L1: Globalization and the State in Multilevel IR
Overview:
I. Globalization: What, when, and where?
- What is globalization?
- Empirical patterns
II. Globalization and consequences for the state
I. Globalization: What, when, and where?
A. What is globalization?
- On the one hand, globalization is an intuitive term due to our more global connections.
these connections could be traveling, the internet, trade…
- On the other hand, when we think about it conceptually there is still some difference.
Regarding this term there are debates over:
- Aspects of life involved - economic life (trade, services) or political life (spread of
policies or IGO’s), or social life (migration, or online connections)
- Territorial levels of connections - is it still state actors or subnational actors or
regional connections across state boundaries…
- Potential versus actual connections - should we focus on potential connections
(potential trade connections) or focus on actual connections (real-life trade flows)
- Manifestations of connections - is it about the frequency, the speed the intensity or
the influence of the connections
- Globalization as a contested concept (Scholte 2005). The concept is still contested, so we
have to choose which definition we want to use.
- Poll
(1) Globalization as internationalization:
- Focus on the increase in interactions between states
- This is the traditional way of seeing globalization. empirically if we are to look at this
type of globalization we will look at the cross-border movement of goods and
services, done at a country level.
- CONS: however, this is a view of globalization that has some issues. for example, it
does not take into account the role of non-state actors (multinational corporations or
NGOs) that work across borders. Also, there is another thing missing in this
conceptualization which is a variation of globalization within countries. (globalization
being different in Amsterdam than in a small village in the middle of nowhere
Netherlands).
,(2) Globalization as liberalization:
- Focus on liberal macroeconomic reforms such as: liberalization of trade, FDI,
finance. However, it will focus primarily on how the liberalization of the economic
policies has increased, and contributed to increases in globalization.
- This view is consistent with Neoliberal economic ideology. it is also the view of
globalization that in the early ages of this current period of globalization (80s and
90s) has seen the most backlash.
- This is a picture of a protest in the world economic forum, which has become a
symbol of globalization along the lines of this neoliberal view.
- PROS: This view of globalization is hopeful in a sense because it is more open to
incorporate non-state economic actors, thus it differs from traditional IR.
- CONS: There are still some problems though. one of the main problems is confusing
globalization with liberalization. The current period of globalization is more than the
liberalization of economic policies. the other issues is that liberalization as a concept
existed before globalization, thus we are and can confuse different concepts
(3)Globalization as universalization/Westernization:
- Diffusion of modernist/Western values. This type of globalization consists of the
diffusion of modern and western values and ideas, such as capitalism, industrialism,
democracy, enlightenment values or social structures of the western world spreading
to other parts of the world.
- If globalization is westernization then we would expect globalization as
homogenization. so the world becomes more homogeneous and more alike. this
could be McDonalds spreading all around the world or more about particular ideas
spreading.
- PROS: This perspective is nicer compared to the first one is that it is more open to
incorporating the role of ideas. and it also is more open to incorporate the role of
non-state actors than the 1rst perspective.
- CONS: There are still some drawbacks from this perspective. one drawback is that
westernization or known as colonization also predates globalizations that we are
currently living in. therefore, we are confusing different things. Also it is not
necessarily clear that globalization has this necessary homogenization effect. We see
a lot of backlash and local differences in how globalization plays out, even in global
actors the way they embed things actually works out quite differently in different
contexts.
,(4) Globalization as spread of transplanetary connections between people (Scholte 2007):
- Geography and space becomes less relevant and important in this current period of
globalization. This is a more fundamental shift in the meaning of space and territory
because of new transportation technology, we can move easier and faster around the
world. but also new information technology which means that we can interact with
people online in ways that we couldn’t.
- This is the most radical and ambitious view of globalization compared to the previous
ones.
- This definition also thinks about Individuals as important actors in globalization. so
the role of people and the increasing movement of people (refugies, tourists,
pilgrims…) gets more emphasis and attention in this view, because people are even
part of the definition of globalization.
- PRO: it recognized that there is more than one globalization and it recognizes that
globalization is a deeply political process that actually encompases many
contradictory trends. On one hand we have globalization and on the other we have
localization in many cases or local movements as a backlash of globalization. it gives
a greater role to individuals.
- CONS: physical space and geography might be more important than Scholte permits
and in some way this pandemic is an experiment of what happened when more
interactions moves online while physical space and movement become constrained.
in some cases, some of us have seen that social movement and interactions are
more important than we thought. This is an interesting way of noting the role of
geography in globalization. In addition, we can say that perhaps the role of the state
is a little more important than what Scholte permits, because a lot of what we do is
still determined by governments, also can be shown using the covid case. we can
say that covid has shown us nationalistic responses by governemtns
- Also more broadly speaking there is a lot of the world that is still not globally
connected, if you travel with a non-western pasport you will realise that this
connection is a lot easier for some people than others.
Linking back to the conceptualization, when we link these four views it is intuitive that each
of those will make us think of IR differently, it would let us ask different questions and
answers about iR. This is why concepts are important, because they can lead us to different
places.
, B. Empirical patterns
Empirical conceptualization:
Empirical literature relies on three dimensions:
- Economic globalization: focuses on flows of goods, capital and services, openness to
such flows
- Political globalization: focuses on diffusion of government policies, the increase of
number of organizations in the world
- Social globalization: about the spread of ideas, information and people.
• KOF index (Konjunkturforschungsstellenindex), see Dreher (2006, 2008) and Gygli et al
(2019) - a way to measure these dimensions, it is the most widely used indicator of
globalization. it includes different aspects of the dimensions previously stated:
(only an idea, not gonna ask which indicator inside which dimension)
- We can see that in the economic and social aspect there are political decisions. and
the social indicators are biased towards the western view of globalization (we can
see globalization as a westernization view).
Economic: Social:
(1) Actual flows Political: (1) Data on Personal Contact
- Trade (percent of - Embassies in Country - Telephone Traffic
GDP) - Membership in - Transfers (percent of
- Foreign Direct International GDP)
Investment, flows Organizations - International Tourism
(percent of GDP) - Participation in U.N. - Foreign Population
- Foreign Direct Security Council (percent of total
Investment, stocks Missions population)
(percent of GDP) - International Treaties - International letters
- Portfolio Investment (per capita)
(percent of GDP) (2) Data on Information Flows
- Income Payments to - Internet Users (per
Foreign Nationals 1000 people)
(percent of GDP) - Television (per 1000
(2) Restrictions people)
- Hidden Import Barriers - Trade in Newspapers
- Mean Tariff Rate (percent of GDP)
- Taxes on International (3) Data on Cultural Proximity
Trade (percent of - Number of McDonald's
current revenue) Restaurants (per
- Capital Account capita)
Restrictions - Number of Ikea stores
(per capita)
- Trade in books
(percent of GDP)
KOF globalization index:
comparison between how globalized countries are now compared to the 1970s. We see that
the world has become more globalized and that the west has always been more globalized
than the global south. In terms of trends over time, we see that some areas of the world
have caught up more than others (e.g. Russia and southern europe).