 1980s, the gap between some regions has markedly narrowedâ€" between Asia and the advanced economies of the West, for exampleâ€"but huge gaps remain globally. Overall equality across humanity, considered as individuals, has improved very little. Within the decade between 2003 and 2013, income inequality grew even in traditionally egalitarian countries like Germany, Sweden and Denmark. With a few exceptionsâ€"France, Japan, Spainâ€"the top 10 percent of earners in most advanced economies raced ahead, while the bottom 10 percent fell further behind. By 2013, a tiny elite of multibillionaires, 85 to be exact, had amassed wealth equivalent to all the wealth owned by the poorest half (3.5 billion) of the world's total population of 7 billion.

Critics of globalization argue that globalization results in weak labor unions: the surplus in cheap labor coupled with an ever growing number of companies in transition weakened labor unions in high-cost areas. Unions lose their effectiveness and workers their enthusiasm for unions when membership begins to decline. They also cite an increase in the exploitation of child labor: countries with weak protections for children are vulnerable to infestation by rogue companies and criminal gangs who exploit them. Examples include quarrying, salvage, and farm work as well as trafficking, bondage, forced labor, prostitution and pornography.

Women often participate in the workforce in precarious work, including export-oriented employment. Evidence suggests that while globalization has expanded women’s access to employment, the long-term goal of transforming gender inequalities remains unmet and appears unattainable without regulation of capital and a reorientation and expansion of the state’s role in funding public goods and providing a social safety net.

Anti-global governance

Beginning in the 1930s, opposition arose to the idea of a world government, as advocated by organizations such as the World Federalist Movement (WFM). Those who oppose global governance typically do so on objections that the idea is in-feasible, inevitably oppressive, or simply unnecessary. In general, these opponents are wary of the concentration of power or wealth that such governance might represent. Such reasoning dates back to the founding of the League of Nations and, later, the United Nations.

Environmentalist opposition

Environmentalism is a broad philosophy, ideology and social movement regarding concerns for environmental conservation and improvement of the health of the environment. Environmentalist concerns with globalization include issues such as global warming, climate change, global water supply and water crises, inequity in energy consumption and energy conservation, transnational air pollution and pollution of the world ocean, overpopulation, world habitat sustainability, deforestation, biodiversity and species extinction.

Another concern is labelled "environmental apartheid", which claims that the resources and wealth of society are typically appropriated by a small minority group of a privileged race or class, under much protection. Thus, the excluded majority never gets a chance to access to resources necessary for well-being and survival. In the pre-Rio conference period, it was the North that contributed most to the destruction of the environment. Globalization is restructuring control over resources in such a way that the natural resources of the poor are systematically taken over by the rich and the pollution promulgated by the rich is systematically dumped on the poor. For example, 90 percent of historic carbon dioxide emissions have been by the industrialized countries. The developed countries produce 90 percent of the hazardous wastes produced around the world every year. Global free trade has globalized this environmental destruction in an asymmetric pattern. Some argue the economy is controlled by Northern corporations and they are increasingly exploiting resources of less wealthy countries for their global activities while it is the South that is disproportionately bearing the environmental burden of the globalized economy. Globalization is thus leading to a type of environmental apartheid.

Helena Norberg-Hodge, the director and founder of Local Futures/International Society for Ecology and Culture, criticizes globalization in many ways. In her book Ancient Futures, Norberg-Hodge claims that "centuries of ecological balance and social harmony are under threat from the pressures of development and globalization." She also criticizes the standardization and rationalization of globalization, as it does not always yield the expected growth outcomes. Although globalization takes similar steps in most countries, scholars such as Hodge claim that it might not be effective to certain countries and that globalization has actually moved some countries backward instead of developing them.

A related area of concern is the pollution haven hypothesis, which posits that, when large industrialized nations seek to set up factories or offices abroad, they will often look for the cheapest option in terms of resources and labor that offers the land and material access they require (see Race to the bottom). This often comes at the cost of environmentally sound practices. Developing countries with cheap resources and labor tend to have less stringent environmental regulations, and conversely, nations with stricter environmental regulations become more expensive for companies as a result of the costs associated with meeting these standards. Thus, companies that choose to physically invest in foreign countries tend to (re)locate to the countries with the lowest environmental standards or weakest enforcement.

Key journals

Key academic journals examining globalization include:

• Antipode
• Development and Change
• Economic Geography
• Globalizations
• Global Society (journal)
• Globalization and Health
• Glocalism: Journal of Culture, Politics and Innovation
• Journal of World-Systems Research
• World Development

See also

References

Further reading

External links

• Comprehensive discussion of the term at the Site Global Transformations
• Globalization Website (Emory University) Links, Debates, Glossary etc.
• BBC News Special Report â€" "Globalisation"
• Globalization collected news and commentary at The Guardian
• "Resilience, Panarchy, and World-Systems Analysis", from the Ecology and Society Journal
• "Globalization" Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy Analysis of the idea and its history.
• Mapping Globalization, Princeton University
• OECD Globalization statistics
• "Globalization", from The Canadian Encyclopedia
• YaleGlobal Online
• Global 3000 Globalization Program by Deutsche Welle-TV
• List of Global Development Indexes and Rankings
• Explained With Maps - The Globalization of Food (Documentary Video)