essay against globalization

• A-Z Publications

Annual Review of Political Science

Volume 24, 2021, review article, open access, the backlash against globalization.

• Stefanie Walter 1
• View Affiliations Hide Affiliations Affiliations: Department of Political Science, University of Zurich, 8050 Zurich, Switzerland; email: [email protected]
• Vol. 24:421-442 (Volume publication date May 2021) https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev-polisci-041719-102405
• First published as a Review in Advance on February 12, 2021
• Copyright © 2021 by Annual Reviews. This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited. See credit lines of images or other third-party material in this article for license information

In recent years, the world has seen a rising backlash against globalization. This article reviews the nature, causes, and consequences of the globalization backlash. It shows that, contrary to a popular narrative, the backlash is not associated with a large swing in public opinion against globalization but is rather a result of its politicization. The increasing influence of globalization-skeptic actors has resulted in more protectionist, isolationist, and nationalist policies, some of which fundamentally threaten pillars of the contemporary international order. Both material and nonmaterial causes drive the globalization backlash, and these causes interact and mediate each other. The consequences are shaped by the responses of societal actors, national governments, and international policy makers. These responses can either yield to and reinforce the global backlash or push back against it. Understanding these dynamics will be an important task for future research.

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Globalization Is Over. The Global Culture Wars Have Begun.

By David Brooks

Opinion Columnist

I’m from a fortunate generation. I can remember a time — about a quarter-century ago — when the world seemed to be coming together. The great Cold War contest between communism and capitalism appeared to be over. Democracy was still spreading. Nations were becoming more economically interdependent. The internet seemed ready to foster worldwide communications. It seemed as if there would be a global convergence around a set of universal values — freedom, equality, personal dignity, pluralism, human rights.

We called this process of convergence globalization. It was, first of all, an economic and a technological process — about growing trade and investment between nations and the spread of technologies that put, say, Wikipedia instantly at our fingertips. But globalization was also a political, social and moral process.

In the 1990s, the British sociologist Anthony Giddens argued that globalization is “a shift in our very life circumstances. It is the way we now live.” It involved “the intensification of worldwide social relations.” Globalization was about the integration of worldviews, products, ideas and culture.

This fit in with an academic theory that had been floating around called Modernization Theory. The idea was that as nations developed, they would become more like us in the West — the ones who had already modernized.

In the wider public conversation, it was sometimes assumed that nations all around the world would admire the success of the Western democracies and seek to imitate us. It was sometimes assumed that as people “modernized,” they would become more bourgeois, consumerist, peaceful — just like us. It was sometimes assumed that as societies modernized, they’d become more secular, just as in Europe and parts of the United States. They’d be more driven by the desire to make money than to conquer others. They’d be more driven by the desire to settle down into suburban homes than by the fanatical ideologies or the sort of hunger for prestige and conquest that had doomed humanity to centuries of war.

This was an optimistic vision of how history would evolve, a vision of progress and convergence. Unfortunately, this vision does not describe the world we live in today. The world is not converging anymore; it’s diverging. The process of globalization has slowed and, in some cases, even kicked into reverse. Russia’s invasion of Ukraine highlights these trends. While Ukraine’s brave fight against authoritarian aggression is an inspiration in the West, much of the world remains unmoved, even sympathetic to Vladimir Putin.

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Globalization: Making sense of the backlash

If you’ve searched “deglobalization” or “nearshoring” or “reshoring” lately, you’re not alone. Google queries of all three terms have surged in recent years.

It’s not hard to figure out why. Wars in Ukraine and now Gaza, U.S. tensions with China and Russia, supply chain breakdowns, and rising populism have all raised doubts about the future of globalization — and whether its promise of a more connected and interdependent world can ever be achieved.

Caroline Freund has a message for the naysayers.

“Deglobalization isn’t happening,” said Freund, the former director for trade, investment, and competitiveness at the World Bank who is now the dean of the School of Global Policy and Strategy at the University of California, San Diego. “What’s actually happening is a reshaping [of the world economy].”

Freund’s insight came during the kickoff session of the SIEPR Fall Policy Forum. The event, held annually by the Stanford Institute for Economic Policy Research (SIEPR), focused this year on the future of globalization and how the United States can help shape the world’s shifting landscape. The Oct. 27 forum convened more than 170 attendees and featured perspectives of top experts from government, business, and academia.

The first thing to keep in mind: Globalization has experienced setbacks before.

“The trajectory of globalization has not been linear over the past 150 years,” said Mark Duggan, The Trione Director at SIEPR and The Wayne and Jodi Cooperman Professor of Economics in the School of Humanities and Sciences, in his opening remarks. “Globalization has clearly had its drawbacks, [but] there is indeed good reason for optimism.”

Access the agenda and recordings of the panel sessions here

The weaponization of economic policy

At the daylong event, featured speakers and audience members delved into a host of major current events affecting U.S. policy at home and abroad — from China’s economic stumbles and Russia’s growing economy despite record-level western sanctions to the U.S. dollar’s seemingly unstoppable reign as the world’s dominant currency and the private sector’s outsized role in the artificial intelligence revolution.

The consensus: More than ever, there’s a need for coordination. Maurice Obstfeld, a senior fellow at the Peterson Institute for International Economics and a former chief economist at the International Monetary Fund, spoke of the war between Israel and Hamas that began Oct. 7.

“The tensions in the Mideast are going to roil the global economy and global cooperation in a way that is very hard to predict,” Obstfeld said in his keynote. Factor in common threats posed by climate change, pandemics, cyber breaches, and nuclear proliferation and, he said, it’s clear that “global cooperation is more essential than ever,” he said.

But what does that cooperation look like in practice? Right now, it’s about coalitions — whether it’s the U.S. teaming with Europe or Russia partnering with China — and using economic policy as weapons.

“We live in a world of market power that’s used not for economic reasons, but for geopolitical purposes,” said Oleg Itskhoki, an economics professor at UCLA and a speaker on the panel about trade tensions and a return to industrial policy. “Everything is weaponized.”

U.S. policy: Throw sand in the gears

Take, for example, U.S. restrictions on trade with China — in the form of tariffs on imports and export controls aimed at curbing China’s access to advanced semiconductor chips and the tools for making them. Or, consider the severe sanctions imposed by the U.S. and its western allies against Russia for starting a war in Ukraine.

On China tariffs and Russia sanctions, the results so far have been disappointing.

Chinese imports to the U.S. have fallen since tariffs were first imposed in 2016, but the numbers mask another problem, said Freund during the session on trade. Asian imports to the U.S., which have held steady, include products whose parts can be sourced to Chinese suppliers. “There’s still Chinese content in our imports,” she said. “It’s just now coming in a much less transparent way.”

As for Russia, the pain that the U.S. and its allies hoped to inflict on its economy by boycotting purchases of oil and gas and freezing assets hasn’t worked, said Itskhoki. China, India, and Turkey have stepped up trade with Russia. And European goods are making their way to Russia through third parties.

The lesson, Itskhoki said, is that weaponizing economic policy exacts a hefty toll on everyone.

Fellow panelist Emily Blanchard, the chief economist at the U.S. State Department, acknowledged that efforts by the U.S. and its allies to counter Chinese and Russian aggression through economic measures has had setbacks. But that doesn’t mean the West should stop trying.

“The objective is to throw sand into [Russia and China’s] gears,” said Blanchard, who is also a professor at Dartmouth’s Tuck School of Business. This means making it as expensive as possible for them to sustain their aggression and — in Russia’s case — to also compromise the quality of the tools it’s using to try to defeat Ukraine.

“We’re clearly at a crossroads in the way that we in the United States, and countries around the world, approach their international economic policies [and their] domestic policies too,” she said.

Russia + China: A purely tactical alliance

On the newfound alliance between Russia and China, the speakers suggested it might not be as formidable as it seems. The strongest relationship between the two countries in more than 100 years is rooted in their shared perception that “enemies are everywhere,” said Kathryn Stoner, the Mosbacher Director and senior fellow at Stanford’s Center on Democracy, Development and the Rule of Law during a session on Russia and China.

Both Russian President Vladimir Putin and Chinese President Xi Jinping face a similar challenge, panel speakers agreed: Trouble in their economies could lead to political strife.

For Putin, fallout from the war on Ukraine is exacerbating labor shortages and a steep drop in life expectancy linked to the pandemic, Stoner said. For Xi, the “triple whammy” of pandemic lockdowns, unsustainable government debt, and the lowest rate of direct foreign investment in three decades appears to be fueling internal dissent, said Minxin Pei, a political science professor at Claremont McKenna College.

Like Russia, China must grapple with worrisome demographic challenges. For Russia, according to Stoner, it’s a tight labor market and falling life expectancy from COVID-19 deaths and war casualties. For China, its high levels of unemployed youth, Pei said.

“This is a regime that knows that it does not have a popular mandate to the extent it used to have one, and that’s based on the economy,” he said.

Artificial intelligence: Winners and losers

It was standing room-only for a session on the global race to dominate artificial intelligence (AI) — and its far-reaching implications for worldwide security and wealth inequality.

AI will “superpower all the good, bad, and the ugly,” said Fei-Fei Li, the co-director of Stanford’s Human-Centered AI Institute (HAI) and unofficial “godmother” of AI who spoke on the panel.

Among AI’s potential for good: curing cancer, supercharging education, and tackling climate change.

Another speaker, Erik Brynjolfsson, the director of the Stanford Digital Economy Lab and a SIEPR senior fellow, predicted that AI will enable huge leaps in worker productivity in the coming decade that could be double what the Congressional Budget Office is predicting. “We’re (already) seeing eye-popping improvements in productivity,” he said, including in one study he co-authored earlier this year showing a 35 percent boost for junior-level workers.

Still, the panelists agreed that there will be winners and losers in the AI revolution. The risk that it could exacerbate wealth inequality — and undermine globalization’s promise of shared prosperity — is real.

This concern is one reason why the speakers were critical of the private sector’s lead in driving AI innovation. Universities haven’t been able to keep up with the speed and scale of AI advances. The same goes for the public sector.

“There are simply not enough technologists within government to actually be able to responsibly figure out how to govern this technology,” said Daniel Ho, a SIEPR senior fellow and the William Benjamin Scott and Luna M. Scott Professor of Law at Stanford Law School. Ho also serves on the National AI Advisory Committee .

The speakers’ insights proved timely. Three days later, on Oct. 30, President Biden released a widely anticipated executive order calling for AI safeguards . The following day, the United States and China were part of an international consortium that  pledged  at a United Nations summit to work together to address the technology's potentially "catastrophic" risks.

*All photos by Ryan Zhang

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Arguments for and against globalization

FOR Globalization

1. one billion people out of poverty.

Between 1990 and 2010, the number of people living in extreme poverty fell by half as a share of the total population in developing countries, from 43% to 21%—a reduction of almost 1 billion people.

Human development indicators have also been improving across the globe. Life expectancy has been increasing steadily everywhere, and most developing countries are now rapidly converging with the rich world; child mortality rates have gone down everywhere; literacy rates, access to clean water, electricity, and basic consumer goods, all of these indicators have been rising.

Scarcity has existed throughout human history. However, never before has the material well-being of so many people been improved in such a short space of time.

2. COMPARATIVE ADVANTAGE

As Adam Smith famously alluded to in  The Wealth of Nations , a global free trade system allows countries to use their resources more efficiently, by selling what they produce best, while buying what other countries produce better.

In a 2011  publication , the OECD argued that comparative advantage is one of the most potent explanations of higher income growth in open economies. The differences between countries, including differences in broad policy agendas, create relative differences in productivity, giving rise to gains from trade.

3. INCREASED INTERNATIONAL COOPERATION

Certain economists, such as Jagdish Bhagwati, argue that the trade openness brought about by globalisation can contribute to the spread of democracy, as “the benefits of trade brings prosperity that, in turn, creates or expands the middle class that then seeks the end of authoritarianism.” Princeton’s John Doces found that “globalisation measured as increased exports to the U.S. increases the level of democracy in the exporting country.”

Using data provided by Freedom House, George Mason economist Daniel T. Griswold found a  correlation  between economic openness and political and civil freedom across 123 countries.

AGAINST Globalization

1. job losses.

Critics often point out that globalisation has led to job losses in the developed world, notably in the manufacturing sector. For instance, the US has lost 5 million manufacturing jobs since 2000.

What makes things worse is the sense that not everybody is playing by the same rules when it comes to global trade. A common refrain of the Trump administration in the US, for example, is that the West has opened its markets to Chinese exports, but China has not properly reciprocated. Globalization, as it currently exists, is making some in the developed world very rich, but hurting working class communities. This has been a gift to populist politicians, but it has been devastating to many communities in Europe and the US that relied on manufacturing.

2. EROSION OF STATE SOVEREIGNTY

Another common argument is that globalisation has eroded state sovereignty. International trade limits the ability of nation-states to control domestic economies, whereas international organisations and laws place limits on their decision-making abilities.

The Eurozone crisis proved that financial markets can topple governments just as easily as elections. Yet there is no democratic control over financial markets.

Large multinationals exploit legal loopholes (and use well-paid lawyers and accountants) to help them avoid taxes. They offshore their operations to countries with weak labour laws and environmental protection, circumventing higher standards in the developed world (despite selling their products there).

3. INCREASED INEQUALITY

Globalization has made some people very rich. The majority, however, are given scraps. The 2018 World Inequality Report  shows  that inequality is rising across the globe (particularly in rapidly-developing economies such as India and China).

Free market critics, such as the economists Joseph Stiglitz and Ha-Joon Chang, argue that globalisation has perpetuated inequality in the world rather than reducing it.

In 2007, the International Monetary Fund suggested that inequality levels may have  increased  due to the introduction of new technology and foreign investment in developing countries.

Photo by william william on Unsplash

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• Inequality Aversion, Populism, and the Backlash Against Globalization
• Globalization increases growth but the wealthy benefit more
• Over time, this rise in inequality causes resentment among voters
• In an attempt to reduce inequality, voters will favor politicians and policies that restrict the flow of goods, services, and people across borders
• The resulting autarky means that all are less wealthy, but there is less inequality

What was the source of this anti-globalization? Why did two wealthy countries turn their backs on one of the very forces—international trade and finance—that added to their own prosperity? In a new paper, “Inequality Aversion, Populism, and the Backlash Against Globalism,” Booth professors Lubos Pastor and Pietro Veronesi develop a theory that describes how growing income inequality spurred resentment among voters and set the stage for a populist backlash against global integration.

According to their theory, a retreat from globalization is a rational response to rising inequality. And the whole cycle—economic growth that exacerbates inequality, which ultimately quells globalization—is inevitable and only a matter of time. As Pastor and Veronesi frankly state: “Globalization carries the seeds of its own destruction.” The authors draw this stark conclusion from a model that connects rising income inequality with the growth of populism. And there is little that policymakers can do to avoid such a backlash against globalization, the model reveals, short of a massive tax overhaul that would move from a system of redistributive income taxes to consumption taxes.

The size of the pie matters, but so does the size of the slices

Pastor and Veronesi, two finance academics, came to this work on the rise and fall of globalism, in part, because of the connection between financial risk aversion and wealth accumulation (they have also done previous work on asset prices and political cycles, among other related subjects). People’s willingness to take on financial risk correlates to increased wealth, on average and over time, and it’s this propensity that distinguishes the agents in the authors’ model. Those agents who are more risk averse and who, consequently, fall further behind, eventually vote for populist politicians and policies.

A retreat from globalization is a rational response to rising inequality.

The authors define populism as “a political ideology pitching ordinary people, who are viewed as homogeneous and inherently good, against the established elites, who are deemed immoral and corrupt.” The agents in the model are assumed to dislike inequality, but their primary concern is with the elites of society who consume a great deal more than others.

Non-rich agents (who are not poor) naturally care about their own consumption, but they also care a great deal about how much the rich are consuming. These agents are intent on reducing the consumption of elites, even if that means limiting the growth of their own consumption. It’s not the size of the pie that matters, in other words, it’s the relative size of their own slice.

A common feature of populism is anti-globalism, according to the authors, which is perceived as benefiting the rich more than others. This is especially true when globalization is partnered with a highly developed financial system that allows for high risk-and-reward scenarios. It is no coincidence, then, that the two countries that recently experienced a populist revolt—the US and UK—have two of the most sophisticated financial systems in the world, and that those systems have generated vast amounts of wealth for relatively few players (while also benefiting many others to a lesser degree). Populists, likewise, favor politicians and policies that restrict globalization and that favor closed borders, both to people and to goods, according to this research, because such policies hurt elites more than others. In the authors’ model, the election of a populist leads to that country consuming its own products with no cross-border trading and no access to international finance (autarky).

Another feature of the authors’ model is that this shift to populism necessarily occurs during good times and not when a country is in a downturn. The reason is that during a growth period in a globalized economy with income inequality, like the recent lengthy (though gradual) upswing, the gap between the rich and others tends to widen. Also, in a growth period, non-rich agents are also improving and, consequently, they are willing to give up some consumption to more sharply reduce the consumption of the rich. During a recession, on the other hand, the wealthy often take a larger relative hit than others (as in the recent Financial Crisis and Great Recession), and income and consumption gaps are closed.

In summary, the authors’ model makes the following predictions:

• Support for populism should be stronger in countries with higher inequality, more financial development, and a more negative current account balance. They find evidence supporting these predictions by analyzing voting data from 29 developed countries. • Populist agents are more averse to risk and are likely to place a large weight on consumption inequality. Their more conservative investment and consumption plans make them less susceptible to the negative effects of autarky and, thus, they are more inclined to favor populist policies. • These agents tend to be less wealthy because of their conservative financial positions and risk aversion. • The model also suggests education as a proxy for risk aversion: less-educated agents tend to benefit less from growth under globalization, and have less to lose from the end of globalization. • The model thus predicts that less-educated, poorer, and anti-elite agents are more likely to vote populist.

Pastor and Veronesi offer one recourse to globalization’s demise: a consumption tax on the purchases of the elites that would serve to subsidize those left behind by globalization. Such a tax could stem a populist tide and keep globalization in place. Other redistributive measures, like income taxes, could slow the impact of globalization but inequality would continue to grow in such an economy and eventually lead to populism.

Globalization is often thought as inexorable and irreversible. However, the authors recount a century of globalization that occurred prior to 1914 that was, in some ways, more expansive than current levels. The onset of World War I, though, and the period extending till after World War II, brought a retrenchment of globalization driven by a number of grievances, including income inequality. Could such a retrenchment happen again? The authors cite literature which suggests that globalization may not be compatible with certain social norms and arrangements that many people find important. Free-flowing goods, services, and migrants may create labor market tensions, but they may also raise other social tensions, including a perceived loss of culture and other norms. Pastor and Veronesi analyze one of those tensions—inequality—and their results suggest that globalization is reversible indeed.

CLOSING TAKEAWAY When inequality becomes large enough, it becomes unsustainable and will set in motion a process to reduce that inequality, according to the model, even at the risk of destroying wealth.

In effect, their model offers the following advice to countries with high inequality and current account deficits, along with sophisticated financial services industries: Get ready—change is coming. As to when such change would occur, the model cannot offer a precise prediction. However, it does suggest that globalized countries that are facing immigration strains, as well as challenges from competing nations, may be particularly vulnerable. When inequality becomes large enough, it becomes unsustainable and will set in motion a process to reduce that inequality, according to the model, even at the risk of destroying wealth.

• Pietro Veronesi
• Lubos Pastor

Advantages and Disadvantages of Globalization Essay

• To find inspiration for your paper and overcome writer’s block
• As a source of information (ensure proper referencing)
• As a template for you assignment

When discussing the drawbacks and benefits of globalization, essays tend to be on the longer side. The example below is a brief exploration of this complex subject. Learn more in this concise globalization pros and cons essay.

Introduction

• Benefits and Disadvantages of Globalization

Reducing Negative Effects

In today’s world, globalization is a process that affects all aspects of people’s lives. It also has a crucial impact on businesses and governments as it provides opportunities for development while causing significant challenges. This paper discusses the advantages and disadvantages of globalization using evidence from academic sources. The report also suggests how governments and companies may implement to reduce the negative impact of the process.

Benefits and Drawbacks of Globalization

Globalization is a complex concept that can be defined by the process of interaction between organizations, businesses, and people on an international scale, which is driven by international trade. Some people may associate it with uniformity, while others can perceive it as the cause of diversification. The reason for such a difference in public opinion is that globalization has both advantages and disadvantages that should be analyzed.

The most significant positive aspects of globalization include global economic growth, the elimination of barriers between nations, and the establishment of competition between countries, which can potentially lead to a decrease in prices. Globalization supports free trade, creates jobs, and helps societies to become more tolerant towards each other. In addition, this process may increase the speed of financial and commercial operations, as well as reduce the isolation of poor populations (Burlacu, Gutu, & Matei, 2018; Amavilah, Asongu, & Andrés, 2017).

The disadvantages of globalization are that it causes the transfer of jobs from developed to lower-cost countries, a decrease in the national intellectual potential, the exploitation of labor, and a security deficit. Moreover, globalization leads to ecological deficiency (Ramsfield, Bentz, Faccoli, Jactel, & Brockerhoff, 2016). In addition, this process may result in multinational corporations influencing political decisions and offering unfair working conditions to their employees.

Firms and governments can work on eliminating the negative effects of globalization in the following ways. For example, countries should work on microeconomic policies, such as enhancing opportunities for education and career training and establishing less rigid labor markets. In addition, governments can build the necessary institutional infrastructure to initiate economic growth. To solve the problem of poor working conditions, it is vital to establish strict policies regarding minimum wages and the working environment for employees. A decrease in the national intellectual potential may be addressed by offering a broad range of career opportunities with competitive salaries, as well as educating future professionals on how their skills can solve problems on the local level.

Companies, in their turn, may invest in technologies that may lead to more flexible energy infrastructure, lower production costs, and decrease carbon emissions. They can also establish strong corporate cultures to support their workers and provide them with an opportunity to share their ideas and concerns. Such an approach may eliminate employees’ migration to foreign organizations and increase their loyalty to local organizations. It is vital for companies to develop policies aimed at reducing a negative impact on the environment as well by using less destructive manufacturing alternatives and educating their employees on ecology-related issues.

Globalization has a significant impact on companies, governments, and the population. It can be considered beneficial because it helps to eliminate barriers between nations, causes competition between countries, and initiates economic growth. At the same time, globalization may result in a decrease in the national intellectual potential, the exploitation of labor, and ecology deficiency. To address these problems, organizations and governments can develop policies to enhance the population’s education, improve working conditions, and reduce carbon emissions.

Amavilah, V., Asongu, S. A., & Andrés, A. R. (2017). Effects of globalization on peace and stability: Implications for governance and the knowledge economy of African countries. Technological Forecasting and Social Change , 122 (C), 91-103.

Burlacu, S., Gutu, C., & Matei, F. O. (2018). Globalization – Pros and cons. Calitatea , 19 (S1), 122-125.

Ramsfield, T. D., Bentz, B. J., Faccoli, M., Jactel, H., & Brockerhoff, E. G. (2016). Forest health in a changing world: Effects of globalization and climate change on forest insect and pathogen impacts. Forestry , 89 (3), 245-252.

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IvyPanda. (2021, June 9). Advantages and Disadvantages of Globalization Essay. https://ivypanda.com/essays/advantages-and-disadvantages-of-globalization/

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We Can’t Undo Globalization, but We Can Improve It

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More trade could provide a lift for U.S. firms.

You can’t go forward by going backward. Take the current debate about trade and globalization, for instance. While the impulse to erect trade barriers is understandable given the pain experienced by workers in a range of industries and communities in recent years, it is not the way to create lasting growth and shared prosperity.

• GP Gary Pinkus is the managing partner for McKinsey & Company in North America and a member of the McKinsey Global Institute Council.
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6 Pros and Cons of Globalization in Business to Consider

• 01 Apr 2021

Throughout history, commerce and business have been limited by certain geographic constraints. In its earliest days, trade happened between neighboring tribes and city-states. As humans domesticated the horse and other animals, the distances they could travel to trade increased. These distances increased further with the development of seafaring capabilities.

Although humans have been using ships for centuries to transport goods, cargo, people, and ideas around the world, it wasn’t until the development of the airplane that the blueprint of a “globalized economy” was laid. This was for a simple reason: You can travel greater distances faster than ever before.

The development of the internet accelerated this process even more, making it easier to communicate and collaborate with others. Today, your international co-worker, business partner, customer, or friend is only a few taps or clicks away.

Globalization has had numerous effects—both positive and negative—on business and society at large. Here’s an overview of the pros and cons of globalization in business.

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What Is Globalization?

Globalization is the increased flow of goods, services, capital, people, and ideas across international boundaries according to the online course Global Business , taught by Harvard Business School Professor Forest Reinhardt.

“We live in an age of globalization,” Reinhardt says in Global Business . “That is, national economies are even more tightly connected with one another than ever before.”

How Globalization Affects Daily Life

Globalization has had a significant impact on various aspects of daily life.

For example, it’s changed the way consumers shop for products and services. Today, 70 percent of Americans shop online. In 2022, there were 268 million digital buyers in the US and by 2025, this number is predicted to reach 285 million.

In addition, the globalized economy has opened up new job markets by making it more feasible to hire overseas workers. This has created a wide range of career opportunities for both job seekers and employers.

The emergence of remote work post-pandemic was also made possible by globalization. According to a survey from WFH Research , only seven percent of paid workdays in the US were remote in 2019. However, this number climbed to 29 percent by January 2024.

Check out the video below to learn more about globalization, and subscribe to our YouTube channel for more explainer content!

Advantages of Globalization

1. economic growth.

It’s widely believed that one of the benefits of globalization is greater economic growth for all parties. There are several reasons why this might be the case, including:

• Access to labor: Globalization gives all nations access to a wider labor pool. Developing nations with a shortage of knowledge workers might, for example, “import” labor to kickstart industry. Wealthier nations, on the other hand, might outsource low-skill work to developing nations with a lower cost of living to reduce the cost of goods sold and pass those savings on to the customer.
• Access to jobs: This point is directly related to labor. Through globalization, developing nations often gain access to jobs in the form of work that’s been outsourced by wealthier nations. While there are potential pitfalls to this (see “Disproportionate Growth” below), this work can significantly contribute to the local economy.
• Access to resources: One of the primary reasons nations trade is to gain access to resources they otherwise wouldn’t have. Without this flow of resources across borders, many modern luxuries would be impossible to manufacture or produce. Smartphones, for example, are dependent on rare earth metals found in limited areas around the world.
• The ability for nations to “specialize”: Global and regional cooperation allow nations to heavily lean into their economic strengths, knowing they can trade products for other resources. An example is a tropical nation that specializes in exporting a certain fruit. It’s been shown that when nations specialize in the production of goods or services in which they have an advantage, trade benefits both parties.

2. Increased Global Cooperation

For a globalized economy to exist, nations must be willing to put their differences aside and work together. Therefore, increased globalization has been linked to a reduction—though not an elimination—of conflict.

“Of course, as long as there have been nations, they've been connected with each other through the exchange of lethal force—through war and conquest—and this threat has never gone away,” Reinhardt says in Global Business . “The conventional wisdom has been that the increased intensity of these other flows—goods, services, capital, people, and so on—have reduced the probability that the world's nations will fall back into the catastrophe of war.”

3. Increased Cross-Border Investment

According to the course Global Business , globalization has led to an increase in cross-border investment. At the macroeconomic level, this international investment has been shown to enhance welfare on both sides of the equation.

The country that’s the source of the capital benefits because it can often earn a higher return abroad than domestically. The country that receives the inflow of capital benefits because that capital contributes to investment and, therefore, to productivity. Foreign investment also often comes with, or in the form of, technology, know-how, or access to distribution channels that can help the recipient nation.

Disadvantages of Globalization

1. increased competition.

When viewed as a whole, global free trade is beneficial to the entire system. Individual companies, organizations, and workers can be disadvantaged, however, by global competition. This is similar to how these parties might be disadvantaged by domestic competition: The pool has simply widened.

With this in mind, some firms, industries, and citizens may elect governments to pursue protectionist policies designed to buffer domestic firms or workers from foreign competition. Protectionism often takes the form of tariffs, quotas, or non-tariff barriers, such as quality or sanitation requirements that make it more difficult for a competing nation or business to justify doing business in the country. These efforts can often be detrimental to the overall economic performance of both parties.

“Although we live in an age of globalization, we also seem to be living in an age of anti-globalization,” Reinhardt says in Global Business . “Dissatisfaction with the results of freer trade, concern about foreign investment, and polarized views about immigration all seem to be playing important roles in rich-country politics in the United States and Europe. The threats in Western democracy to the post-war globalist consensus have never been stronger.”

2. Disproportionate Growth

Another issue of globalization is that it can introduce disproportionate growth both between and within nations. These effects must be carefully managed economically and morally.

Within countries, globalization often has the effect of increasing immigration. Macroeconomically, immigration increases gross domestic product (GDP), which can be an economic boon to the recipient nation. Immigration may, however, reduce GDP per capita in the short run if immigrants’ income is lower than the average income of those already living in the country.

Additionally, as with competition, immigration can benefit the country as a whole while imposing costs on people who may want their government to restrict immigration to protect them from those costs. These sentiments are often tied to and motivated—at least in part—by racism and xenophobia.

“Meanwhile, outside the rich world, hundreds of millions of people remain mired in poverty,” Reinhardt says in Global Business. “We don't seem to be able to agree about whether this is because of too much globalization or not enough.”

3. Environmental Concerns

Increased globalization has been linked to various environmental challenges, many of which are serious, including:

• Deforestation and loss of biodiversity caused by economic specialization and infrastructure development
• Greenhouse gas emissions and other forms of pollution caused by increased transportation of goods
• The introduction of potentially invasive species into new environments

While such issues are governed by existing or proposed laws and regulations, businesses have made climate change concerns and sustainability a priority by, for example, embracing the tenets of the triple bottom line and the idea of corporate social responsibility .

Managing the Risks of Globalization

The world is never going to abandon globalization. While it’s true that individual countries and regions put policies and practices in place that limit globalization, such as tariffs, it’s here to stay. The good news is that businesses and professionals willing to prepare for globalization’s challenges by developing strong social impact skills have the potential to benefit immensely.

Whether you’re a business owner, member of executive leadership, or an employee, understanding the impacts of globalization and how to identify its opportunities and risks can help you become more effective in your role and drive value for your organization.

Taking a course like Global Business is one path toward developing international business skills and gaining an understanding of the macroeconomic, political , and social conditions that continue to impact globalization.

Are you interested in breaking into a global market? Sharpen your knowledge of the international business world with Global Business , one of our online business in society courses . If you aren't sure which course is the right fit, download our free course flowchart .

This post was updated on February 26, 2024. It was originally published on April 15, 2021.

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Henry Mintzberg

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I am for and against globalization

How can any reasonable, thinking person be against globalization? After all, it promotes economic development, particularly in disadvantaged countries, lowers costs to consumers, and by connecting people around the world, helps to avert conflicts.

How can any reasonable, thinking person be for globalization? After all, it exacerbates income disparities, particularly in developed countries, threatens communities with cultural assimilation, and weakens national sovereignties.

It is remarkable how many people line up either for or against globalization and then dismiss the other side. Who’s right? Neither. Those who embrace globalization are no more thoughtful than those who dismiss it. We should all be lining up for and against globalization, to retain what is constructive about it while challenging what has become destructive.  We need globalization in its place, namely the marketplace, and out of the public space.

Unfortunately, the prevailing, cosmopolitan powers of the world— investors, executives, economists, and consultants — mostly line up for globalization, leaving those against it to protest locally, on their streets and in their ballot boxes. 1   But their marches and occupations have hardly made a dent in the armor of globalization, while voting for the likes of Brexit and Trump—against what is wrong rather than for what could be right—has not solved anything.

What we call globalization is really economic globalization, because it enables economic forces to prevail over social concerns and democratic precepts. Multinational companies play governments off against each other in their quest for reduced taxes and suspended regulations, while local communities have to compete for jobs that can be no more reliable than the next offer. Globalization may be connected everywhere, but it is rooted nowhere, while sustainable employment takes root in local soil, not on the “globe”.

Hence this force for economic development is fast becoming one for abandoning decades of social and political development. Trade pacts now allow companies to sue sovereign governments over legislation that reduces their profits, while companies such as Uber ride roughshod over local regulations. How about this from an article in the New York Times (23 September 2017), about the city of London’s challenge to Uber: “There is a feeling in the air that regulators should stand up to businesses that simply ignore any rules they don’t like.” No kidding!

John Kenneth Galbraith’s forgotten concept of “countervailing power” can help to understand what has been happening. 2 Countervailing forces arise in democratic societies to offset concentrated centers of power, as did the unions in America with the rise of the large corporations. But where are the unions in today’s so-called global village, and what other force has arisen to offset that of the global corporations?

The most obvious candidate is global government, but the United Nations is hardly up to that. The globe may be amalgamating economically, but it remains fragmented politically as well as socially. Indeed, the most powerful international agencies, all ardently economic—the WTO, IMF, World Bank, and OECD—have been the cheerleaders for globalization.

How, then, to face this corporate hegemony? The challenge will have to begin from the ground up. Perhaps never before have so many people been prepared to vote with their feet, their ballots, and their pocketbooks. Thoughtful, concerned citizens, acting in local communities that are connected globally through the social media, can bring direct pressure to bear on objectionable behaviors, while prodding their governments to act more concertedly on their behalf. Communities, after all, have been the places where major social change has often begun—for example, with a tea party in the Boston harbor or a woman boarding a bus in Montgomery, Alabama. From such sparks have come significant groundswells that have transformed societies.

True, the most powerful countries have also been cheerleaders for globalization, or at least for their own global corporations. But other countries, especially on the receiving end of the globalization demands, could act together to push back, instead of being further divided and ruled. Is this not what the European Union has been doing with its challenges to Google and other companies? Here, then, lies one potentially countervailing power to economic globalization. (For other suggestions on dealing with such imbalances in society, see my TWOG “ Going Public with my Puzzle .”)

Without restraining the power of economic globalization, we shall be facing greater social disruption, the election of more tyrants, and the further deterioration of our democratic institutions. We certainly need strong enterprises. But not free enterprises. Not if we are to be free people.

© Henry Mintzberg 2018. A similar version of this bog appeared on September 18 in the Sloan Management Review blog , under the title “We must keep globalization in its place: The Marketplace.” For further discussion of balance across markets, governments, and communities, see my book Rebalancing Society . For management education that is worldly beyond global, see impm.org .

Photo by Lisa Mintzberg is of a soap bubble, about 10 centimeter in diameter.

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1 See the classic article by A.W.Gouldner, “Cosmopolitans and Locals: Toward an Analysis of Latent Social Roles”, Administrative Science Quarterly (Vol. 2, No. 3, Dec., 1957: pp. 281-306). In a similar vein, David Goodhart has distinguished “anywhere” people from “somewhere” people” (in the Financial Times, 17 March 2017). About the latter, he wrote: “…more than 60% of British people still live within 20 miles of where we lived when we were 14.”

2 J.K. Galbraith, American Capitalism, The Concept of Countervailing Power (originally published 1952).

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In U.S. and UK, Globalization Leaves Some Feeling ‘Left Behind’ or ‘Swept Up’

Focus groups reveal the degree to which americans and britons see common challenges to local and national identity.

In 2016, both Americans and Britons participated in divisive votes shaped in part by questions of immigration and global engagement. In the United States, voters cast ballots in a presidential election ultimately won by Donald Trump and his “ America first ” vision. Across the Atlantic, “leave” voters outnumbered “remain” voters in a national referendum on continued European Union membership, framed by the slogan “ Take back control .” Attempts to explain the twin poll results have focused on people who felt left behind and who voted against the seemingly inexorable tide of growing economic interdependence, cultural diversity and social connectivity that define a globalized world. But direct, systematic comparisons of the two countries have been rare.

Pew Research Center undertook focus groups in the United States and United Kingdom in 2019 – prior to the outbreak of COVID-19 – to understand better the degree to which similar narratives about globalization and its impacts are evident in each country – and whether these narratives vary by geography, political affiliation or other factors in each country.

Pew Research Center has been studying issues of national identity and globalization for some time, but this project is the Center’s first foray into exploring the topic using comparative, international focus group data. We conducted 26 focus groups from Aug. 19 to Nov. 20, 2019, in cities across the U.S. and UK, grouped by political and geographic attributes as described below in the table (for more, see the methodology ). All groups were asked questions about their local communities, national identities and globalization by a trained moderator. The questions were based on a discussion guide designed by Pew Research Center.

To analyze the data collected from these discussions, researchers reviewed the focus group transcripts and consolidated the sentiments into “data displays.” These displays summarized participants’ responses to the moderator’s questions and included coding schemes to highlight key themes and points of interest in the conversation, as well as the dynamics of the discussion. Researchers analyzed the coded data, focusing on how opinions varied across the groups, which served as the primary unit of analysis. Particular care was taken to ensure that the viewpoints expressed in this report accurately capture the range of opinions expressed, emphasizing not just a majority opinion, but minority and dissenting opinions as well.

The analysis presented in this report is indicative of key narratives and frames of references that influence how people perceive and understand important issues. The findings are not statistically representative and cannot be extrapolated to wider populations. Similarly, while we often refer to groups of participants as “Democratic groups” or “leavers,” these descriptors are shorthand, based on the research design or moments in the focus group conversation. Depending on the topic, a participant’s age, gender, city, employment status or other factors may have been equally relevant to their opinions and views about globalization.

The focus groups confirm that the story of being “left behind” remains common in both the U.S. and UK. Participants highlighted the ways in which the forces of globalization left them rudderless, closing industries, leading people to abandon their homes and harming them economically. But the group conversations also reveal a narrative of being “swept up” by globalization. Those who are swept up experience dislocation because of too much attention from global forces – investment and new job creation supplant traditional work, inflate real estate prices and displace some people from their homes and communities. Stories of being left behind and swept up both lead to feelings of alienation and loss.

Attitudes toward globalization shaped less by local change, more by national context

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In academia, this is referred to as a “sociotropic” attitude. Academics have found similar relationships when examining trade attitudes or attitudes toward immigration. For example, when it comes to trade, scholars argue that people’s attitudes toward international trade are based less on their material self-interest than on perceptions of how the U.S. economy as a whole is affected by trade. Similarly, when it comes to immigration, research suggests people’s opinions are shaped by their concerns about the national cultural impacts of immigration more than their personal economic experiences.

Given that people can feel dislocated whether they are left behind or swept up, what separates those who see globalization negatively from those who see it positively is how they perceive changes to their country, rather than their neighborhood. Those who are more locally or nationally rooted tend to see globalization breaking down the national community and changing what it means to be part of the nation-state in ways they find disaffecting. In contrast, those who embrace globalization tend to focus on the ways in which globalization itself can create community – fostering new connections by breaking down boundaries between people to foster international cooperation and understanding.

In the following section, we describe how focus group participants defined and described globalization. Then, we look at how globalization impacted participants’ local communities and created a sense of loss, both for those who were left behind and those who are swept up by globalization. We then look at how people see globalization changing what it means to be British or American and how both those who are more globally oriented and those who are more nationally rooted express feelings of alienation in their country. Finally, we look at participants’ attitudes toward globalization at the international level, concluding that some view global interconnectivity as an opportunity for cooperation while others see it as a battleground for competition. Throughout the essay are quotations representing a range of views from participants, some of which have been edited for grammar, spelling and clarity.

Key findings and road map to the essay

Defining globalization

The term “globalization” was difficult for participants to define, but it was not difficult to describe.

The local context

Whether groups felt their communities were globalization “winners” who experienced job creation in their city or “losers” who felt the decline of industry, people focused on the changing character of their communities, the increased transience and the declining opportunities. Those “left behind” by globalization and those “swept up” often experienced similar feelings of loss and assigned blame to multinational corporations.

The national situation

People in the UK and U.S. felt that what it means to be British or American, respectively, is changing. Participants who are more inwardly oriented focused on how multiculturalism was “diluting” the dominant national character. People who were more globally oriented focused on how Brexit and the 2016 election have left them feeling like their country is no longer the multicultural, accepting place they had prized it to be. For separate reasons, participants highlighted their alienation and confusion about what it means to be part of their nations today.

Globalization

Participants who are less open to globalization tend to view the international sphere through the lens of the nation-state and as competition, expressing a need to stand alone apart from the interference of international bodies.

Participants who are in favor of globalization see the ways in which community can exist internationally, separate and apart from national boundaries. 

Regardless of their comfort with globalization, participants highlighted its inevitability.

Globalization: You know it when you see it

The question “What is globalization?” was not easy for focus group participants to answer. Definitions were wide-ranging, touching on economic changes such as the rising influence of multinational corporations and the role of international trade; international organizations like the United Nations; immigration and the movement of people; and amorphous concepts like the exchange of ideas and cultures. As a further indication of how challenged participants were by the task of defining globalization, some offered a response, only to hurriedly seek confirmation from the moderator that their answer was “correct.”

Though participants were often unsure of how to define globalization, key themes did emerge. These centered on economics and trade, the global balance of power, immigration and cultural exchange, technological advancement, and community.

And unlike technical definitions, participants found it relatively easy to share illustrations of globalization. They brought up the impacts of globalization on their daily lives, like the experiences of calling customer service and reaching a call center in another country. People touted the ability to order goods from the other side of the world on Amazon and have them delivered the next day. Others brought up how immigration has shifted the fabric of their country for better or worse, or how openness to foreign ideas and customs was changing their country’s culture – again, for both better and worse.

Globalization and change at the local level: Whether left behind or swept up, feelings of loss pervade

When describing key changes in their local communities, participants did not always invoke “globalization.” Yet their stories often linked to broader illustrations of what constitutes globalization. This was particularly true when participants spoke about changes due to industrial shifts, automation and the growing influence of multinational corporations. All three were consistently described as negatively impacting local communities – in contrast to growing cultural diversity or improved communication technology, which were sometimes viewed favorably.

Who is left behind? Who is swept up?

Though academics and journalists have widely used the term “left behind,” participants infrequently used it themselves. Here, we use the term “left behind” to discuss people who experienced losses like the closure of factories, institutions and local shops or the loss of jobs and opportunities.

We also use the term “swept up” to discuss people who experienced losses associated with growth, like mounting costs of living and increasingly crowded cities.

Some participants described elements of both phenomena. For example, in London, where participants complained of increasingly expensive housing and constant development, participants also lamented the loss of local pubs and decline of high streets.

Industrial change, automation and the influence of multinationals were prime catalysts in stories of being left behind by globalization. Being left behind was often equated with job loss and shuttered businesses. Depending on the locale, participants described either industry-specific or general job losses. Focus group participants in Pittsburgh and Newcastle were particularly animated by stories of being left behind, describing how they or people they knew had lost jobs at coal mines, steel mills and other industrial facilities.

In these cities and elsewhere, participants pointed to the carry-over effects of job loss – from local stores being unable to remain profitable to neighborhoods becoming less prosperous and more dangerous, exacerbated by the onset of crime and drug use that accompanied peoples’ material decline. People who felt left behind also noted the impact of economic decline on local social ties. Participants linked falling rates of homeownership with growing numbers of “transient” renters and less meaningful relationships with neighbors.

What is a high street?

In the UK, a “high street” is defined by the Office of National Statistics as “a cluster of 15 or more retail addresses within 150 meters.” But focus group participants used the term colloquially in much the way Americans would describe a “main street” in a town. The term evoked the center of commercial life and activity.

Job loss was sometimes described as almost a trap. Participants in Newcastle highlighted how their area simply receives less in terms of job training, education and employment opportunities now than they used to, making recovery from job loss more difficult to bear. The same was true in Pittsburgh, where one woman noted that “the market is now changing [and] the people that are already here … are no longer benefiting from it.” Another man commented about how Pittsburgh used to be a blue-collar town but it doesn’t ring true anymore.

For some, these perceived changes and the loss of jobs or opportunities in their town were met with great sadness, while others responded with a more matter-of-fact attitude and seemed to accept these changes as an inevitable fact of life. For example, one man in Newcastle framed the loss of these jobs simply as a result of changes in the labor market, saying, “The job trends are changing – heavy industry’s no longer up here, and we’re getting more offices. … People are coming in from different parts of the country, different parts of the area.”

Across the UK, participants lamented the decline of high streets – used colloquially in much the way Americans describe a “main street” but formally defined by the UK Office of National Statistics as “a cluster of 15 or more retail addresses within 150 meters.” They described the closures of independent businesses in their area and the increased presence of charity shops, or thrift stores, and chains.

Data from the UK Office of National Statistics indicates that between 2012 and 2017, the regions in which the focus groups took place all experienced either negative or stagnant growth in high street retail. 1 But, when accounting for food service, accommodations and other sectors beyond retail, all four regions experienced growth during that period, both on high street and elsewhere, suggesting that perceptions of decline may be heavily colored by retail, in particular.

Looking at employment, a similar trend emerges. In many of the cities where groups were conducted, participants expressed concerns that the declining high streets meant limited employment opportunities. Yet, in the regions where the groups took place, employment on high streets actually grew when accounting for sectors beyond retail, even while employment on high streets in retail fell in all regions but London. And while London did see growth in retail employment on high streets, it was roughly even with the city’s population growth, which also stood at 6% between 2012 and 2017.

The closures and changes people described extended from the workplace to the “high street” in the UK, and the tone was often one of profound loss. In all four cities in the UK where focus groups were conducted, people noted the closure of independent businesses on the high streets, highlighting how these shifts left them feeling like the previous epicenter of their community was no longer the bustling center of commerce.

Often, the blame was laid at the feet of globalization. For example, one woman in Newcastle highlighted how globalization means “smaller businesses … go out of business because [of] competition from … worldwide companies.” Participants also highlighted how these changes negatively impact young people’s job prospects, because with the closure of shops, there are fewer employment opportunities.

There was also a sense that the decline of these high streets was impacting individuals’ daily lives and routines, with one woman in Newcastle saying that in the good old days you could get everything you needed on the main road, but now “it’s degenerating, it’s a s—hole.” Participants described how the commercial decline was uneven, noting strip malls and retail parks getting huge amounts of investment as mom and pop shops on the high streets were left to die out.

“Opportunities [are] about careers, and you look at the average high street now and how that’s changed in 20 years … this is a completely different world for people to get jobs.” MAN, 38, BIRMINGHAM

The demise of high streets also extended to concerns about the erosion of each city’s local character and charm. In the UK, particularly among Leavers, homogenization was a focus, with participants defining globalization as the “breakdown of individuality” and “everywhere being the same.” Once again, the blame for this perceived homogenization was placed on multinational corporations. One man from London pithily described it as “Starbucks [and] McDonald’s [causing] every high street [to] look the same.”

In addition to the decline of high streets, participants in the UK lamented the closure of local pubs and youth clubs. These places were viewed as key community-building institutions, and their loss was seen as a death knell of social cohesion in their area, ushered in by changing business and industry. Groups described local pubs as gathering spaces for members of the community to build relationships and get to know each other, discussing how their closure meant people did not bond anymore. Youth clubs were also seen as pillars of communities, and groups suggested that their demise has pushed young people onto the streets to cause mischief and engage in criminal activity.

“They’re putting loads of money into [the retail park] but [on] the high street, everything’s closing down …” “That’s right, yes, unless it’s a charity shop [thrift store] or a coffee shop …” “Or a Gregg’s [a major UK bakery chain].” Exchange among woman, 32; man, 52; and man, 34, all of Birmingham

In the U.S., similar tropes emerged. People focused on how there were limited employment opportunities, unfair competition between small businesses and chain retail stores, and large companies threatening the character of their neighborhood. But in the U.S., these complaints focused less on specific commercial districts – like a main street – and extended to the community more broadly.

While the general theme of decline was common across the two countries, an alternate narrative of being swept up by global currents of change also emerged. This sense was palpable across several focus groups in Seattle. All groups there agreed that local investments by multinational corporations like Amazon, Microsoft, Boeing and Starbucks had led to a major influx of people and money, which had put upward pressure on the cost of living in the city.

Seattle focus groups composed of Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders and of White Democrats shared stories about gentrified neighborhoods, highlighting how housing had become less affordable and how the city’s growth had eroded its culture and character. Groups composed of White Democrats and White independents focused on increased homelessness due to the rising cost of housing. In groups made up of White independents and Republicans, people highlighted how the city’s growth has overwhelmed public services and how local governments have not dealt appropriately with the influx of people and money into the city.

Across the Atlantic, the narrative of being swept up by globalization was most evident among focus groups in London. Participants noted how the city’s position as an international hub, or “magnet,” affects daily life for Londoners. Examples of negative impacts included increases in traffic, crime and housing costs, plus constant construction. Some mentioned that, paradoxically, all of this growth actually meant fewer employment and housing opportunities for local residents. One woman, for instance, faulted “overseas investors” looking to profit off of the city’s housing shortage with the construction of luxury flats that sit vacant when the city was in need of affordable housing.

Although they experienced globalization differently, groups who felt swept up pointed to some of the same outcomes as those left behind, such as the rising cost of housing, declining home ownership and the disintegration of social ties and community. Similar stories also surfaced with respect to increases in local homelessness, drug abuse and crime.

Both those swept up and those left behind saw others benefiting from the very forces of globalization they found so disruptive and disorienting. When probed to say more about who or what has benefited from globalization, American participants regularly suggested that it was “the wealthy,” “the 1%” or “powerful people.” Similarly, participants in the UK described beneficiaries as “white-collar,” including business owners, heads of corporations and generally those in positions of power.

The perception of globalization creating “winners” and “losers” was based on local stories. In Seattle, Houston and London, local residents who worked in sectors such as technology and health care were seen as more capable of earning good wages and keeping up with the rising cost of living. By contrast, people in other sectors were described as bringing home meager wages and struggling to achieve financial stability.

Both those who felt swept up and those left behind agreed that the wealthy were largely immune from the effects of globalization. In London, one 26-year-old Conservative “leave” voter noted that the wealthy “don’t necessarily feel the impact of that population boom” in his city because they do not have to go to overcrowded schools and generally do not rely on the public services like social housing, health care, and other public provisions that have been overburdened in the UK.

Whether feeling swept away or left behind, focus group participants in both the U.S. and UK punctuated their stories about local change with a profound sense of loss – loss of financial security, loss of employment opportunities, loss of social solidarity. And while participants may not have often used the precise term “globalization,” they nevertheless laid the blame for their losses at the feet of global actors, especially multinational corporations.

Between tolerance and tradition: Globalization, culture change and national identity

Unlike the consistent picture of globalization’s negative impact on local communities, focus group participants in the U.S. and UK differed on whether globalization was a boon or bane for their respective countries. Yet even those who, as a matter of principle, welcomed immigration and cultural diversity ultimately admitted to feeling out of place in their own country. But in their case it tended to be related to concerns about the forces they perceived as “anti-global” in their country – people who insisted on protectionist or exclusionary agendas under the banners “America first” and “Take back control.” Ironically, both positive and negative narratives of globalization’s national-level impact left participants feeling alienated and adrift.

Participants see and feel globalization changing what it means to be British or American because of the flow of people, cultures and ideas. Regardless of political orientation, most focus groups began their discussion of what it means to be British or American by emphasizing multiculturalism and tolerance. They also overwhelmingly highlighted the benefits of globalization in terms of the diversity of options available in their country: available goods, cuisines, cultural offerings and the like. Even one man who voted “leave” and highlighted his general disapproval of immigration noted that he “likes [his] curries,” referencing the abundant Indian and Pakistani food offerings in his community.

“You can eat pho … for breakfast. You can have some pupusas later on. You can have some tacos later on. You can have barbecue. You could have crayfish. … The music … you get to experience different cultures … I mean, you can’t beat that.” MAN, 21, HOUSTON

But, particularly for those in groups composed of “leave” voters and Republicans, the limits of this comfort with globalization and multiculturalism came when there was a corresponding sense that these cultures were changing British or American culture, or immigrants and foreigners were benefiting at the expense of locals. In the UK, one older woman from Birmingham summed up the sense that the national culture is changing, declaring, “[Our] Britishness is being diluted because of all the other cultures coming in here. … If there was a fair ratio of people that the country could cope with and it wasn’t draining all of our resources, then it’s fine. … I think it’s nice to experience other cultures and share … but now it’s like that blend has taken away the Britishness.”

Those who were less comfortable with immigration tended to couch their discomfort in discussions of differing “values” or parenting strategies. For example, people highlighted wanting to be around people who pay their fair share and are morally upstanding, qualities they often attributed to themselves while contrasting themselves with people from other cultures.

One woman in Birmingham shared that she thought Pakistani people were too different from other Britons because they “eat with their hands” and suggested that immigrants don’t believe in British values so they should “go back home.” In some “leave”-voting groups in the UK, when prompted, participants explicitly said they wanted to live in predominantly White, British areas, claiming that people from other cultures could not meet their standards for morality and that people naturally preferred segregated neighborhoods.

People also highlighted the way immigration could be alienating, changing how it felt to be “British” in public. For example, one older White “leave”-voting woman in London said she finds it “awful” to get onto the tube and hear people speaking myriad languages, describing it as a “very hostile environment” for her. In Birmingham, another “leave”-voting woman told an extended story about her experience giving birth in a hospital and having no midwives who spoke English, which made her feel like a minority and caused her to feel unsafe and un-cared for.

“ We can trade between countries; the shop down the street from me is mostly Polish but also sells things from Spain and Cyprus, and sometimes it’s nice to go in there and buy food from another country that you wouldn’t necessarily get elsewhere.” Woman, 32, Birmingham

Ideologically right-leaning groups especially stressed that traditional culture – which some equated with Christianity – was relegated to second-class status in the country. People highlighted perceived double standards, such as schools accommodating other religions – teaching about Diwali or banning sausage rolls – but forcing the annual winter holiday celebrations to be just that, and not Christmas parties.

In the workplace context, one older man in Birmingham suggested he would have difficulty getting time off to go to a christening but that there are prayer rooms for Muslims to take regular breaks. Other cultural practices such as flying the St. George’s Cross to express English identity were seen as impossible for fear of offending others, or worse, for fear of being labeled a racist by others in the community.

In the U.S., too, participants highlighted the times at which accommodations for immigrants or perceived foreigners limited options for people seen as deserving natives. For example, in Houston, participants in the Republican group balked at the number of jobs in their area requiring bilingual applicants, saying that it gives an unfair leg up to Hispanic job seekers. Some felt this was part of a broader trend of disadvantaging White Americans and highlighted the ways in which restricting immigration could lead to more resources for “locals.” A man in Seattle exemplified this sentiment, saying, “Immigrants have more rights than we do” and get more benefits. He added that he “resents [his] tax dollars paying for someone who’s not feeding into the tax system, whether they are Americans or illegal.” In other instances, immigrants, by their mere presence, were as seen as devaluing homes since, according to one woman in Pittsburgh, they have “eight households [living] in one house.”

“I think the British list that I thought of was … loose national project of making a multicultural, prosperous, liberal, strong nation, which punches way above its weight on the international scene … but it’s looking kind of shaky now, a bit wonky, because we don’t know who we are any more. I don’t, I’ve never felt less British. I’ve always had a strong British identity. … And [now] all I want to do is run, I want to get out of here. I don’t want to be part of this. It looks shambolic.” Man, 53, London

This sense that what it means to be American or British is changing today – and the corresponding alienation and loss – was not felt only by focus group participants who opposed global interconnectivity and multiculturalism. For those who were supportive of their nation-state’s integration into the global community, the Brexit vote in the UK and the 2016 presidential election in the U.S. presented similar feelings of loss and alienation in society, as well as a changing sense of what it means to be British or American today. While both elections were not solely focused on these themes, both events focused, at least in part, on inherently international questions: how to control immigration, how to secure borders, how to participate in international organizations, and whether to pursue “America first” policies or to “take back control” from the EU.

Whereas some focus group participants may have felt alienated because of a perceived sense that immigration is changing their culture, on the flip side, those who want their country to be part of the EU or to remain involved in the international community and welcome immigrants feel disaffected because of how those events have changed the way they view their nation-state and their place in it.

In the UK, for example, the Brexit referendum was regularly touted as a profoundly alienating moment, exposing people to a side of Britain they hadn’t seen before and highlighting the political divisions in the country. For people in “remain”-voting focus groups especially, it signaled to them that they are a minority in their country – in terms of their beliefs for some, and in terms of their ethnic identity for others.

Participants spoke more openly upon recognizing they shared points of view

This feeling created an interesting dynamic in some focus groups, as participants did not know how the groups were selected. Respondents often skirted around sensitive political or cultural issues, speaking in vague terms or euphemisms, until conversation had advanced to a point where they felt confident that many or most of the people in the room with them shared their viewpoints. In some instances, as this would happen, the moderator would even confirm for people that they were in a room of like-minded individuals on a particular issue (most regularly that they were Brexit “leave” voters). At that point, the tone of conversation would palpably shift and people would appear more relaxed when discussing sensitive topics.

As one man in Birmingham said, recalling the day after the referendum, “It was quite surreal … this doesn’t represent me … [Britain] doesn’t feel like home anymore.” One Black woman of African descent in Birmingham told a story about going to vote with her husband in the Brexit referendum in 2016, saying, “I think it’s the first time in a long time when I could feel the blatant racism in the room. We walked into the school where we were voting and everybody turned around to look at us.” Another “remain” voter of Bangladeshi descent in Newcastle said she had felt at home until Brexit, but she has now lost friends because Brexit “[brought] out the inner racist. … Personally, I feel my life’s completely changed since Brexit.” On the other hand, those who voted “leave” shared stories of being vilified by remainers as xenophobes or racists.

“ I used to think that we really believed what Emma Lazarus wrote in her poem, that’s on the base of the Statue of Liberty. And now it’s, ‘Give me your tired, your poor, as long as they’re White, Northern European.’ ” Woman, 70, Houston

In the U.S., too, especially in focus groups composed of Democrats, people highlighted that the 2016 election had shaken their belief in the core values of the country. As one man in Houston said, “I feel like we were more welcoming of immigrants … now it seems like there are people that don’t want certain immigrants … Brown [immigrants]. It’s always been like … ‘Come here, this is the American Dream’ … I feel like that’s really being squashed.” Some explicitly faulted President Trump for the change, saying he has inflamed things, “egging on” racism. A young Hispanic woman in Houston noted, “Once upon a time, there were people who were racist, but they kind of kept it behind closed doors. … But now it’s way up in the forefront … you see people just spewing hate at innocent folks because they heard someone speaking a different language in Taco Bell.”

The sense of not feeling at home in one’s country was also expressed by those who voted “leave” in the UK and for Donald Trump in the U.S. Leavers and Republicans alike discussed how the “out of control” levels of immigration and the accommodations immigrants receive may have created a deep sense of alienation in their own country and a corresponding sense that, if they share this opinion with others with different viewpoints, they will be castigated. For some, this has translated into lost friends or personal animosity, with people on both the political left and right offering examples of losing friends – or being unfriended on social media – because of different views over political candidates.

“ I’m fair skinned and my brothers are darker skinned … being out in public, people give them the once over … it’s disheartening for me … we didn’t have that problem a few years ago out in public. [Also,] at dinner with some acquaintances … they started talking crap about Latinos. I [said,] ‘You know, as a Mexican … I disagree with you,’ and he goes, ‘Oh, but you’re one of the good ones, so I wasn’t talking about you.’ – I feel like that statement wouldn’t have been made five years ago. ” Woman, 19, Houston

In both the UK and the U.S., participants also explained how they felt polarization has deepened in their country. One American noted that it’s currently “traumatic” to be American, saying, “I used to have an identity of what American meant and it’s devaluing.” Another described America as “tribal,” saying “There’s no compromise, no common sense. No listening to other people. Political tribes.”

“ It’s on the verge of civil war. Not a racial civil war. It’s a political civil war. ” Man, 51, Pittsburgh

While the changes participants saw in their countries and the perceived catalysts of those changes varied, nearly all participants said these shifts were causing them to feel disconnected from their national identity. For some, globalization in the form of immigration and multiculturalism had wrought too much change, to the point that they felt they could no longer recognize their country.  They noted that they couldn’t feel a connection with others under the mantle of being “British” or “American” because the culture had been eroded too much and that some people grouped under that label felt too different from them.

“We’ve lost our identity as a people. We’re fighting each other. Us and them. A house divided … on socioeconomic [status], race, gender, just pick something [and we’re divided].” Man, 58, Houston

For others, pivotal events marking a political shift away from the globalized world and toward a “country-first” national character alienated them from how they used to conceptualize and understand their countries. For these people, community and national identity meant welcoming people from elsewhere and blending cultures, foods and ideas.

Despite fundamental differences in how they characterize their countries, both groups of people were reticent to label themselves as “cosmopolitan.” Even those who supported the principles of a globally oriented world tended to describe “cosmopolitans” as elitists who were “out of touch” or were wealthy jet-setters, evoking images of a “Sex and the City” lifestyle. And even while globally oriented and nationally rooted people both were disillusioned with what it meant to be British or American today – albeit for different reasons – there was a discomfort with identifying as a “citizen of the world” or, as Theresa May evoked, a “ citizen of nowhere .”

Sovereignty, competition and community in a globalized world

As described above, disruptions linked to globalization have engendered profound feelings of loss and alienation at both a local and national level. In response, some focus group participants expressed support for “taking back control” – the slogan of the Brexit campaign – or putting “America first,” the oft-repeated slogan of the 2016 Trump campaign. For these participants, the international sphere is perceived as a space of competition, with a focus on the nation-state. In contrast, focus group members who expressed feeling alienated less by globalization, and more by nationalist rhetoric and policies, tended to highlight opportunities to create a sense of community at the international level. Those with the latter mindset emphasized the importance of cross-border interactions between people, cultures and countries and the ways nation-states can cooperate rather than compete.

In the course of the focus group discussions, participants observed that globalization extends beyond economic issues, such as trade, multinational corporations and open markets, to questions of governance, sovereignty and the connectivity made possible by new communication technology. Core to the discussion of globalization’s political implications was the role and influence of multinational or multilateral organizations such as the UN, the World Bank and – in the case of the UK – the EU. Particularly for participants who were less comfortable with globalization, these organizations were framed in terms of implications for the nation-state.

“[America] should stop being so dependent on [competitor countries] and should be more stern with them. But climate change and terrorism are global issues, and it takes a village to solve them. [The U.S. should] keep its friends close and its enemies closer.” Woman, 52, Seattle

In groups composed of Republicans and Conservatives in the U.S. and UK respectively, participants evoked the notion of sovereignty and their country’s right to self-determine if, how and with whom to interact on the world stage. Some in the U.S. claimed that organizations like the UN and the G7 were avenues for “global government” or other countries to assert power over the country and “try to tell everybody what to do.” Respondents in Republican groups stressed power discrepancies – highlighting the ways in which America has been taken advantage of by countries like China. For global skeptics in the U.S. focus groups, a recurrent theme was American leadership and preservation of the country’s self-interest, even in the context of multilateral cooperation. As one Seattle woman said, “America should be the leader” and “set an example.”

In the UK, history of empire colored views of nation’s place in the world

In the UK, the issue of history and empire was front and center in these discussions. Those who were least comfortable with globalization tended to harken back to the British Empire and to glorify the role of the nation-state historically. In contrast, those who tended to be more accepting of globalization were more likely to suggest that reconceptualizing history – and the UK’s role internationally – was merited. For example, these participants noted that the UK needed to think of itself less as a powerful, historic maritime power and more as part of a global community. As one Scottish participant noted, “We think we are more important in the world than what we probably actually are. We are a tiny island. We seem to be told that we are this global superpower all the time, but actually our power is getting less and less, and I think people need to be aware of it and start being a bit more realistic about what’s going to happen in the future.”

A different story emerged among “remain” groups in the UK. Here, participants observed that their country’s current standing in the G7 and other organizations owed to a history of international influence that had placed the UK high up in the “global pecking order.” The idea of competition among nation-states was pervasive, with participants using sporting analogies to describe how the UK today could “punch above its weight” on the world stage or be “one of the big players” globally.

In both countries, participants discussed competition between nation-states in terms of economic, as well as political influence. Global trade was often framed as a zero-sum game. Trade was about one’s own country benefiting at the expense of other states. One man in Pittsburgh commented that the U.S. risked becoming “poor” if it disengaged from global trade and could no longer “manipulate other countries to get their resources.”

“ I used to work for a company [that bought rubber] manufactured locally. And then it worked out it was a pence cheaper to get [the rubber] in China, so it all went out to China … the knock-on effect of one of those plants shutting down and the guys that supply their raw materials and everything. ” Man, 48, Newcastle

Especially in the American focus groups, there was a heavy emphasis on outsourcing, with people mentioning changes such as less desirable jobs moving abroad and the growth of overseas call centers. Participants fixated on how the U.S. was “losing” this zero-sum game to countries like China or India – countries that “won” by virtue of manipulating currency or flouting environmental regulations. This idea also materialized in discussions about trade agreements such as the North American Free Trade Agreement (which has since been replaced by the United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement).

“ If you tell a company in America, ‘Hey, you can move your manufacturing wherever, and we won’t charge you for it’ … well of course they’re going to do it. Because in other countries, they can manufacture whatever, and then they can just dump their waste into the river because they don’t have the environmental controls that we have. ” Man, 53, Pittsburgh

But not everyone saw the international arena as one of nation-states in competition. Participants also talked about the possibility – and importance – of countries “working together to solve problems that the entire world faces.” In focus groups on both sides of the Atlantic, people emphasized that their country was often ill-equipped to independently tackle large-scale issues like climate change or terrorism. Others discussed how solving complex issues was not possible for one country to do on its own without drawing on the resources and expertise of other countries. Even skeptics of globalization acknowledged that cooperation, at least to some extent, was necessary to solve complex issues.

“ We need to be educating and sharing. … Certain countries have gotten better expertise and that kind of thing in certain fields, and they can share knowledge. ” Man, 46, Birmingham

In some cases, international cooperation was described as a responsibility. For example, one Labour-supporting “remain” woman in Birmingham noted that “every person is responsible for climate change,” regardless of where they live. The same was also true when it came to issues like public health (though these focus groups took place before the global outbreak of COVID-19).

“ We can’t solve [international problems] on our own, anyway. ” Man, 68, SEATTLE

Participants who saw globalization as an opportunity, as opposed to a threat, also talked about personal forms of international community made possible by advances in communication technology. For some, this was portrayed as an alternative to feelings of local or national solidarity weakened by global forces. The speed and pervasiveness of social networks was described as enabling communication “instantly across the world” and creating the possibility of a “worldwide community” that can provide “support when something happens all over the world.”

“ [Globalization] could only be a good thing … sharing knowledge instead of, like, ‘This is our information, and this is their information.’ ” Woman, 47, Pittsburgh

Others spoke about even more personal forms of international community, such as a man in Seattle who shared that, thanks to online connections, he had found a small but global group of people who had gone through the same jaw surgery that he had. Another man in Houston shared how, as a hiring manager, he couldn’t find qualified Americans to fill certain roles, so he has had to reach out to people overseas. For participants like these, technology and other products of globalization were viewed as a means to forge connections or bonds with people beyond their local and national communities.

Participants also stressed the ways in which people and ideas could flow, creating webs of interconnectivity and interaction that weren’t bounded by national borders. They pointed to the role of technology in education as providing “long-distance learning for the world.” One woman in Houston noted, “It’s no longer about one nation, it’s the entire … everything impacts everything else,” while another Houston woman stressed that globalization involves “recognizing that we are all passengers on spaceship earth … [and] share a common interest.” Core to this discussion was the sense that globalization involved the evolution of an “open marketplace for the world,” with “flattening borders” that reduced countries to mere “passport designations” or destinations for Amazon deliveries.

“ I think because of the internet, we have to start looking at ourselves as part of the planet earth, not Americans, not Italians, not Mexicans, whatever it is, we’re coming to the place where we’re going to have to be earthlings. ” Woman, 72, Seattle

While these focus groups were diverse and stretched across the U.S. and UK, their participants largely viewed globalization through one of two lenses: fostering an arena of international rivalry and competition, or creating the possibility of new cross-border communities. Among the former group, increased international connections have meant greater insecurity and threats to their country’s ability to maintain power and influence. For the latter group, globalization has come with perceived opportunities, and even obligations, to connect with others, find common cause and tackle global problems.

Disruptive … but inevitable?

Across the focus groups, participants in the U.S. and UK consistently agreed on one thing: Their communities, their countries and their worlds are changing. While the term “globalization” did not always roll off their tongues, participants concurred that the catalyst for change was an increasingly interconnected world in which multinational corporations, foreign trade and multilateral organizations had become important factors shaping local and national identities.

Whether people described being swept up by influxes of money and people, or left behind as jobs and investment moved elsewhere, the experience of globalization was often described in terms of “loss” and no longer feeling at home in one’s community or country. In some instances, these feelings led participants to sympathize with nationalist appeals to “take back control” or put “America first.” Others were less invested in defending local and national identities; they saw opportunity in the form of new social ties beyond their immediate locales and new international forms of solidarity, abetted by travel, digital connectivity and a sense of shared priorities across national borders.

Above all, the general sense among focus group participants is that no matter one’s politics, location, career or position in life, globalization is here to stay. Participants generally agreed that change at the local and national levels will continue, driven by increased international connectivity. Industries will continue to shift, societies will continue to wrestle with issues of multiculturalism, and technology will continue to alter the pace and pattern of cross-border ties and identity.

Methodological note

This cross-national, comparative qualitative research project was designed to explore more fully how local context and national identity shape opinions about globalization. Analysis is based on the 26 focus groups we conducted across the U.S. and UK in the fall of 2019 and more information about the groups and analysis can be found here and here .  

Acknowledgments

This report was made possible by The Pew Charitable Trusts. Pew Research Center is a subsidiary of The Pew Charitable Trusts, its primary funder. This report is a collaborative effort based on the input and analysis of a number of individuals and experts at Pew Research Center. 

• The Birmingham focus groups took place in the West Midlands, the Newcastle groups took place in the North East and the Edinburgh groups took place in Scotland. The UK Office of National Statistics treats London as an independent region. ↩

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The pros and cons of globalization.

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A story in the Washington Post said “20 years ago globalization was pitched as a strategy that would raise all boats in poor and rich countries alike. In the U.S. and Europe consumers would have their pick of inexpensive items made by people thousands of miles away whose pay was much lower than theirs. And in time trade barriers would drop to support even more multinationals expansion and economic gains while geo political cooperation would flourish.”

There is no question that globalization has been a good thing for many developing countries who now have access to our markets and can export cheap goods. Globalization has also been good for Multi-national corporations and Wall Street. But globalization has not been good for working people (blue or white collar) and has led to the continuing deindustrialization of America.

Globalization is a complicated issue. It is necessary to evaluate the pros and cons before drawing any conclusions.

Supporters of globalization argue that it has the potential to make this world a better place to live in and solve some of the deep-seated problems like unemployment and poverty.

1. Free trade is supposed to reduce barriers such as tariffs, value added taxes, subsidies, and other barriers between nations. This is not true. There are still many barriers to free trade. The Washington Post story says “the problem is that the big G20 countries added more than 1,200 restrictive export and import measures since 2008

2. The proponents say globalization represents free trade which promotes global economic growth; creates jobs, makes companies more competitive, and lowers prices for consumers.

3. Competition between countries is supposed to drive prices down. In many cases this is not working because countries manipulate their currency to get a price advantage.

4. It also provides poor countries, through infusions of foreign capital and technology, with the chance to develop economically and by spreading prosperity, creates the conditions in which democracy and respect for human rights may flourish. This is an ethereal goal which hasn’t been achieved in most countries

5. According to supporters globalization and democracy should go hand in hand. It should be pure business with no colonialist designs.

6. There is now a worldwide market for companies and consumers who have access to products of different countries. True

7. Gradually there is a world power that is being created instead of compartmentalized power sectors. Politics is merging and decisions that are being taken are actually beneficial for people all over the world. This is simply a romanticized view of what is actually happening. True

8. There is more influx of information between two countries, which do not have anything in common between them. True

9. There is cultural intermingling and each country is learning more about other cultures. True

10. Since we share financial interests, corporations and governments are trying to sort out ecological problems for each other. – True, they are talking more than trying.

11. Socially we have become more open and tolerant towards each other and people who live in the other part of the world are not considered aliens. True in many cases.

12. Most people see speedy travel, mass communications and quick dissemination of information through the Internet as benefits of globalization. True

13. Labor can move from country to country to market their skills. True, but this can cause problems with the existing labor and downward pressure on wages.

14. Sharing technology with developing nations will help them progress. True for small countries but stealing our technologies and IP have become a big problem with our larger competitors like China.

15. Transnational companies investing in installing plants in other countries provide employment for the people in those countries often getting them out of poverty. True

16. Globalization has given countries the ability to agree to free trade agreements like NAFTA, South Korea Korus, and The TPP. True but these agreements have cost the U.S. many jobs and always increase our trade deficit

• The general complaint about globalization is that it has made the rich richer while making the non-rich poorer. “It is wonderful for managers, owners and investors, but hell on workers and nature.”

• Globalization is supposed to be about free trade where all barriers are eliminated but there are still many barriers. For instance161 countries have value added taxes (VATs) on imports which are as high as 21.6% in Europe. The U.S. does not have VAT.

• The biggest problem for developed countries is that jobs are lost and transferred to lower cost countries.” According to conservative estimates by Robert Scott of the Economic Policy Institute, granting China most favored nation status drained away 3.2 million jobs, including 2.4 million manufacturing jobs. He pegs the net losses due to our trade deficit with Japan ($78.3 billion in 2013) at 896,000 jobs, as well as an additional 682,900 jobs from the Mexico –U.S. trade-deficit run-up from 1994 through 2010.”

• Workers in developed countries like the US face pay-cut demands from employers who threaten to export jobs. This has created a culture of fear for many middle class workers who have little leverage in this global game

• Large multi-national corporations have the ability to exploit tax havens in other countries to avoid paying taxes.

• Multinational corporations are accused of social injustice, unfair working conditions (including slave labor wages, living and working conditions), as well as lack of concern for environment, mismanagement of natural resources, and ecological damage.

• Multinational corporations, which were previously restricted to commercial activities, are increasingly influencing political decisions. Many think there is a threat of corporations ruling the world because they are gaining power, due to globalization.

• Building products overseas in countries like China puts our technologies at risk of being copied or stolen, which is in fact happening rapidly

• The anti-globalists also claim that globalization is not working for the majority of the world. “During the most recent period of rapid growth in global trade and investment, 1960 to 1998, inequality worsened both internationally and within countries. The UN Development Program reports that the richest 20 percent of the world's population consume 86 percent of the world's resources while the poorest 80 percent consume just 14 percent. “

• Some experts think that globalization is also leading to the incursion of communicable diseases. Deadly diseases like HIV/AIDS are being spread by travelers to the remotest corners of the globe.

• Globalization has led to exploitation of labor. Prisoners and child workers are used to work in inhumane conditions. Safety standards are ignored to produce cheap goods. There is also an increase in human trafficking.

• Social welfare schemes or “safety nets” are under great pressure in developed countries because of deficits, job losses, and other economic ramifications of globalization.

Globalization is an economic tsunami that is sweeping the planet. We can’t stop it but there are many things we can do to slow it down and make it more equitable.

What is missing?

Leadership – We need politicians who are willing to confront the cheaters. One of our biggest problems is that 7 of our trading partners manipulate their currencies to gain unfair price advantage which increases their exports and decreases their imports. This is illegal under WTO rules so there is a sound legal basis to put some kind of tax on their exports until they quit cheating.

Balanced Trade – Most of our trading partners can balance their trade budgets and even run a surplus. We have not made any effort to balance our trade budget and have run a deficit for more than 30 years resulting in an $11 trillion deficit. The trade deficit is the single biggest job killer in our economy, particularly manufacturing jobs. We need the government to develop a plan to begin to balance our trade deficit even though this is not a political priority in either party.

Trade Agreements – Both the NAFTA and the South Korean Korus trade agreements might have been good for Wall Street and the multi-national corporations but they eliminated jobs in America and expanded our trade deficit. The upcoming Trans Pacific Trade Agreement will do the same thing and Congress should not fast track this bad agreement for a dozen reasons.

Enforcing the rules – China ignores trade rules and WTO laws with reckless abandon. Besides currency manipulation they subsidize their state owned companies to target our markets, and provide funding to their state owned companies that dump their products in America. They also steal our technologies, sell counterfeit versions of our products, and impose tariffs and other barriers anytime they want - as we do nothing to stop them. China does not deserve to be on our most favored nation list and we need to tax their exports to us until they stop these illegal activities.

What is good for third world countries, like Kenya, or countries with tremendous growth, like China, has not been good for American workers. Globalization is deindustrializing America as we continue to outsource both manufacturing blue collar and white collar jobs. Supporters of globalization have made the case that it is good because it has brought low priced imported goods, but they have not matched the decline of wages in the middle class and will not offset the loss of many family wage jobs

Globalization is like being overwhelmed by a snow avalanche. You can’t stop it – you can only swim in the snow and hope to stay on top. I would like to make the argument that the US should try a lot harder to swim in the snow and stay on top. We can’t stop globalization but there are many policies and strategies we can use to make it more equitable. We can enforce the trade laws, force the competition to play by the same rules, and stop giving our competitors the tools (technology and R& D) to ultimately win the global war.

Mike Collins is the author of Saving American Manufacturing. His website is www.mpcmgt.com.

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Globalisation: Meaning, Arguments for and Against

Let us make an in-depth study of the Globalisation:- 1. Meaning of Globalisation 2. Arguments in Favour of Globalisation 3. Arguments Against Globalisation.

Meaning of Globalisation:

Globalisation is a process of increasing integration and growing economic ‘interdependence’ of countries worldwide.

It refers to “the expansion of economic activities across political boundaries of nation states.”

Its important attribute is its increasing degree of openness of domestic economies.

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It is associated not only with the increasing cross-border movement of goods and services, capital and technology, information and people but also with an organisation of economic activities which straddles national boundaries. Its three broad dimensions are international trade, international investment, and international finance.

Thus, globalisation brings about changes through these three channels that impart dynamism in the economy.

First is the export earnings. Through liberalisation of tariff and trade, export-oriented industries are required to be developed.

Second is the foreign capital flow, mainly via multinational corporations (MNCs) that bring technology.

Third is the deregulation of financial sector so that cross border mobility of resources gets momentum. In addition, trade policy, exchange rate policy, industrial policy, etc. are all relaxed. As the process of globalisation strengthens, all producers depend on global networks which establish links from the stage of raw materials to the final stage of delivery and marketing.

Globalisation also refers to the adoption of market-friendly approach, thereby making the economy more open and competitive. It is to be kept in mind that globalisation does not remove planning or state authority in regulation and control of the economy.

Arguments in Favour of Globalisation:

At the outset, one must say that globalisation is a controversial issue because it impinges both gains and pains. We will first put forward the arguments favouring globalisation.

i. Globalisation is expected to promote efficiency, productivity and, hence, higher economic growth rate. In a controlled and regulated economy, there is no inducement to the industries to become efficient and self-reliant as these are protected from foreign competition through import restrictions and from domestic competition through industrial licensing. Globalisation has one pillar of liberalisation. Liberalisation and the market principles improve the allocative efficiency of resources. This will increase export earnings, allow the inflow of foreign capital and technology. Industries and farm sector, banking and financial sectors are then exposed to international competition. Competition enhances efficiency, productivity and ultimately a better economic growth rate is likely to be achieved.

ii. As far as consumers are concerned, quality goods at the right price will be delivered. This helps to bring down prices. Quality improvement and price reduction will then be enjoyed.

iii. Foreign capital is attracted. It augurs the advent of multinational enterprises (MNEs) who bring modern up-to-date technology in less developed countries. Not only MNCs bring with them modern technology but also it brings investment funds, organisational structure, managerial culture, distribution network, etc. All these create income and employment in the country.

Arguments Against Globalisation:

Critics argue that globalisation cannot make any dent on poverty reduction, employment generation, export promotion, foreign direct investment and growth rates of the economy. Critics perceive threat of the global market manifested in terms of falling rate of growth, industrial recession especially in America and some major industrial countries and poor rate of growth of export.

i. It is feared that globalisation will promote fierce and unhealthy competition. Instead of competition and cooperation, one may argue that MNCs will swallow the domestic producers of poor backward countries overtime. Ultimately, this will cause concentration of economic and political power into the hands of the foreign business enterprises.

ii. Merely opening up the domestic economy without reaching out to foreign markets or helping industries to meet the global challenges has limited the benefits of globalisation without reducing its costs.

iii. The apparent increase in export earnings of the less developed countries as a consequence of globalisation is not expected to provide great benefits, particularly those in the lower income brackets. Further, modern technologies used by the MNCs have the potentiality of making the unemployment situation worse.

This widens inequalities in the distribution of income and wealth. In India, food, employment and health scenarios have been adversely affected for the poor people as a consequence of new economic policy reforms introduced in the 1990s. Above all, integration of the domestic economy into the world economy provides larger benefits to the developed countries than to the LDCs.

iv. Foreign capital is not interested in producing goods that an underdeveloped country requires. Globalisation then distorts production structure of an economy.

Thus, the policy of globalisation should be pursued with caution since there is no escape from globalisation in today’s interconnected and interdependent world. It is necessary that economies must open up much more. But, this should be done much more critically. Globalisa­tion is not the panacea for all the ills from which an economy suffers. There are other measures too that can hardly be bypassed to achieve a higher growth rate.

Related Articles:

• Benefits of Liberalisation and Globalisation of Indian Economy
• Ingredients of Globalisation of Indian Economy
• Arguments for and Against Free Trade | Trade Policy
• Impact of Globalisation on Indian Economy

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Globalization: Two Sides of The Arguments Both for and Against

• Categories: Controversial Issue Globalization

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Published: Jun 20, 2019

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