Globalization

Abstract

It is extremely difficult to penetrate hype surrounding term globalization, but, whether it is viewed as a panacea or demonized as source of all our evils, we need to try to do so (see Scholte, 1996). In a relatively short period of time, term has spread across academic disciplines, spawned multiple research centers, and generated a vigorous countermovement. It is most labile (as psychoanalysts would put it) of terms-fluid and slippery in its meaning and political implications. As a starting point I believe we could do worse than start with Daniel Drache's (1999: 7) (slightly?) tonguein-cheek conclusion that the simple truth is that one-third of globalisation narrative is oversold, one-third we do not understand because it is a process unfolding, and one-third is radically new. As debate on globalization moves beyond early polemical or wide-eyed assertions of its novelty, there seem to be three basic positions in contention: (1) globalist, which sees process as inevitable and irresistible by old national order; (2) traditionalist, which refuses to accept novelty of process and clings to nation-state; and (3) transformationalist, which sees a significant shift at global level but questions its scope and inevitability (see Held, 2000: 22-23). This triad is not too forced and is certainly an improvement on earlier polarization of positions. Most observers now accept time-space compression (Harvey, 1989) aspect of globalization and notion that social relations have become stretched across nation-state boundaries. There has been an intensification of cross-border flows in eco-