I - Module 1 – INTRODUCTION TO GLOBALIZATION

II - Topics

1.1 Defining & competing conceptions of globalization

1.2 Philosophies & Ideologies of Globalization
1.3 Positive and Negative aspect of Globalization

III. TIME FRAME: 7 hrs.

IV. INTRODUCTION:

Since the early 19th century, globalization has been a buzzword throughout the world.
Globalization refers to the existence of free exchange of goods, services, culture, and even
people, between and among countries. Under the banner of globalization, countries have
discarded taxes on imported goods (tariffs) and opened their doors to highly skilled workers
and professionals. Through globalization, people became more interested to travel, learn new
languages, and immerse themselves into new cultures and lifestyles. Despite globalization’s
obvious benefits to a number of people around the world, its complexity and vastness
understandably lends itself to competing conceptions, philosophies, and ideologies that view
it with different lenses (San Juan, 2018).

V - INTENDED LEARNING OUTCOMES: In this lesson, the students will be able to:

1. Identify and differentiate the competing conceptions of globalization;

2. Identify the underlying philosophies of the varying definitions of globalization;
3. Explain the positive and negative aspects of globalization.

VI - PRE – ASSESSMENT: Fill-in the opposite column in the table below.

In my own understanding,
globalization is ……..

Globalization has positive and

negative effects, like ……….

Should free trade and free

movement of people be without
limits? Is a borderless world really
possible?

VII. LEARNING ACTIVITIES

Let’s
travel Competing Conceptions of Globalization
 On globalization as “a contested concept,” Manfred Steger remarks that the term
globalization has been used in both popular and academic literature to describe a process, a
condition, a system, a force, and an age. Given that these competing labels have very different
meaning, their indiscriminate usage is often obscure and invites confusion.

The United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD) defines

economic globalization as the “closer integration of national economies through trade and
financial flows as well as cross-border migration of people. As national economies ‘open up’
and lower their external barriers, they become more exposed – and more vulnerable – to
global forces and influences.

The free movement of goods or products is facilitated by liberalization or the abolition

of tax on imported goods (tariff), while the free movement of capital or investment is
implemented through deregulation or the lifting of strict banking and financial regulations
aimed at encouraging investors to invest more and retain their ability to pull out their
investments at any time with ease. Meanwhile, free movement of persons is achieved through
the loosening or abolition of visa restrictions and barriers to migration.

Liberalization and deregulation are economic processes that typically require special
laws and/or policies. Such policies and laws are products of deliberation and even
confrontation between conflicting interests. To illustrate a typical conflict on the idea of
globalization, one only has to look at the perennial tit-for-tat fight between big corporations
and labor unions on issues such as migration and outsourcing of jobs, wage hikes, and
privatization of industries and services; or the decades-old enmity between the developed
countries more popularly known as the First World, and the developing and/ or
underdeveloped nations collectively labeled as the Third World on issues such as subsidy on
the agricultural sector, industrialization, and foreign land ownership.

As a long-
term process,
modern globalization
was jumpstarted on
October 30, 1947 by
2- nations that
signed the General
Agreement on
Tariffs and Trade
(GATT) which
primarily aims to
regulate
international trade.
In 1995, it was
formally supplanted
by the World Trade
Organization (WTO) [Link]
through the
Marrakesh Agreement signed by 124 nations. The WTO (still popularly referred to as GATT-
WTO in many countries) describes itself as “the only global international organization dealing
with the rules of trade between nations … negotiated and signed by the bulk of the world’s
trading nations and ratified in their parliaments . . . to help producers or goods and services,
exporters, and importers conduct their business.” These systems came under intense criticism
in 2008 after a major financial crisis hit the United States, with the contagion reaching Europe
and other parts of the world because of the strong financial and economic ties of countries
under globalization. Such criticisms culminated in anti-globalization tirades of politicians such
as France’s Marine Le-Pen and United Kingdom’s (UK) Nigel Farage, and social movements
such as the Indignados (Literally, “outraged”) of Spain, and the Occupy Movement that started
in the US itself, with some groups and academics pronouncing or asking about the “end of
globalization.”

Thomas Friedman’s best-selling book The Lexus and the Olive Tree, gives a relatively
balanced and oft-cited definition of globalization which he considers as both an era and a
system that “is not static, but a dynamic ongoing process: globalization involves the inexorable
integration of markets, nation-states, and technologies to a degree never witnessed before-in
a way that is enabling individuals, corporations, and nation-states, and technologies to a
degree never witnessed before – in a way that is enabling individuals, corporations, and nation
– states to reach the around the world farther, faster, deeper, and cheaper than ever before,
and in a way that is . . . also producing a powerful backlash from those brutalized or left behind
by this new system.”

Benedict Anderson explained that the “early globalization” during the last two decades
of the 19th century was made possible by developments such as invention of the telegraph,
the inauguration of the Universal Postal Union which “vastly accelerated the reliable
movement” of printed materials around the world; wide use of the steamship that facilitated
swifter intercontinental travel; and “a thickening latticework of railways that moved millions of
people and commodities within national and colonial borders, linking remote interiors to each
other and to ports and capitals.”

Beyond the definition of globalization, distinctions between internationalization and

globalization are also contested. Leslie Sklair reveals that “much of the globalization literature
is confused because not all those who use the term distinguish it clearly enough from
internationalization, and some writers appear to use the two terms interchangeably, a clear
distinction must be drawn between the international and the global. Sklair further argues that
globalization is broader and more complicated than internationalization. Internationalization
refers to processes and systems that pertain to relationships between nation-states, while
globalization encompasses processes and systems related to “global social relations” – or
interactions between international and/or transnational entities.

Let’s do it!

Task 1: Using a Venn diagram, compare and contrast the competing conceptions of
globalization.
 Philosophies and Ideologies of/on/against Globalization

Globalization’s backers,
supporters, and ideologies have “six
core claims” that seem to make it an
ideology in itself: “globalization is about
the liberalization and global integration
of markets; globalization benefits
everyone; globalization furthers the
spread of democracy in the world;
globalization requires war on terror.” As
a system, globalization is currently led
and promoted by ideologies. Capitalism
is the dominant economic framework
and system in many parts of the world
today. It is primarily premised on the
“profit motive.” Its promoters claim that
seeking profit is the most basic aim of
any individual or entity in this world.
The profit motive partly explains why,
for example, people tend to buy stocks
[Link] of profitable companies, or why
governments of Third World countries
allow mining corporations to operate even in places where the ecosystem is vulnerable.

Neoliberalism’s adherents further build on the profit motive by asserting that for
capitalism to thrive, markets should be free from government intervention, claiming that “Free
markets and free trade will . . . set free the creative potential and entrepreneurial spirit which
is built into the spontaneous order of any human society, and thereby lead to more individual
liberty and well-being, and a more efficient allocation of resources.”

Ferreting out the truth from the jargon, they lobby for deregulation, privatization, and
liberalization to give corporations a free hand in the global economy. The pro-globalization
side defends its adherence to neoliberal capitalism by claiming that freeing corporations from
much government regulation will encourage capitalists to invest more on existing industries,
even on experimental and innovative ones; privatizing industries (such as petroleum and
mining) and services (such as transportation and health care) will create opportunities for
corporations to create more wealth from almost sure profits and possibly reduce the price of
commodities and services as competition between enterprises becomes stiffer: and
liberalizing the global economy through lifting tariffs imposed on almost any product and
service will drastically accelerate and cut the costs of trade, saving companies billions of
dollars in the process and making imported goods relatively cheaper.
 Meanwhile, critics of globalization are divided into two main camps: the anti-
globalization side and the alter-globalization current. As their names suggest, the anti-
globalization side and the alter-globalization current differ only on their long-term objective:
the former wants an end to what it considers as a highly imbalanced system of globalization
that favors the First World over the Third World, corporations over citizens and communities,
and profit-seeking over environmental sustainability. The latter favors “altering” or “changing”
the current system of globalization to make it more humane, more pro-environment, and more
grassroots-driven rather than staying as a top-down imposition.

These “challengers” of globalization include forces of “national-populism, new

localisms, and various religious fundamentalists with strong political inclinations and of global
feminism, international-populism, and various ideational clusters associated with ‘global
justice’ movements. Many critics of globalization also espouses of capitalism and
neoliberalism, because of the almost seamless link between these ideologies and
globalization. Karl Marx’s classic book Das Capital emphasizes that “the directing motive, the
end and aim of capitalist production, is to extract the greatest possible amount of surplus-
value, and consequently to exploit labor-power to the greatest possible extent.

Such capitalist penchant for maximizing profits even at the expense of workers (who
tend to receive only a small share of the total profits that enterprises generate) and more
recently, even at the expense of the environment – has only become more explicit under
globalization, as it allows firms to shift all or part of its operations to countries where wages
and/or labor standards are low, in a process called outsourcing.

Competition to attract firms has resulted in a race-to-the-bottom system where “the

labor standards in one country are positively correlated with those elsewhere (i.e. a cut in labor
standards in other countries reduces labor standards in the country in question). This
interdependence is more evident in labor practices (i.e. enforcement) than in labor laws.”

Task 2: Draw a concept map of globalization highlighting key words that you think comprise
the totality and philosopies of globalization.
 Positive and Negative Aspects of Globalization

Supporters and critics of globalization enumerate a lot of positive and

negative aspects of this complex system, in their quest to win the public
to their side. The positive aspects of globalization cited by its supporters include the following:
multiculturalism and multilingualism (free exchange of goods and services need); free trade
(reduced costs on selling products almost worldwide provided huge profits for a number of big
transnational corporations, and resulted in cheaper price of some consumer goods such as
cell phones and computers): cultural and educational exchanges (the rise of multilingualism
inevitably leads to the study of diverse cultures and eventually, more educational exchanges
such as EU’s Erasmus Mundus Program between universities of all countries); and global
cooperation (globalization’s rules and mechanisms are created and governed by global
institutions such as the uNited Nations encourage global cooperation on many issues ranging
from climate change to poverty eradication).

Among the prominent promoters of

globalization are thinkers such as Thomas
Freidman, Martin Wolf, Mustafa Akyol,
Theodore Levitt, and Fareed Zakaria;
politicians such as Jose Manuel Barroso, Lee-
Kuan Yew, Hillary Clinton, and Emmanuel
Macron; and entities such as Bilderberg,
International Monetary Fund (IMF), World
Bank (WB), and WTO. ZAkaria stresses that
“globalization created huge opportunities for
[Link]
growth, many of which were taken by U.S.
companies. These companies have benifited
enormously by having global supply chains
that can source goods and services around the world, either to lower labor costs or to be close
to the markets in which they sell.” Additionally, WTO claims that it can “cut living costs and
raise living standards; settle disputes and reduce trade tensions; stimulate economic growth
and employment” among others. On the other side of the debate, anti nad alter-globalization
advocates put forward a number of globalization’s negative aspects: linguistic hegemony of
English (as the US and the then very much UK-influenced EU utilize English, globalization
compels other countries to use it as well, with some former colonies such as the Philippines
and Malawi, even prioritizing it over their own national languages); cultural homogenization
(big corporations – such as fast food chains like McDOnald’s, consumer item giants like
Nestle, and Holyywood film companies like Pixar, Marvel, and Disney – dominate markets in
many countries because of their enormous financial power and presence in almost every
country).

Third World dependence on the First World (despite globalization’s obvious

contribution to the succesful leap of some countries from Third to First World status, more
Third World countries from providing massive state subsidies or aid to their farmers – while
EU heavily subsidizes their agrigultural sector, and the way global financial institutions fail to
help many developing countries in jumpstarting their industrialization); global income and
welath ineaqulaity (as only the biggest corporations seem to benefit from stiff competition and
unbridled free trade); tax injustice (under globalization, countries compete for foreign
investments and are forced to lower corporate tax rates, thereby reducing the expected
government income which can be used for social services that can shield the most vulnerable
sectors from the negative effects of globalization); and racism and anti-migrant sentiment (as
corporations in many First World countries hire more migrants to save on wages, first World
working-class citizens complain about being left behind in their own countries, hence partly
fueling the rise of racism and anti-migrant sentiment). Prominent anti- or alter-globalization
thnkers include Alenjandro Lichauco, Ha-Joon Chang, Jose Maria Sison, Joseph Stiglits,
Noam Chomsky, Samir Amin, Slavoj Zizek, Thomas Piketty, Yans Varoufakis, and Walden
Bello. Other anti- or alter-globalization personalities include US President Donald Trump, US
Senator Bernie Sanders, Pope Francis, UK Labour Party leader Jeremy Corbyn, former
Venezuelan President Hugo, Guatemalan indigenous people leader Rigoberta Menchu, and
French politician Marine Le-Pen.

Globalization is more favorable to developed countries because:

1. Investments in developing countries earn profits which the former typically repatriate,
rather than reinvest;
2. Control multilateral financial institutions such as the IMF, World Bank, and even the
biggest private banks
3. Technology transfer on a massive scale seldom happens, hence developed countries
tend to retain a monopoly on innovations vital to the growth of the manufacturing
sector;
4. The bulk price of the developing countires main exports is lower than the bulk price of
their typical imports from developed countries (technology/machinery and high-value
products;
5. Migrtaion of workers and professionals from developing countries to the developed
countries deplete the former’s human resources which they need free themselves from
poverty and dependency;
6. Education system of developing countries is aligned with the needs of
developed/capital-rich countries which are also typical destinations of migrant workers
from the developing nations.

Task 3: Using the T-chart, identify (5) positive and (5) negative aspects of globalization and
explain briely.

_____________________________________________________________
Positive Negative

1. 1.
Explanation: Explanation:
VIII. SELF- EVALUATION:

Listen to the globalization-related song entitled, “Imagine” by the Beatles and write a 300-
word reflection paper on the message of the song.

IX. REVIEW OF CONCEPTS:

✓ Globalization has transcended its being an economic term and has become a
phenomenon whose impacts have altered social, cultural, and political
landscapes in an international scale.
✓ Globalization has spurred interconnection, and yet, at the same time, is pointed
at as cause of the widening gap between the richer and the poorest of the
world.
✓ Social movement is people and organizations advocating for positive social
change through a variety of means and approaches.
✓ Free trade where exchanges of goods or products between nations without
tariff or tax.
✓ Deregulation is the loosening or lifting of government regulations, usually to
favor private corporations’ flexibility of operations and profitability.
✓ Liberalization is the process or policy of removal or reduction of restrictions or
barriers on the free trade between nations.
✓ Privatization is subjecting an industry or service to private control and
ownership.
 ✓ The European Union (EU) is an economic and political organization comprised
of 28 member states. Originating from the European Coal and Steel Community
(ECSC) and the European Economic Community (EEC), the EU was
established with the intent to integrate European nations and empower the
region.

X. POST-TEST: In your own words, answer the following questions briefly.

1. How does globalization differ from internationalization?

___________________________________________________________________

2. Why is globalization considered as a “complex concept”?

___________________________________________________________________

3. What forces drive globalization? Is the interaction of these forces amicable or

combative?
___________________________________________________________________

XI. REFERENCES

1. Al, PK. (2018). The Contemporary World. 1st Ed.

2. San Juan, DM., (2018). Journey through Our Contemporary World. Vibal
Publication, Manila, Philippines
3. [Link]
4. [Link]
5. [Link]