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Notes On Globalization A Basic Text (Ritzer 2015)

Globalization refers to the increasing interdependence of the world's economies, cultures, and populations due to flows of goods, services, technology, investment, people, and information across borders. It represents a fundamental shift from modernity to a global age characterized by greater integration and mobility. Processes of globalization can be understood through metaphors of solids, liquids, and gases - as barriers to movement have broken down over time, the world has become more "liquid" and flows of people and information move more easily across borders. However, globalization is also shaped by structures that can both enable and restrict these flows.

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129 views

Notes On Globalization A Basic Text (Ritzer 2015)

Globalization refers to the increasing interdependence of the world's economies, cultures, and populations due to flows of goods, services, technology, investment, people, and information across borders. It represents a fundamental shift from modernity to a global age characterized by greater integration and mobility. Processes of globalization can be understood through metaphors of solids, liquids, and gases - as barriers to movement have broken down over time, the world has become more "liquid" and flows of people and information move more easily across borders. However, globalization is also shaped by structures that can both enable and restrict these flows.

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Demonise Blood
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© © All Rights Reserved
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Notes on

Globalization: A Basic Text


Ritzer 2015

“In the era of globalization, shared humanity face[s] the most fateful of the many fateful steps”

Globalization

- The most important change in human history.


- Refers to the increasing interdependence of the world's economies, cultures, and populations
because of cross-border trade in goods and services, technology, and flows of investment,
people, and information.
- Trans planetary process or set of processes involving increasing liquidity and the growing
multidirectional flows of people, objects, places, and information as well as the structures
they encounter and create that are barriers to, or expedite, those flows.

Global Age
- defined by the replacement of modernity with globalization. And this entails a
fundamental shift in the basis of activity and social structure for both communities and
individuals.

Globalization

Greater integration Reduce level of integration


(When things flow easily) (When structures block flows)
“…Is globalization a reality?”

 According to Globalists, there is such a thing as globalization, and it encompasses virtually


the entirety of the globe.
 According to Skeptics, there is no such thing as globalization because vast portions of the
globe, and a significant portion of the world’s population, are wholly, or in significant part,
outside of, and even actively excluded, from the processes generally associated with it.

The Metaphors of Solid, Liquid and Gas

(The utilization of such metaphors is intended to provide the reader with a more vivid
understanding of the global age and how it differs from previous epochs)

SOLIDS

- Solidity describes a world in which barriers exist and are erected to prevent the free
movement of all sorts of thing. (Great Wall of China etc.)

People, things, information, and places “harden” over time

They have limited mobility

People either did not go anywhere

Since people did not move very far, neither did information.

- solid natural features (mountains, rivers, and oceans) made it impossible for people and
things to enter or exit.
- In here, objects are used where they are produced
- New forms of solidity are demanded as a result of increased fluidity.
LIQUIDS AND GASSES

- Liquidity: Increasing ease of movement of people, things, information, and places in the
global age.
- The spatial and temporal aspects of globalization are in continuous flux.

The flow of people, things,


Solid has tended to “melt” and
information, and places “liquified”
become increasingly liquid
over time

Liquid evaporates into gas Process continues

- Gaseousness: Hyper-mobility of people, things, information, and places in the global age
- Faster spread of information, available virtually instantly around the world (satellites)

Flows - Movement of people, things, information, and places due, in part, to the increasing
porosity of global barriers.

 Interconnected flows: Global flows that interconnect at various points and times.
 Multidirectional flows: All sorts of things flowing in every conceivable direction among
many points in the world.
 Conflicting flows: Trans planetary processes that conflict with one another (and with
much else).
 Reverse flows: Processes which, while flowing in one direction, act back on their source
(boomerang effect)

Heavy Light Weightlessness


difficulty in moving easier to move moves far more easily
(Producers are also (Advancement in (internet)
consumers) technology)

Economic globalization: Growing economic linkages at the global level.

Structures: Encompassing sets of processes that may either impede or block flows or serve
to expedite and channel them.

Material Structures:
- Heavy Structures That Expedite Flows:

 Routes Or Path
 Intercontinental Airlines
 Free-Trade Zones
 Export and Imports
 Formal and Informal “Bridges”
 Networks
 Social Structures

-Heavy Structures That Hinder Flows:


 Trade Agreements
 Regulatory Agencies
 Borders
 Customs Barriers
 Standards

Subtler Structural Barriers:

 Operations of the International Monetary Fund (IMF)


 World Trade Organization (WTO)
 World Bank

CONCERNS ABOUT FLOWS AND STRUCTURES:

 Extensity of the global flows


 Intensity of the global flows
 Velocity of global flow
 Impact propensity of global flows

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