I have stumbled upon this cartoon on the internet when i was researching on economic globalisation. I have chosen this for my reflections this time round as I believe that this cartoon has captured the idea of what I want to bring out in this post, which is that globalisation has brought to an increase in the marginalisation of the poor. (This cartoon shows that as the "rcih person" gets "heavier" or "richer", the cushion will compress even more on the "poor" guy.) I am sure all of us are familiar with the phrase, "the rich gets richer, the poor gets poorer". So therefore in my post this time round, I shall discuss on the pros and cons of globalisation and how the people are affected by the growth of the economy. I will also bring out some points to show that this phrase may not necessarily be 100% true.
Firstly, let us look at the claims made on the disadvantages of globalisation, where marginalisation of the poor is said to have occurred. Some radical view on globalisation is that it erodes global and national solidarity and brings about the increasing impoverishment and exclusion of the "Third World Countries" or also known as the LEDCs (Less Economically Developed Countries). The poor has been marginalized, according to them. Globalisation is a means for the exclusion and deepening inequality; it is a new form of Western Imperialism which dominates and exploits through TNC (TransNational Companies) capitals and instrumental governance such as IMF and the World Bank.
Globalisation has also been claimed to have intensified global and national inequality. There is an increases economic and social gap within countries. Globalisation is described as an uneven process causing world fragmentation. There has been increasing inequality through trade too, resulting in the amplification of the trade gap. This is evident in a few countries, for example, through increasing globalisation, the value of world trade is 17 times greater than that of 50 years ago. However, Latin America's share has decreased from 11% to 5% and Africa's from 8% to 2%. Globalisation also exploits LEDCs through TNCs. The World Guide has descirbed globalisation as a "euphemism for transnationalisation". This is the spread of powerful companies all over the globe that suits corporate interest best.
Increased global integration means that poorer countries become more vulnerable to the world financial markets. The East Asian Crisis was a direct result of globalisation and has resulted in an intensifying poverty. The crisis shows that even the strongest developing states are at the mercy of global economic forces that serve the interest of the dominant capitalist powers.
Globalisation is a form of disempowerment. International negotiations to reduce and eliminate foreign debt have led to increasing exports of capital and the further indebtness of the countries affected. Thus, the developing and poorer countries will have problems clearing their debt and thus it will make them "poorer". Therefore the LEDCs economies have became worse and this has constrained their development strategies.
However, despite all these claims that the poor are constantly marginalised, there are advantages of globalisation.
Globalisation has increased world prosperity and organisational efforts to stabilise the world economy has significantly improved. Figures have shown that global poverty has fallen more than in the last 50 years than in the last 500. The welfare of the people in most regions has also significantly improve over the past few decades.
Globalisation promotes development in the LEDCs as well spreading technology and knowledge of MEDCs (More Economically Developed Countries). Globalisation also has brought about huge amounts of benefits. The emergence of a single global market, the principles of free trade, capital mobility and global competition has allowed the diffusion of prosperity and wealth. New opportunities and possibilites have been opened up. Contrary to the view that it makes LEDCs more vulnerable, increasing global integration actually means that there are better organisational structures put in place to deal with the world political, economical and social problems.
Global market civilisation has also been reinforced by the policies of the major institutions of global economic governance. Such examples are the IMF, World Bank and the G7. Global governance, the World Bank, has restructured the LEDCs economies such that they can manage indebted economies.
Therefore, in conclusion, I do agree that globalisation has made "the rich gets richer, and the poor gets poorer". However, we should not limit our viewpoints until there and be narrow-minded. There are many advantages of globalisation that has, without doubt, increased the political, economical and social aspects of the countries today.
DONE BY: Nur Atiqah Ismail, TA 2D'o6 (:
ECONOMIC expert (:
Article: http://www.converge.org.nz/pirm/lurgi.htm
Globalisation has allowed it to become easier for people to move from one place to another around the world; people from different parts of the world are able to interact with one another more frequently as compared to the past. The activities that we engage in also cause us to come into contact with animals that carry viruses. These viruses may remain dormant in us, but it may also evolve such that it can survive in humans. Because of these two factors, the spread of disease has grown over the years.
The various human activities have made humans come into contact with carriers of viruses that were originally not found in humans, and lead to the mutation of these viruses, making them able to thrive in human beings. For example, Marburg and yellow fever viruses, were originally infections of monkeys; Rift Valley fever was an inherited infection of mosquitoes; and hanta virus was maintained in rodent populations. The increase in human activity and interactions with animal hosts of viruses allowed opportunities for humans to host viruses that were not originally found in human beings.
Thus, the spread of infectious disease has been increasing over the years, not just because of the increase in human interactions across the world, but also because of human activity which introduces man to viruses that were not found in humans before.
It is possible for us to make use of the improvements in communication to develop and find cures for such diseases. We can build upon each other’s technologies and ideas to produce an antidote for such viruses as quickly as possible. But without globalisation in the first place, will there even be a need for us to find a cure for all these infections and diseases?
Environmental expert
Jean Ng
2D'06
Article for economic globalisation:
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/17436057/site/newsweek/
Reflections:
The global economy has expanded tremendously ever since 1960s. In my opinion, there are 3 powerful trends that has caused this to happen and changed the whole global economic landscape.
Firstly, there is an increasing power of information and communications technologies. Next, countries have opened up their markets for economic expansion and thirdly, more and more multinationals are seeking out new markets and workforces. In short, these 3 powerful trends can be summarised into one word: globalisation.
World trade has exploded since the early 1960s. Between 1970 and 2004, the share of exports relative to global output has more than doubled and is over 25%. Furthermore, China and India has opened their economies and pursued an export-led strategy. In 2004, the global economy grew 4.7 percent, says economists at Goldman Sachs. Asia, excluding Japan, grew by 8.2 percent; Latin America by 5.6 percent and the United States by 4.4 percent. These are some evidence to show that the global economy has expanded ever since the 1960s.
However, with the current "explosion" of global economy, one of the biggest question to us is: is the global economy is stable? In the article above, the author has mentioned that "good times don't last forever. After all, the 1960s was followed by a decade of malaise."
In my opinion, this in an unanswerable question. This is because shocks are unpredictable. Therefore, we are not able to predict the stability of the global economy, mainly because we do not know what will happen for us to be able to guard against.
There are risks, however. For example, higher currencies for Europe and Japan could weaken their export competitiveness. This is because a higher currency will tend to make a country's exports more expensive and its imports cheaper. The United States, Europe and Japan already contribute to half of the global economy. Thus, if these three countries were to go into recession, other countries might follow.
Furthere, a good economic system needs a strong political framework. However, if we just look at the framework for the global economy now, we can tell that it is unstable. 20 years ago, only the United States and its Cold War allies contribute to the global economy. All the three policy objectives- economic, military and foreign- were overlapped. However, in today's context, the global economy now includes India, China and the former Soviet Union. Thus, more problems will arise as more countries are involved in the growth of the economy since there will be more personal objectives from each of the countries.
However, this can be proven wrong as globalisation has causes global cooperation and dependance. For example, the SARS outbreak has shown some global cooperation between countries.
In conclusion, I believe that the global ecomomy will continue to expand ever more greatly over the years in the near future. There have been questions raised about the stability of the global economy, but I believe that as long as countries continue to have a strong economic, political and social framework, these risks have a lesser potential to develop. It is probably too early to worry about such an outcome, let's all just enjoy the growth of the economy! (:
DONE BY: NUR ATIQAH ISMAIL, TA 2d'o6(:
Economic Expert
