Download Globalization - University of San Diego

Globalization
Some More Questions
Is globalization inevitable?
Does globalization ultimately help or hurt people?
Does globalization make the world more diverse or more
the same?
Does globalization lead to culture-sharing or cultural
imperialism?
Does globalization lead to an increase or decrease in
violent conflicts?
Is globalization ultimately good or bad for the
environment?
Does globalization increase or decrease instances of
environmental injustice?
Is globalization sustainable?
A Popular Literary
Image of Globalization
Samuel Huntington
The Clash of Civilizations
and the Remaking of World Order
(1993, 1998)
The “Civilizations”
Another Popular
Literary Image of Globalization
Benjamin Barber
Jihad vs. McWorld:
How Globalism and Tribalism
are Reshaping the World
(1995)
And Two Last Popular
Literary Images of Globalization
Thomas Friedman
The Lexus and the Olive Tree:
Understanding Globalization
(2000)
The World is Flat:
A Brief History of the
Twenty-first Century
(2005)
Some Responses to Globalization in Terms
of Nation-States
and International Economic Integration
Skeptics: Globalization has not significantly
reduced the regulative and redistributive
capacities of nation-states. Nation-states can
adequately respond to globalization.
Deregulators or Hyperglobalists: Globalization
has reduced the regulative and redistributive
capacities of nation-states. This is a beneficial,
efficient, and overall good thing, and
globalization should be encouraged.
Some More Responses to Globalization
Reversers: Globalization is constraining the
public policy making abilities of nation-states
and other political actors, and this is
undesirable. Globalization should be slowed
down or reversed.
Internationalists or Transformationalists:
Globalization is constraining the public policy
making abilities of nation-states and other
political actors. To deal with the bad
consequences of this, international systems of
effective governance should be developed.
“Assessing Global Poverty and Inequality:
Income, Resources, and Capabilities”
Ingrid Robeyns
Scholars and Politicians on the Political
Right, and Mainstream Economists:
There are fewer people living in poverty today than there
were in the past ten or twenty years!
Inequality between the poor and the rich countries is
decreasing!
People in poor countries benefit from economic
globalization!
People in poor countries have become better off thanks
to the policies of the World Trade Organization, the
World Bank, and the International Monetary Fund!
Scholars, Politicians,
and Social Activists on the Political Left:
There are more people living in poverty today than there
were in the past ten or twenty years!
Inequality between the poor and the rich countries is
increasing!
People in poor countries are harmed by economic
globalization!
People in poor countries have become worse off thanks
to the policies of the World Trade Organization, the
World Bank, and the International Monetary Fund!
So what is the real story?
Robeyns:
Different evaluative approaches used to assess well-being,
poverty, and inequality give different answers to these
kinds of questions.
1. Income Measures
2. Classifying Resources
3. Functionings and Capabilities
Income Measures from the World Bank
The World Bank says that poverty is decreasing in the world.
http://devdata.worldbank.org/wdi2006/contents/cover.htm
But how is poverty defined?
The most often cited measure is someone who lives on $1 (U.S.) or
less a day.
This is equivalent to the purchasing-power parity of $1.08 in the U.S. in
1993.
Classifying Resources I: GDP and GNP
Human development traditionally is based on economic growth in
monetary outcome terms for nation-states:
1. Gross Domestic Product (GDP): A monetary measure of the value
of goods and services, for final consumption or investment,
produced by a national economy over the course of a year.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_GDP_(nominal)
2. Gross National Product (GNP): Start with GDP. Then add income
that accrues to domestic residents from investments abroad.
Then deduct income earned in the domestic economy which is
owned by people abroad.
Classifying Resources II:
Rawlsian Social Primary Goods
Recall John Rawls’ theory of distributive justice.
People in the original position (POPs) behind a veil of ignorance know
nothing about who they are. They do know, however, that
regardless of who they turn out to be, they will want social primary
goods, including income, wealth, liberties, opportunities, and the
social basis of self-respect.
To determine these goods, we could track and compare:
1. Individual disposable income within a given state.
2. Basic rights guaranteed by a given state.
3. What kinds of social, political, and economic opportunities are
available to individual people within a given state.
4. Whether or not people feel there exists a social basis for
self-respect within their given state.
Human Development Reports (HDRs)
Developed by the United Nations Development Program
in the 1990s as an alternative to simple GDP and GNP to
measure human well-being.
Theoretically linked to capabilities approaches to justice.
In addition to goods and services, an HDR is designed to
capture peoples’ opportunities, choices, valued ways of
living, and flourishing.
Based on an aggregate of data:
http://hdr.undp.org/hdr2006/statistics/indicators/
Capabilities Approaches
These are theoretically linked to HDRs, but they might allow us to move
beyond welfare comparisons and actually compare people’s lives.
Central insight: Human development concerns not just what people have
(such as resources and money) but, more importantly, what people actively
can do with their lives.
Amartya Sen’s approach is based on the idea that expanding peoples’
freedoms is both the principal means of development and the primary end
of development.
Martha Nussbaum’s approach is based on the idea that there are core
human capabilities that are central in human lives and that distinctively
make us human.
These approaches support the creation of social, political, economic, legal,
and moral conditions for people to develop and exercise their capabilities.
Amartya Sen: “Development as Freedom”
What justice ought to “distribute”:
1. Elementary functions: “doings” and
“beings” such as having access to
adequate food and shelter that can be secured by
personal liberty, income, and wealth.
2. Complex functions: “doings” and “beings” such as
having self-respect and being able to take part in
political communities that depend on factors
independent of possessing resources.
Some Aspects of Sen’s Approach
Rather than an exclusive focus on economic
indicators, focuses also on the range and quality of
valued options of people’s choices.
To examine a person’s capabilities, normatively rank:
1. A set of life paths that person could follow.
2. How that person actually lives.
3. How satisfied that person feels
4. The goods/commodities that person uses.
Martha Nussbaum: “Capabilities Approach”
Develops an open and revisable threshold list of central human
capabilities that all people ought to be able to exercise.
This list can be used for public planning purposes by governments
and other political entities. The goal would be to develop legal,
political, and social institutions and procedures that create
conditions in which people can develop and exercise their
capabilities.
List of Central Human Capabilities
to be “distributed.”
1. Life: being able to live a normal human life span.
2. Bodily Health: being able to have good health.
3. Bodily Integrity: being able to be physically secure, including rights over
one’s own body.
4. Senses, Imagination, and Thought: being able to use these mental
capacities in a truly human way through adequate education,
informed consent, and freedom from repression.
5. Emotions: being able to have and freely express feelings and sentiments.
6. Practical Reason: being able “to form a conception of the good and to
engage in critical reflection about the planning of one’s life.”
7. Affiliation: (a) being able to interact well with other people, and
(b) having the social bases for self-respect, dignity, and non-humiliation.
8. Other Species: being able to live with concern for the natural world.
9. Play: being able to play and laugh.
10. Control Over Environment: being able to effectively participate in
political processes, to have possessions, and to seek employment.
Conclusion
We might be able to reconcile conflicting
answers to questions about poverty, inequality,
and economic globalization by viewing these
different evaluative approaches as
complementary rather than as purely rival
alternatives.
This might open a door for bringing together
globalization champions from the political right
and anti-globalization champions from the
political left.