Download PDF Globalization: A Very Short Introduction Second Edition by Manfred B. Steger

Sinopsis

Although the term ‘globalization’ can be traced back to the early 1960s, it was not until a quarter of a century later that it took the public consciousness by storm. ‘Globalization’ surfaced as the buzzword of the ‘Roaring Nineties’ because it best captured the increasingly interdependent nature of social life on our planet. At the end of the opening decade of the twenty-first century, there were millions of references to globalization in both virtual and printed space. Unfortunately, however, early bestsellers on the subject – Samuel Huntington’s The Clash of Civilizations, Benjamin Barber’s Jihad Versus McWorld, or Thomas Friedman’s The Lexus and the Olive Tree – had left their readers with the simplistic impression that globalization was the inevitable process of a universalizing Western civilization battling the parochial forces of nationalism, localism, and tribalism. This influential assumption deepened further in the wake of the 9/11 attacks and the ensuing Global War on Terror spearheaded by an ‘American Empire’ of worldwide reach. As a result of this rigid dichotomy that pitted the universal against the particular and the global against the local, many people had trouble recognizing the myriad ties binding religious-traditionalist fundamentalisms to the secular postmodernity of the global age.

As an illustration of this narrow perspective, let me introduce a bright history major from one of my Global Studies courses. ‘I understand that “globalization” is a contested concept that refers to the shrinkage of time and space,’ she quipped, ‘but how can you say that religious fanatics who denounce modernity and secularism from a mountain cave somewhere in the Middle East perfectly capture the complex dynamics of globalization? Don’t these terrible acts of terrorism suggest the opposite, namely, the growth of reactionary forces that undermine globalization?’ Obviously, the student was referring to Saudi-born Al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden and his associates whose videotaped statements condemning the activities of ‘infidel crusaders and Zionists’ were the steady diet of worldwide broadcasts in the years following the 9/11 attacks.

To be fair, however, I could not help but be struck by the sense of intellectual urgency that fuelled my student’s question. It showed that globalization in all its dimensions remains an elusive concept without real-life examples capable of breathing shape, colour, and sound into a vague term that continues to dominate the twenty-first century media landscape. Hence, before delving into necessary matters of definition and analytical clarification, we ought to approach our subject in less abstract fashion. Let’s begin our journey with a careful examination of the aforementioned videotapes. It will soon become fairly obvious why a deconstruction of those images provides important clues to the nature and dynamics of the phenomenon we have come to call ‘globalization’.

Content

1. Globalization: a contested concept
2. Globalization and history: is globalization a new phenomenon?
3. The economic dimension of globalization
4. The political dimension of globalization
5. The cultural dimension of globalization
6. The ecological dimension of globalization
7. Ideologies of globalization: market globalism, justice globalism, jihadist globalism
8. Assessing the future of globalization

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