Critique Of Globalization Research Articles

Globalisation and Its Malcontents: In pursuit of the promise of education

In the course of exploring critiques of globalisation, this essay will focus on two postures—each with its range of arguments—that have emerged as alternatives to globalisation, namely, the delinking position and the subverting position. The first argues for standing “outside” of globalisation and its educational cultures and apparatuses. It brings together positions found in black feminism (as in the work of Audre Lourde), various religious, cultural, and ideology-centred approaches such as Islamic education and Afrocentric education, and critical dependency theorists such as Samir Amin, all of whom argue in one way or another for delinking the “South” from the “North”. The second argues for working “inside” the globalised world. This posture, represented by an eclectic group of philosophies and approaches that span radical constructivism, different versions of multiculturalism, and, on the left, old and new interpretations of Marxism, argues variously for developing more authentic and relevant pedagogies and for making a case for mobilising social structures behind political efforts to change the curriculum. The direction that this essay will take, in the course of critiquing these “outside” and “inside” postures, is to argue that neither is sufficient, by itself, as a reply to the assimilative and exclusionary impulses of the form of globalisation that dominates the world today. It is suggested, instead, that a way towards an alternative imagination to the hegemonic culture of globalisation lies in exploring the relationship between an engaged “inside” and “outside” view.

The World Social Forum and the Lessons for Economic Geography

This article examines the development of the World Social Forum (WSF) using theoretical arguments that have emerged from the new economic geography. In particular, it draws on the critique of economistic accounts of globalization by Richa Nagar, Victoria Lawson, Linda McDowell, and Susan Hanson to evaluate how far the WSF serves to move beyond institutional, spatial, and personal barriers that often limit academic debate over neoliberalism and global economic change. Following this critique, the authors evaluate how far the criticisms of neoliberalism that have been articulated at the WSF transcend traditional barriers to inclusion in debates and struggles over globalization. As such, the article examines the degree to which the WSF allows for (1) informal economic spheres to be considered and connected to formal economic developments, such as the Free Trade Area of the Americas;(2) excluded spaces and places to be discussed and involved; and (3) excluded actors and subjects to be both represented and included in the debates. The conclusions point to the limits of what has been accomplished at the WSF, but also underline the progress that it represents toward modeling a more socially, culturally, and internationally inclusive critique of neoliberal globalization for economic geographers.

Women in the Fortress Europe: Feminist Crime Fiction as Antifascist Performative

katrin sieg is Associate Professor affiliated with the bmw Center for German and European Studies and the German department at Georgetown University. She is the author of Exiles, Eccentrics, Activists: Women in Contemporary German Theatre (1994) and Ethnic Drag: Performing Race,Nation, Sexuality in West Germany (2002, both with University of Michigan Press). She has published in the areas of contemporary German culture,theater, and feminist theory. Currently, she is completing a book on German popular culture and feminist critiques of globalization, titled Sexing Germany.

Mark Twain's Critique of Globalization (Old and New) in Following the Equator, A Journey Around the World (1897)

Mark Twain's Critique of Globalization (Old and New) in Following the Equator, A Journey Around the World (1897)

Captain Cook and the Discovery of Antarctica's Modern Specificity: Towards a Critique of Globalization

Research Article| January 01 2005 Captain Cook and the Discovery of Antarctica's Modern Specificity: Towards a Critique of Globalization Mariano Siskind Mariano Siskind Search for other works by this author on: This Site Google Comparative Literature Studies (2005) 42 (1): 1–23. https://doi.org/10.2307/40247458 Cite Icon Cite Share Icon Share Twitter Permissions Search Site Citation Mariano Siskind; Captain Cook and the Discovery of Antarctica's Modern Specificity: Towards a Critique of Globalization. Comparative Literature Studies 1 January 2005; 42 (1): 1–23. doi: https://doi.org/10.2307/40247458 Download citation file: Zotero Reference Manager EasyBib Bookends Mendeley Papers EndNote RefWorks BibTex toolbar search Search Dropdown Menu toolbar search search input Search input auto suggest filter your search All Scholarly Publishing CollectivePenn State University PressComparative Literature Studies Search Advanced Search The text of this article is only available as a PDF. Copyright © 2005 by The Pennsylvania State University. All rights reserved.2005The Pennsylvania State University Article PDF first page preview Close Modal You do not currently have access to this content.

Captain Cook and the Discovery of Antarctica's Modern Specificity: Towards a Critique of Globalization

Captain Cook and the Discovery of Antarctica's Modern Specificity: Towards a Critique of Globalization

In Defense of Globalization

IN DEFENSE OF GLOBALIZATION Jagdish Bhagwati New York: Oxford University Press, 2004. xii, 3o8pp, $36.95 cloth (ISBN 019-517025-3)In the flurry of popular and scholarly books addressing the nature and impact of contemporary economic globalization, Jagdish Bhagwati's In Defense of Globalization is an important contribution. As the title reveals, the book articulates strong support for globalization, particularly in the guise of free trade and direct foreign investment. Bhagwati's goal is to systematically debunk the principal arguments of anti-globalization activists, whom he divides into two camps: anti-establishment forces with total opposition to market-based systems, and critics who focus on more specific aspects of globalization yet, he contends, base their arguments on incomplete or poor information. Dismissing the former group, Bhagwati takes on the arguments of the latter to expose flaws in their reasoning and reveal the "human face" of globalization.The book is organized around a broad range of themes that, together, encompass the major contemporary critiques of globalization. In response to critics' arguments that globalization increases poverty and income disparities, undercuts worker rights and labour standards, imperils democracy, harms the economic and social positions of women, erodes local cultures, and harms the environment, Bhagwati aims to show that the opposite is often true.One of the great strengths of the book is to disaggregate the constituent parts of globalization, which is often treated as an undifferentiated whole in popular discourse. Bhagwati carefully distinguishes between different kinds of international flows of goods, services, and people. In particular, he emphasizes the distinction between long- and short-term capital flows. Although he is an ardent proponent of globalization, Bhagwati is less than sanguine about the impact of short-term capital flows on developing economies and he blames the east Asian financial crisis on the absence of adequate capital controls in the most affected countries.By adopting a more tempered and socially conscious perspective, Bhagwati differs from other proponents of the global spread of free markets. For example, he shuns "shock therapy," or the rapid and comprehensive implementation of market-oriented reforms, in favour of a more gradual course of economic change that avoids social dislocation and, hence, political backlash. The book also devotes substantial attention to the contention that globalization exacerbates social ills such as child labour or the economic and social subjugation of women. Bhagwati largely rejects these claims, although some of his arguments-such as his observations about the motivations of and benefits for women participating in "global care chains" (76-80)-are largely based on anecdotal evidence, but he recognizes that cross-border movements of women and children in domestic labour and prostitution rings is indeed an explorative aspect of contemporary globalization.Bhagwati's discussion of the positive effects of globalization on poverty alleviation is a key component in his effort to expose the humane aspects of globalization. The author claims that globalization reduces poverty through a two-step process: trade increases growth, which in turn reduces poverty (53). While there is broad consensus on the first step of the process, there is less agreement on how and whether growth reduces poverty. The book cites the work of David Dollar and Aart Kraay, World Bank economists who published a recent study linking increased trade with poverty reduction. But Dollar and Kraay's contentions have catalyzed a spirited debate questioning or at least modifying their findings. Furthermore, recent decades suggest mixed experiences with trade and poverty in the developing world. While some countries such as China and India have experienced declining absolute poverty levels during recent periods of open economic policies, others, notably in Latin America, continued to exhibit high poverty rates and wide income disparities. …

LABOR HISTORY SYMPOSIUM

LABOR HISTORY SYMPOSIUM

Response to Rodriguez: A "Long Walk to Freedom" and Democracy?

Havidan Rodriguez's article, A 'Long Walk to Freedom' and Democracy: Human Rights, Globalization, and Social Injustice, (2004) offers a powerful critique of globalization, capitalism, and democracy. His piece provides evidence of how individuals remain in inhumane conditions, despite doctrine designed to protect all. He also poses challenging questions and begins answering them with theoretical claims and empirical evidence. Yet, in his examination of human rights, Rodriguez does not consider collective rights, such as rights to culture, language, and the environment. Instead, he emphasizes individual rights, primarily first- and second-generation human rights. He also uses a convenient definition of globalization and assumes that democracy is a desirable choice of government always compatible with human rights doctrine. It is important to establish more clearly what globalization is — both theoretically and empirically — before we can fully consider its impact on human rights doctrine, protections, and enforcement. Globalization Globalization, in theory, is a two-way process: the universalization of particularism and the particularization of universalism (Robertson 1997). Local communities interact with the global community, and the global community interacts with the local communities. This can occur in economic, cultural, and political spheres. One result of a global economy is an expanded area of economic competition, the global market (Chase-Dunn 1999). With the resulting standardization — universalizing the particular — goods can be sold around the world with little, if any, customization, such as the Sony corporation's Walkman (du Gay et al. 2000 (1997)). At the same time, localities can customize standard goods — particularizing the universal — exemplified

Diaspora by Degree: Narrative and Performance in Interviews of Expatriates from Wanganui, New Zealand

AbstractRecent critiques of globalization call for diligent folkloristic attention. This study considers the experience of immigration and transnationalism as it is expressed in personal experience narratives of expatriates living in Wanganui, New Zealand. In addition to narrative interpretation, it applies performance analysis to verbal soliloquies, entangled discourses, and kinetic moments. Acknowledging the corporeal and sensate properties of the interview helps to "humanize" and ground abstract theories of globalization. The unpredictability of human interactions can also turn interviews into sites of "deep" contradiction replicating on an intimate scale some of the behavioral and social incongruities inscribed within transnational spaces all over the world.

‘Who is Lhakpa Sherpa?’ circulating subjectivities within the global/local terrain of Himalayan mountaineering

This paper traces different formations of subjectivities negotiated within the transnational circuits of mountaineering media and cultural production. Drawing from ethnographic research in Nepal and Canada in 2000, I examine various representations of the second Nepali woman to climb Everest in order to demonstrate the linkages between scales and geographies of media narratives and subjectivities. Appearing in newspapers, a research interview with myself (a foreign researcher) and on the Internet, these differently scaled narratives render Lhakpa Sherpa in terms of local and global subjectivities, which shift after her successful climb, and are complex and dynamic. I engage with feminist critiques of globalization to encourage a view of globalization as enacted rather than merely resisted and to analyse ‘the global’ and ‘the local’ as inseparable and contingent and productive of particular gendered subjectivities. The disjuncture between her popularity in Nepal and the lack of knowledge about her in Canada reveals the uneven processes of globalization wherein Lhakpa Sherpa struggles against gender and racial politics in mountaineering at the same time that she is privileged to climb as a sponsored mountaineer, a new subjectivity for a Nepali mountaineer.

Diaspora by Degree: Narrative and Performance in Interviews of Expatriates from Wanganui, New Zealand

Recent critiques of globalization call for diligent folkloristic attention. This study considers the experience of immigration and transnationalism as it is expressed in personal experience narratives of expatriates living in Wanganui, New Zealand. In addition to narrative interpretation, it applies performance analysis to verbal soliloquies, entangled discourses, and kinetic moments. Acknowledging the corporeal and sensate properties of the interview helps to "humanize" and ground abstract theories of globalization. The unpredictability of human interactions can also turn interviews into sites of "deep" contradiction replicating on an intimate scale some of the behavioral and social incongruities inscribed within transnational spaces all over the world.

Do We Underestimate the Benefits of Cultural Competition?

Economic globalization has drawn fresh attention to cultural issues. The Uruguay Round of trade negotiations debated whether there should be a protectionist “cultural exception” for television and movies, as practiced by the French, Canadians, Brazilians, South Koreans, and Chinese to varying degrees. Governments around the world subsidize culture, in part to favor one national tradition over potential competitors. More generally, cultural questions are central to broader critiques of trade and globalization (Cowen, 2002). Current analyses, however, have neglected some insights from economics. We will suggest that market competition across cultures is desirable and favors relevant notions of diversity. An underlying theme is that individuals hold unjustified prejudices—or, in economic jargon, “systematically biased beliefs”—about globalization.

A False Alarm: Overcoming Globalization's Discontents

Globalization is a buzzword that has no precise definition. It takes on many mean ings, drawing both fervent support and fervent opposition. Indeed, the term is so imprecise that it is possible to be simul taneously for and against globalization. In Defense of Globalization focuses on its economic dimension, defined by Bhagwati as diverse forms of international integra tion such as foreign trade, multinational direct foreign investment, movements of 'short-term' portfolio funds, technological diffusion, and cross-border migration. His main thesis is that economic global ization is an unambiguously good thing, with a few downsides that thought and effort can mitigate. His secondary thesis is that globalization does not need to be given a human face; it already has one. A thoughtful and objective evaluation, Bhagwati believes, will make this clear, and that is what he sets out to do. The book addresses a slate of charges against globalization: that it increases poverty, encourages child labor, harms women, threatens democracy, imperils culture, lowers wages, erodes labor stan dards, worsens the environment, and gives full reign to predatory corporations. Bhagwati also discusses capital market liberalization and international migration, before turning to fixes for globalization's downsides: improving governance, accel erating social agendas, and managing the speed of transitions. He concedes a few points to globalization's critics but, wielding logic and fact, demolishes most of the al legations made against it. His conclusion:

La nécessité d'un droit mondial de la concurrence

THE NECESSITY OF A GLOBAL COMPETITION LAW The intensification of international trade, the increasing number of national (or regional) competition laws and the tendency to their extraterritorial application have increased the risk of contradictory decisions by national competition authorities. Besides, the accumulation of uncoordinated requirements imposed by coexisting national competition codes causes considerable costs at the expense of enterprises which are internationally active, not only but especially in the field of merger control. The problems arising can be tackled on a unilateral, bilateral or multilateral level. The article shows that the unilateral and bilateral approaches have their merits, but are not sufficient to resolve the fundamental questions. The same is true for the efforts made so far on the multinational level, e.g. within OECD, UNCTAD or the International Competition Network (ICN). Their activities are certainly useful to strengthen the co-operation between national cartel authorities and to create a global competition culture. However, these institutions did not reach a breakthrough in eliminating conflicts due to the diverging national competition law codes in the world. Only the WTO seems to have the capacity for adopting world competition rules of a universal and binding character. Certainly, the obstacles to a « TRAMs »-Agreement (Trade-Related Aspects of Antitrust Measures) seem to have grown after the failure of the Cancun Ministerial Conference in September 2003 : Now, not only national concerns of sovereignty have to be overcome. But the « Singapore Issues » have definitely become part of a negotiation package which will be untied only if a solution will be found for all components, including more appropriate rules for agricultural products. Nevertheless, this new connection is not only negative : As the history of trade rounds shows (with the TRIPs-Agreement being the most prominent example), solutions for particularly controversial subjects can be achieved if opponents are compensated for their consent by concessions in other trade matters. Therefore, the reluctance which can be observed in the field of transnational competition rules, should not discourage, and – above all – not inspire a too modest approach. A future multilateral WTO-competition agreement should contain not only the Doha elements (core principles like transparency, non-discri-mination and procedural fairness, provisions on hardcore cartels, appeal for technical assistance and capacity building), but in addition rules on the abuse of dominant positions and on vertical restraints which segregate national markets. There is no convincing reason why the WTO dispute settlement should not be applied to a competition law agreement. Regarding merger control (and private litigation), an agreement on specific rules seems out of reach. Works in other fora on the harmonisation of notification forms and procedures should be continued. At the same time, a restricted number of WTO-members could – in a plurilateral agreement – pave the way for the inclusion of merger control rules into the WTO system. As regards developing countries, their own interest militates for strong competition rules : Very often, these countries are the victim of international cartels or of bid rigging connected to public procurement. Concerns, that the non-respect of a WTO competition agreement could trigger cross retaliation in other areas, can be dispelled by the adoption of appropriate clarifications (no mandatory prosecution of cartel offences, flexibility in cartel exemptions, legitimacy of a national industrial policy, etc.). The problem of scarcity of resources can be met by delegating competition law enforcement to the regional level. If no valid reasons speak against world competition rules, there are strong arguments in favour of it. The widespread estimation has to be mentioned that the process of globalisation necessitates better rules on the international level. The economic system of market economy yields the best results only if certain conditions are met. An effective competition policy is one of these. The adoption of such rules within the WTO system would be an important response to the critique of globalisation by underlining that the expansion of international trade is subject to a framework striving to maximise not only private, but also public welfare.

Transnational Feminisms in a New Global Matrix

Utilizing an ethnographic case-study approach, this article examines the experiences of women of color encountering globalization, and the shifting political and economic landscape through forms of transnational organizing. Central to this analysis is an examination of the increased pressures born by women of color and the emergence of new strategies of resistance that move outside nationalist and state-centered models. The article highlights such alliances between a group of US Chicanas and Latinas from Colorado, and indigenous women in Chiapas, Mexico, paying particular attention to the transformative relationships as well as the points of tension and disruption. Overall, the article brings into conversation theories of oppositional consciousness among US ‘Third World Feminists’ and postcolonial feminist critiques of globalization to map the boundaries of a transnational feminism useful for women encountering hierarchies of race, class and gender in the new millennium.

Localizing knowledge in a globalizing world: recasting the area studies debate

American Baroque, Doris Sommer Nature, and Culture in Discourses of Globalization, Arturo Escobar Disappearing Local: Rethinking Global/Local Connections, Angelique Haugerud Globalizing the Local, Localizing the Global: Mapping Transnational Women's Activism, Amrita Basu, Asserting the Local National in the Face of the Global: The Case of Egyptian Soap Opera, Lila Abu-Lughod Why Area Studies? David Ludden Multiple Worlds of African Studies, Sandra Greene Deterritorialization and the Crisis of Social Science, Tim Mitchell Middle East as an Area in an Era of Globalization, Rashid Khalid No Longer Far Away: The Reconfiguration of Global Relations and Its Challenges to Area Studies, Arif Dirlik Knowledge, Place, and Power: A Critique of Globalization, Eqbal Ahmad

Blinded by the Enlightenment: Günter Grass in Calcutta

AbstractGünter Grass's 1988 Zunge zeigen has been criticised as an example of Eurocentricism, an especially harsh charge against this author known for his critique of globalisation. The claim that Grass writes about India as a colonising Westerner overlooks the ways in which he undermines the sovereignty of the Western subject through his polyphonic, self‐reflexive account. The result is a sincere attempt to destabilise the oppressive subject he has been accused of promoting. This attempt notwithstanding, Grass's critique does falter for two reasons that critics of Zunge zeigen have not addressed. The first concerns his use of Theodor Fontane both as a bridge to the history of colonialism and as a model for engaged literature. Fontane proves tenuous on both counts, and diverts Grass's attention both from India's colonial history and literary present. Second, Grass's prescription for overcoming the misery he documents in India and Bangladesh – the Enlightenment – ultimately reinscribes a discourse of domination that favours Europe. By choosing Kali, the Hindu goddess of destruction, to represent India, Grass reinforces the notion that rationality is a European invention that is alien to the mystical, chaotic East. Ultimately, Grass fails to account for the Enlightenment's own historical complicity in colonialism.

Assessing Globalization's Critics: 'Talkers are No Good Doers???'

This paper is about the critics of the "doers" of globalization. It describes who they are, where they came from, what they want, how economists, policymakers, and others might understand them better, and where globalization might head from here. Many critics are themselves strongly internationalist and want to see globalization proceed, but under different rules. Some, particularly the protesters in the streets, focus mainly on what is wrong with the world. But some of them put forward broad alternative visions and others offer detailed recommendations for alleviating the problems they see arising from status quo globalization. Most of them have roots in long-standing transnational advocacy efforts to protect human rights and the environment and reduce poverty around the world. What brings them together today is their shared concern that the process by which globalization's rules are being written and implemented is undermining democracy and failing to spread the benefits broadly. This paper sketches the key issues and concerns that motivate the critics in a way that is broadly representative and intelligible to economists. It finds more resonance for the critics' agenda in economics than they commonly recognize. And it attempts to capture the concerns of Southern as well as Northern critics and to analyze the issues that divide as well as bring them together. Finally, it evaluates those issues and alternative proposals on which even globalization enthusiasts and the critics might come together cooperatively.

The contemporary gender agenda of the US public accounting profession: embracing feminism or maintaining empire?

Abstract In this paper we analyze the social relations operating within the contemporary gender agenda of the United States (US) public accounting profession, with the ultimate goal of revealing the role that that agenda plays in the expansion of empire. Competing narratives of globalization are used to support our characterization of the US as a contemporary empire, and to develop the role played by the US profession in that imperial project. A feminist account of the ideology of domesticity serves as a framework to critique the contemporary gender agenda of the US profession, and feminist critiques of globalization and development are used to interpret the gendered nature of the economic agenda that is currently being exported by the US profession and its multinational clients. The analysis leads to conclusions about the involvement of the US profession in facilitating empire and about complexities embedded in the roles held by women in the US public accounting profession.