Criticism of Globalization

8/6/2019 Criticism of Globalization

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Group 1

Criticism of Globalization: Positive and Negative Aspects

Prof. Abdelhadi Boutaleb

(Member of the Academy of the Kingdom of Morocco.)

Before defining globalization, it might be useful to start with

defining a concept that was used before globalization. This

concept is still used nowadays to denote a meaning different

from that of modern globalization, which has special

dimensions.

It was well known to ancient Greek logicians that defining

concepts or terms with their synonyms or antonyms is an

approach that is confirmed and recognized by the rules of

science and of logic. This is a scientific method to understand

the opposite or approximate concept. It helps fathom the concept

through comparing the points of divergence and similitude.

The concept that I will deal with very briefly is Universality.Universality means belonging to the world and opening it to

humans, their ideas and information and transferring their

practices, ideas and trends from their limited space (the

homeland, the birthplace or the place of residence) to a wider

space throughout which human-beings all human-beings as

well as all ideas, information, currents and creeds - move

without restrictions or borders whatsoever so that the human

thought becomes a factor that influences and is influenced by the

universal environment as a whole. Longing for universalitygrows into a dream of seeing this very universality substitute

citizenship, the single homeland, the nation-state and the

borders, a dream wherein the world becomes a large homeland

for human beings and an extended space for their work and

movement. This trend is now known as Universality.


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The tendency to generalize identification to the whole world is

called universalism. This concept has existed since the dawn of

time, as it emerged since the very beginning of the existence of

man, as humans were possessed by an instinct to fathom the

secrets of the world. This instinct was general amongst allhuman-beings to such an extent that man can be described as a

globe-trotter by nature, who hates to be confined in one

homeland without being able to move around the world to

discover it and draw lessons from this experience.

However, the longer man lives in his homeland, the more

attached to this homeland he grows and, hence, to himself in

view of the benefits that the homeland brings him and thememories man gathers in this homeland with the passing of

time.

Numerous are the phenomena that can be described as universal,

including trends, creeds and theories that were designed to be

spread and belong to the world as a whole.

Capitalism joins its former enemy communism in their shared

universal trend. Communism endeavored to spread its dominionover the world. And now capitalism is poised to be the sole

world order

However, universalism did not often stem from mans ambitions

of forcible expansion on others land, as was the case of ancient

emperors or modern colonizers, nor from mans tyrannical use

of indigenous populations to serve his own interests.

Universalism rather sought essentially to secure benefits and

foster exchange as changing environment entails morediversified and larger prospects to achieve individual and

collective purposes in wider and more favorable horizons.

In this open world, shared values were spread amongst

humankind, without being impeded by borders or stalled by any


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authority, blockade or restriction. These ideas, ethics, values,

principles, religions and theories were described as universal.

This universalism marked the religions that came to educate man

and enable him to spread good on earth. This is the origin of theprinciple of Gods assigning humankind, all humankind, to act

on His behalf on earth to build and wisely manage Gods

creatures on earth. This principle matches the human instinct,

which is marked by and built on universalism.

The Holy Koran incited human-beings to enlarge their

knowledge and thoughts through exploring earth without

restrictions: Go ye through the earth and see (Holy Koran,

surate Annaml, Al-Ankabout and Arroum).

The message of Islam is universal. God addressed Prophet

Mohammed saying in the Holy Koran: We sent thee but as a

mercy for all creatures (Holy Koran, Surate Al-Anbiaa 21,

Verse 107). God also said in Surate Sabaa 24, Verse 28 We

have not sent thee but as a universal (Messenger) to men.

Therefore, the Holy Koran addressed the entire humanity using

the expression O people, because the call of Islam is for all,i.e. universal. And God in Islam is the Lord of Alamine

(humanity) and not only the Lord of the people of the Arabian

Peninsula, where Islam was revealed.

This idea was embodied in what can be considered as Islams

first call ever for universal co-existence, well before the calls

made by nations and by international organizations. This came

in Surate Al-Imrane 3, Verse 64: Say: O People of the

Scripture! Come to an agreement between us and you: that weshall worship none but Allah, and that we shall ascribe no

partner unto Him, and that none of us shall take others for lords

beside Allah.


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This universal call was consecrated when Islam abolished

discrimination based on race, colour and sex, a custom that was

known to all pre-Islamic communities not only in the Arabian

Peninsula alone but in the world at large. God told humankind:

O mankind! We created you from a single (pair) of a male anda female, and made you into nations and tribes, that ye may

know each other. Verily the most honoured of you in the sight of

Allah is (he who is) the most righteous of you. (Surate Al-

Hujurate 49, Verse 13).

This verse brought in three principles whereupon the

universalism of Islam is founded: equality among people, their

inalienable right to difference as peoples and tribes (this pointsout to the types of legitimate differences), preserving the

existence of the other embodied in the difference of peculiarities

so that each race knows its sisterly race and, therefore,

promoting exchanges (to know one another, as seen in the afore-

mentioned verse of the holy Koran).

Equality in universalism, abolishing differences without

however canceling peculiarities and urging mankind to fathom

the secrets of these peculiarities as a means to better know eachother is a triangular relationship whereupon Islam founded its

universal call and message to achieve mutual respect among

humankind. Without this respect, no understanding nor

cooperation is possible among people.

Nevertheless, Islam did not impose this universalism (welded

around a unique universal community based on piety) by means

of force, occupation or tyranny. Islam rather disseminated its

message with wisdom, good advice and argumentation, far from

any constraints or any hegemonic ambition and without

exclusion of the Other. Moreover, Islam upheld its call in a

harmonious co-existence with the messages of the previous


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monotheist religions and on the basis of faith in their messengers

and revealed books.

In the light of universalism, refined by religion, piety and virtue,

the Arab and Muslim wise men were the first to lift barriershampering knowledge and wisdom. They promoted the motto

knowledge without borders and urged for the quest of

knowledge and science from the cradle to the grave and

everywhere in the world.

They effected this motto in the realms of scientific research and

in exchanging wisdom. Some of them achieved the miracle of

the greatest journeys around the globe at a time when it was

difficult to cross the world by land or sea. They made

discoveries, interacted culturally with the others and contributed,

hence, to the heritage of the universal civilization.

These globe trotters, including historians and geographers,

conveyed a clear, thorough and genuine image of the worlds

large nature, diversified environments, different races, and

remote areas with their human, architectural and cultural

peculiarities.

Civilizations, therefore, belong to all humankind or to the world

as a whole and in this global sense a universal content. These

civilizations are the product of distinguished ways of thinking

and practice and were shaped by a shared creativity that can be

described, without being mistaken, as universal.

The civilization that isolates itself is doomed to fall in decline

and oblivion, while open and inter-penetrated civilizationsflourish, develop and diversify their creativities and hence live

longer and spread all over the world.

Which civilization can rightfully claim to be the fruit of its own

sons and people alone? Werent the spiritual civilizations


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influenced by the materialism of the other civilizations? Werent

the civilization of materialistic societies influenced by the

spirituality of other civilizations? The western materialistic

civilization today says it is originally a Jewish-Christian

civilization.

Reference:

Retrieved from

http://www.isesco.org.ma/english/publications/islamtoday/20/P1.p

hp

Retrieved on 23/12/10
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Group 2




What is Globalization?

Today and more than ever before, the world has become aglobal village with the expansion of the communication

networks, the rapid information exchange, the gradual shrink of

borders and of attachment to identities and citizenship, the lifting

of the barriers of visas and passports, the consecration of a new

era when national sovereignty and the authority of the nation-

state is fading away in favor of regional groupings, international

organizations and international legality and law. This means the

beginning of the return to the universal trend which is imposed by human instinct, but in a broader environment and in an

evident endeavor to dominate the world.

Todays universalism is marked by its reliance on sophisticated

and highly performing technology that was not available for the

old form of universalism.

The fact that the verb globalize and the noun globalization

-both require a subject and an object in the other languages fromwhich the world Awlama was translated into the Arabic

language- implies that the globalization process is not

spontaneous as it is implied by the word universalism.


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Globalization is an act by the subject, a globalizer, on an

object that has to accept the act thoroughly and in detail,

willingly or unwillingly.

Globalization is also an act and a practice. It is equally anintegrated system wherein the subject leaves no choice to the

object destined to be shaped up. That is why globalization

advocates describe it as inevitable for humanity, sooner or later.

The subject of this globalization is the United States regime

embodying the uni-polar system and seeking to spread this

system so that the world adopts the American system in politics,

economy, sociology, culture, way of thinking, behavior and

lifestyle. This will make the American system the unique

universal system. Such a situation prompted some circles to

describe globalization as Americanization.

The American globalization discourse was preceded by a call to

building a new world order made by former US President

George Bush after the Gulf world War. George Bush himself

was behind the holding of a summit of the United Nations

Security Council on January 3, 1992 to debate the foundations ofthe new order. However, the final communiqu of this summit

did not clearly lay out the traits of this order nor did it define its

objectives and limits nor the means to build it. The communiqu

only spoke in the customary way used by the international

political community which proclaims at the end of each world

war the birth of a new world order. It was quite normal that the

World Gulf War should be no exception to the pattern that

marked the end of the two world wars.

The First World War led to a new world order based on

consecrating the legitimacy of the occupation of the South by the

North, and dividing areas of dominion in the world by consensus

among the allies, winners of the war. This trend was reflected in

the Versailles Convention, which can be considered as a


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convention for the distribution of booty, and the Charter of the

League of Nations.

Likewise, the Second World War yielded the distribution of

dominion, decided at Yalta in 1945 between the United States ofAmerica and the Soviet Union in a consecration of bi-

polarisation between them, which made the Yalta Agreement, an

agreement for the distribution of booty among the winners of the

war.

After the Gulf War, the world experienced several events that

reshaped the political map, drawn by the two poles after the

Second World War, and replaced with a new map, where the

United States of America emerged as the single power that takes

hold of the booty, by controlling the oil-exporting Arab region

and deciding for its destiny and maps.

Globalization, which is designed to be the major trait of the new

World Order - that is poised to be an old one - has spread since

the beginning like an octopus in all fields. It uses its gains

through being attached to them and through consolidating them

as well as through enlarging its networks around the world totake more. This globalization octopus risks to go beyond all

obstacles and restrictions to swallow everything.

Since the 1980s, there was a succession of events that deeply

influenced the world, and contributed to reshaping the systems

of the world and unifying them in a new World order or a new

world. This situation heralded the fall of the Soviet Union pole

and the start of a uni-polar order, embodied in the United States

of America.

In 1985, the former Soviet President Michael Gorbatchev

declared a peaceful revolution to build a new order in the Soviet

Union, based on reform, or Perestroika, and transparency, or

Glasnost.


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In 1987, the World population increased strongly to stand at

more than five billion souls.

In 1989, the Soviet Union collapsed and the Berlin Wall fell. In

the Same year, Germany was reunified to become a capitalistdemocratic state.

In 1991, Iraq invaded Kuwait, and the United States of America

drummed up the support of its Western allies to the Desert

Storm war. Meanwhile, the Soviet Union stood as a sheer

spectator, signaling thus its withdrawal from the competition for

polarization. Former President Bush called, after victory, for

establishing a new world order.

On 3 January 1992, the Security Council positively responded to

the call of the President of the United States of America to

convene a summit that was crowned with a declaration that

served as the first international document that paved the way for

the specialized international organizations to devise regulations

and technology to come up with what it is today called the

strategy of globalization.

The present study will deal with the concept of globalization and

its evolution towards full domination of the world, as it has

become omnipresent in all fields. We will tackle the relationship

between economic globalization and capitalist liberalism in the

world, and survey the fields that are being globalized.

We will equally address the various types of discourse of

globalization and of anti-globalization as well as the movements

of resistance, that oppose globalization in a bid to safeguardtheir threatened peculiarities. We will highlight the positive

aspects of globalization and its negative consequences.

We will conclude with the following question: What kind of

world do we wish to build in the 21st century? We will try to


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answer in conclusion that we aspire to a globalized world, but

within some limits, a kind of fair globalization that rejects

opportunist gluttony. We dream of a world able to preserve the

diversified peculiarities and identities of its inhabitants, a unified

and diversified world at the same time.

What is the Fields of Action of Globalization?

Some claim that beginning with economic globalization was

meant to fulfill a universal comprehensive development and

reflect the world cooperation in economic fields as a starting

point for a global cooperation in all other realms.

Economic globalization appeared as an extension of the world

capitalist liberalization which seeks to enable strong capital to

achieve utmost benefits through liberalizing trade and

establishing free competition in trade exchanges. This is thesystem of free economy which is based on opening markets to

capital able to conquer them. In other words this is the market

economy.

Economic globalization thrived with the beginning of the 1990s

as a result of a well-organized interdependence between the

world capital and the goods and services markets, and also

thanks to the rush of countries which had not joined the GATTat that time, to adhere to the World Trade Organization after the

Second Uruguay Round and committing themselves to its world

conventions.

The provisions and covenants of the World Trade Organization

(WTO) came to confirm the principles of free competition of


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capital and the gradual lowering of barriers hampering the free

movement of capital and their flow onto markets. The WTO

principles and covenants also confirmed the freedom of

movement of national products in the world markets. Goods and

services, made in a local or national market, are distributed andconsumed in an international space, regardless of their origin. In

this way national economies are gradually integrated into the

world market part of what is called global economic openness.

No need to say that economic globalization requires states (or

the public sector) to give up their role in favor of the national or

foreign private sector. It equally requires the nation-state to

implement a policy of the public sector privatization, to lifthurdles on this privatization policy until the public sector is

deprived of all its previous prerogatives that used to entitle the

nation-state to playing the leading and major role in running the

national economy. All this is done in favor of the private sector

which has become an actor in the fields of employment, health,

education, environment protection, the management of some

utilities like water and electricity distribution and national firms.

Globalization assigns these fields to the private sector and tomultinational companies. According to statistics, the number of

these companies in the world rose from 100 in 1970 to nearly

50,000 now. Some 200 of these companies were categorized as

nation-states and multinationals given their importance. More

than 100 of these companies were multinationals, while the

nation-states accounted for less than 100.

This clearly indicates the rapid evolution of world economy as a

result of economic globalization, privatization and the reduction

of the role of the state. Moreover, this shows the long way that

economic globalization has covered in the process, as it

outclassed the liberal capitalism market, which progressed

slowly and timidly.


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Other telling figures show that multinational companies

contribute only 7 percent to employment in the world and pay

only 9 percent of taxes at the world scale, while controlling 80

percent of the world trade.

Reference:

Retrieved from


hp



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Group 3




The Expansion of Globalization:

Globalization has gone beyond the economy to affect all walksof human life, defying their national and individual peculiarities

and challenging their own immunity.

Likewise, as the world stood by watching and as the

marginalized groups stood unaware, information, science,

technology, culture and intellectual property were globalized,

combined to the globalization of values, ethics, ways of life and

of thinking. Part of the all-out globalization, identities andspecificities are also set to be globalized, the objective being to

reach a single standardized humankind.

Globalization has political, economic, cultural and ideological

dimensions. The political dimension started when the world

adhered to the Western democratic system, whose

implementation became inevitable, leading to a globalization of

the system of government and of the ways of participation in

government. The mechanisms leading to the holding of soundpopular elections were also globalized.

International organizations took care of globalizing international

law, international legitimacy and human rights, their charters

globalized the rules of war and peace and the patterns of


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international cooperation. Therefore, politics was globalized in

the largest sense of the term, including the systems of

government and the conditions of international cooperation and

of international relations. The international community started to

perfectly command the details and the smallest components ofthis globalization up until the United Nations Organization and

its agencies and bodies, especially the Security Council.

In economic fields, economic globalization which we mentioned

earlier affected all aspects of humankinds living, from

production to consumption, going by distribution and exchange.

In the cultural field, globalization started to affect culture in its

general meaning, i.e. humankinds imagination, theories and

practices and even their feelings, freedom of thinking, of

enjoying specificity and inner dialogue as well as dialogue with

the Other.

Let us take a rapid look at the impact of globalization on the

fields to which we have just pointed out:

1- Globalization of Information:

Globalization of information is materialized through the

globalization of telecommunications and communication, i.e.

new information technologies, which are the communication

networks and satellite TV channels which convey information

across the planet, making the world a small village, as put by

Mac Luhan.

Humankind now lives in a world without borders where humansshare each others happiness and sadness in real time and have a

clear image everyday of their fellow human-beings everywhere.

The Internet today plays a key role within this globalization or

this universal revolution, led by multinational communication

companies within the framework of free competition.


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Most satellite TV channels - supported with multinational

advertising companies while backing and consecrating economic

globalization - at the same time strive to globalize thought and

standardize the way of life, using covert or overt, direct or

indirect advertisement as well as influential psychological stylesthrough inciting people to adhere to massive consumption and to

prefer western products, particularly American ones, be they

materials, thought or style.

It would be enough to know that the predominant language is

English which globalization seems to impose as the language of

the world.

Some 88 percent of data available on the Internet is in the

English language, against 9 percent in German, 2 percent in

French and 1 percent in the other languages.

The globalization of information is embodied in the shrink of

written literature and of the end of the civilization of paper with

the expansion of the new information technology and the

civilization of technological development.

Today, only four international news agencies monopolise

information and shape it in total freedom, namely the Associated

Press (USA)- the most important news agency, the United Press

(USA), Reuters (Great Britain) followed by Agence France

Presse (France).

Knowing that more than one fifth of the world population are

illiterate and the overwhelming majority are civilization-

illiterate, meaning that they know nothing of the evolution of thetechnological and information civilization, either because they

do not use it or because they use it to the minimum- shows that

the globalization of information benefits only a minority of

people who are able to acquire this technology. This is no source

of concern for globalization which is based on free competition


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and enabling the strongest and the fittest to win its challenge.

This is why some are calling globalization social Darwinism.

2- The Globalization of Science:

The greatness of nations is no longer measured by their

geographical size, their military influence, nor their possession

of advanced armament. It is rather evaluated by these very

nations ability to control and draw benefits from economic

networks, monitor information and communication channels and

possess scientific research and invention capabilities.

These capabilities are available to three groups of nations: North

America, and on top of it the United States of America, theEuropean Union and Japan.

According to statistics, research and development (R and D)

expenditure in the world stood at 25 billion US dollars in 1992.

These three groups accounted for 82.6 percent of this amount,

distributed as follows: the United States of America 38.5

percent, the European Union 28.3 percent, Japan 15.8 percent,

Asia 9.5 percent, Russia (former Soviet Union) 4 percent, LatinAmerica less than 1 percent and Africa 0.2 percent.

Technological development was instrumental in the

globalization of science, resulting in the unification of scientific

data and rules. However, the above-mentioned figures are clear

indications of who monitors the evolution of the globalization

of science, who benefits from it and who is leading the world

today.

3- Globalization of Culture:

The globalization of economy, politics, the systems of

government, information and technology inevitably leads to the

globalization of culture, as a unified pattern of thinking


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enshrined in the minds by TV channels, movies and ads which

are presented as a means of modern education. Most of this

globalization message is conveyed in the English language.

Most of todays culture consists of contents broadcast by theseinformation networks, including values and ethics, which are the

mere values and ethics of those controlling and monopolizing

these networks.

It is common knowledge that the predominant type of culture is

the American one. For instance, 80 percent of ticket sales in

British cinema are paid for US movies. The rate stands at 60

percent in France and 90 percent in three east European

countries: the Czech Republic, Poland and Hungary.

Figures also show that the US motion picture production

accounted for 60 percent of the world production in 1944 and 80

percent in 2000.

4- The Globalization of intellectual property:

The quest to globalize culture is also evident in the debates held

at the World Intellectual Property Organization. The Americans

submitted for discussion a request that the holder of books,

songs and all types of intellectual production copyrights should

relinquish their rights in favor of large private groups. The

European Union countries opposed this type of globalization,

while Britain alone accepted it, creating a breach within the

Union. The firms meant by this request are only the strong

American enterprises, which are, alone, able to win the stake of

competition in this field too.

Europe, led by France, waged a campaign within international

specialized organizations, to grant (cultural exception) to the

audio-visual field and to cinematographic production. France

believes it invented cinema before Hollywood, and,


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consequently, has the right to request for its cinematographic

production in particular and culture, in general, an exceptional

treatment rather than dealing with it as a mere economic

commodity that the World Trade Convention no longer protects.

5- Globalization of Values and Ethics:

A heated debate is taking place on the globalization of values

and ethics, especially when new assessment elements are

integrated, challenging the universally-recognized and accepted

ethics and religions.

When I led the Moroccan delegation to the Beijing Conference

on Women, we were faced with difficulties resulting from theattempt of some non-governmental organizations to integrate the

right of what they called a third gender within human rights. It is

claimed that this third gender refuses to be a male or female. The

majority of delegations opposed this abnormal trend. There was

a heated debate between protagonists and antagonists of this

trend. Among the opponents, there were the Muslim world and

the Vatican.

The defenders of this third genders rights to marriage, to inherit

and to enjoy a separate identity failed to snatch a decision from

the Beijing Conference entitling them to rights different from

those of the two genders. They justified their standpoint by

arguing human rights should go global and divide human beings

into males and females and a third gender in between. They

argued that this third gender should be given equal rights as the

other two genders.

The management of Globalization :

Globalization is endowed with universal mechanisms that

manage it firmly and with scientific techniques. These

mechanisms are embodied in international specialized


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institutions that theorize and translate globalization into tangible

reality. The most important of these institutions are the World

Bank, the International Monetary Fund, the Organization for

Cooperation and Economic Development, called the club of the

rich.

All these institutions adopt the American logic and draw their

theories from the successful American economic system that

enjoys large capital able to win international competition. This is

the administration that guides the globalization policy and puts

pressure on states to act according to their guidelines.

This leads us to the conclusion that the United States is well

qualified for taking the lead in the globalization system that the

world currently experiences. Only Canada in North America, the

European Union, the region of East and South-East Asia, which

includes Japan, China and the emerging dragons inspired by the

Japanese model, are the ones relatively able to compete with the

United States within this system.

Reference:

Retrieved from


hp



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Group 4




The Discourse of Globalization :

After the decline of the ideologies opposing economic

liberalism, globalization addressed its discourse to the whole

world. According to the American perspective, globalization is

not a mere choice that can be accepted or rejected. It is rather an

inevitability of the new world order and the developing world is

only left with one alternative: to stay confined in its

backwardness.

According to the same discourse, globalization is the shortest

and most viable way for the developing world to achieve

political, social and intellectual modernity. Globalization is said

to be the best and most effective means for the developing world


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to achieve comprehensive development, because it is the sole

way to progress for this world economically, and therefore,

intellectually and socially. The same discourse even argues that

changing the world to the better is through applying

globalization. In this way, the American discourse becomes atype of aggression and sounds like a threat to gag the freedom of

choice. Globalization by virtue of this discourse, is the sole way

to develop a world without borders, a world where only the law

of the market prevails. According to the same standpoint,

globalization is the means to bridge the gap between the rich

and the poor and between economically developed communities

and those aspiring to development.

In its bid to prove the inevitability of globalization, the

American discourse says small states are no longer able to

exploit the divergences between the superpowers, as they used to

do during the cold war and that political openness the world has

reached is intrinsically linked to economic openness. They are

both essential for globalization . That is why the United States

established a close link between them and ties its cooperation

with other countries to the compliance with and commitment to

economic and political openness.

The Action of the Globalization Administration:

This methodological discourse is coupled with a technical

campaign conducted by international economic institutions

representing the administration of globalization , such as the

World Bank and the International Monetary Fund. These

institutions back the American discourse with reports supported

with statistics on means to pull national economies out of their

stagnation and on the mechanisms that developing countries

should use to reach economic growth on the path towards a

comprehensive development. These means include structural

adjustment programs, an all-out privatization, restricting the role


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of the nation-state and relinquishing its financing of burdening

social services such as education, health, information,

environment and employment. They equally include relieving

the State from subsidizing prices through liberalizing them and

the laws of market supply and demand, reducing investmentcosts and adopting flexibility in matters of employment.

Therefore, globalization is, according to this discourse, a

dynamic promising a more prosperous future in which all parts

of the world will fulfil the long-cherished dream of change,

whose means were lacking before globalization. The addressees

of this globalization theory are the whole world, with special

emphasis on the peoples of its architects, in a bid to convincethem of the positive aspects of globalization. Former US

President Bill Clinton had said in a speech to the American

people: globalization will be Americas promising chance. It

will not be an obstacle to its development. Globalization will

build a world with new borders that should be expanded.

Globalization will be no threat to us -we Americans. On the

contrary, we will be among the first to reap its fruits.

Anti-Globalization Discourse and Efforts to PreserveIdentity:

Many are concerned over threats posed by sweeping

globalization to identity and peculiarity. They face the American

pro-globalization discourse by another, attacking the United

States and arguing that through the globalization of the world,

Washington only seeks to Americanize the globe and reshape it

according to its whims and wishes.

French intellectuals are at the forefront of the Europeans

reservations against rushed globalization and urge for protecting

peoples identity against the dangers of savage globalization.

Even French high-ranking government officials and decision-

makers share this view.


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Some of these personalities describe the American intellectual

invasion as a new empire expanding worldwide as a space

without borders.

France uses various approaches in its resistance to this invasion.The French government requires French TV channels to allocate

60 percent of their programs to European production to avert

American dominion. The French government also issued

instructions to stop financial and material assistance to French

cultural events that do not adopt the French language as the

official language. A growing trend in France calls for devising a

law compelling officials to use only French in public events.

Recently, France insisted that the new Secretary General of the

United Nations, after Boutros Boutros Ghali, should have full

command of the French language.

Frances defense of its identity and linguistic and cultural

specificity against rampant globalization has grown to become

an obsession and a concern of all intellectuals, thinkers and

politicians alike. The mobilization is so intense that one can say

that France is facing an identity crisis that some writersdescribed as a collective hysteria resulting from the

domination of the English-speaking American culture at the

expense of the French culture which is losing ground in the

world. The rich and the decision-makers in France now speak

only English, while French has become the language of the poor

and the common people, Michel Sires once wrote.

At the last French-Speaking Summit he attended, former French

President Francois Mitterrand called on the summiteers to helpFrance defend its language and identity against the US

intellectual invasion. However, the French-speaking countries

from which the former President sought help accounted only for

3 percent of the world population.


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The French Culture Minister, who represented his country at a

meeting of the United Nations Educational, Scientific and

Cultural Organization (UNESCO) in Mexico, waged a campaign

against the United States of America. I am amazed that the very

countries that taught the world a considerable amount offreedom and triggered revolution against tyrants, are now the

ones that seek to impose a totalitarian culture on the whole

world, he said. This is a type of financial and intellectual

imperialism that does not go through the occupation of land, but

rather through the confiscation of consciousness, the way of

thinking and of life, he added.

In his attempts to defend the French way of life, PresidentJacques Chirac opposed the opening of a Macdonalds restaurant

in the Tour Eiffel, so that this monument remains one of the

embodiments of the French way of life.

An undeclared war is currently waged worldwide for the

protection of national identity. The pro-globalization circles are

dealing blows to identity. Though not deadly, these blows

remain painful.

When it opposed the Maastricht Treaty, Norway was defending

its own identity against being integrated in the European

identity, although this Nordic country belongs to the European

space.

Singapore, a liberal and advanced nation, deals with reservation

with the Internet and fears that its Confucius values would fade

away and its specificity would be swept away.

In January 1997, South Korea was the scene of strikes and

upheavals to defend workers rights which were violated

because of economic globalization. Until then, South Korea was

a model of a great liberal capitalist country, open onto the world

market and a disciple of globalization. The January strikes were


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the first protest movement staged by a banned trade union to

demand social rights, whose preservation and defence seemed at

logger heads with the very principles of globalization. The

strikes in South Korea was described as a revolution against

liberal globalization.

Even in the United States, an intellectually-organized and

popular trend is growing, calling for the safeguard of the

American identity that has become under the threat of the influx

of immigrants from the whole world.

Reference:Retrieved from


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Group 5




Globalizations Positive and Negative Aspects:

Globalization has positive and negative aspects. On top of its

positive aspects comes the tremendous development of new

information and communication technology. This progress

helped bring the various parts of the world closer and

disseminate knowledge particularly through the Internet which

created a new and open world, a world with unified feelings and

with increasingly closer cultures and interacting civilizations.However, globalization was planned in a rush. It is a momentous

phenomenon indeed. Was it acceptable to leave its handling to

large capital and international financial organizations, created to

serve capitalism and provide conditions for its limitless

movement around the world?

This has become a reality in which the shaping of globalization

is being dominated by the financial dimension. Even the

economic dimension was less important than the financial one.Political, cultural and intellectual considerations are subordinate

elements that will eventually melt down into the financial and

economic dimensions.


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All this raises fears that other decisive mutations will take place,

change the face of the world and severe all links with the past.

Modern states that have no ancient civilization, do not fear for

their identity nor for their civilization, because they are new

ones with no legacy, no heritage and no prosperous history to beproud of and to build on to engage in the future.

These fears are not specific to the South. Some countries of the

North, are also aware of such threats, based on their attachment

to the principles of homeland, borders, nationalism, the flag, the

national anthem, history and national sovereignty. These

countries fear is also nurtured by their pride of their nations

role and concern to see them swallowed by globalization, aglobalization whereby the strong dominates the weak.

Globalization might appear as premature for a majority of

countries, in the North and in the South, particularly in countries

where the Nation-State still plays the leadership in societies and

that are not up to the level of societies for which globalization

was tailor-made.

The societies that rightfully fear the negative aspects ofglobalization are those where national capitalism is unable to

spread its hegemony for the simple reason that either it does not

exist at all or that it is too weak. Such societies also cannot

relinquish their Nation-State that has not yet fulfilled its

objectives, and where civil society and the private sector are still

unable to take over the States authority and leading role,

particularly in social areas. Moreover, in those societies,

privatization is impossible because the private sector is unable to

replace the public sector, i.e. the societies where privatization is

a squandering of the States wealth and resources in favor of

foreign companies.

The fear of globalization goes as far as considering it as a system

that sweeps all the principles known to the civilized world,


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including the protection of the weak by a strong Nation-State

from exclusion, unemployment and poverty and the provision of

social security to its weakest citizens.

Some opponents of globalization see in its system a merereflection of the dominion of the social aspects by the financial

ones. They even consider it as a new form of occupation, not a

political or a military one, but rather a financial occupation that

imposes a uniform type of thinking and erases all national

historical heritage.

The opponents of globalization adopt various forms of

opposition. They did not restrict themselves to staging

demonstrations and other movements of protest, similar to the

first one held in Seattle. Experts and thinkers amongst these

opponents are now devising a social and economic counter-

project to outline new foundations for a fair, egalitarian and

human globalization based on a balanced world economy and

catering for the interests of developing countries. This new type

of globalization builds a new unified world where the plurality

of concepts, values, culture and specificities is not excluded.

This project adopts the positive aspects of globalization anddismisses the negative ones.

The theoreticians of the alternative globalization have already

started to declare the fundamental principles of this system that

they will present in the form of a charter to the United Nations to

give it an international legitimacy after being submitted for

debate at the world level. Globalization that was imposed on the

world as a fait accompli never proceeded in this way.

Nevertheless, globalization remains a complex and ambiguous

phenomenon for which analysts give different analyses.

Globalization architects say it means the generalization of

wealth and prosperity, as it targets the promotion of economic


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exchanges, the increase of foreign investments and the

development of modern technology that secures the

advancement of information and communication means.

Other analysts and experts among opponents believeglobalization is an excessive hegemony of capitalism, as it

enriches the rich and impoverishes the poor countries that are

called by euphemism developing nations, while some of them

head steadily towards more backwardness. Such a situation only

plunges the majority of the worlds population into yet more

exclusion and marginalization.

Therefore, globalization appears as a dual phenomenon with two

antagonistic dimensions.

Seen from one perspective, it looks like a system of wealth,

prosperity or even the promised heaven. From another, it

appears as a system of exclusion and marginalization. For some,

it is a merciful angel, while for others, it is Satan.

Looking at globalization from one single perspective is short-

sighted, because it has both positive and negative aspects.

In a speech to the General Conference of UNESCO on October

15, 2001, President Jacques Chirac of France said globalization

can be described neither as positive nor negative, for such a

judgment gives it a moral dimension that it does not have and

intentions that it does not pursue. Making a judgment of

globalization will ascribe to it unspecified and unclear social

projects, while globalization deals with material objects only. It

is these objects that we should judge as positive or negative andnot globalization itself.

We believe that the French Presidents statement is different

only in terms of methodology that does not rid globalization of

its negative aspects.


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Documents

Criticism of Globalization