Globalization - Etymology and Usage

Etymology and Usage

The term globalization is derived from the word globalize, which refers to the emergence of an international network of social and economic systems. One of the earliest known usages of the term as the noun was in 1930 in a publication entitled Towards New Education where it denoted a holistic view of human experience in education. A related term, corporate giants, was coined by Charles Taze Russell in 1897 to refer to the largely national trusts and other large enterprises of the time. By the 1960s, both terms began to be used as synonyms by economists and other social scientists. It then reached the mainstream press in the later half of the 1980s. Since its inception, the concept of globalization has inspired competing definitions and interpretations, with antecedents dating back to the great movements of trade and empire across Asia and the Indian Ocean from the 15th century onwards. Due to the complexity of the concept, research projects, articles, and discussions often remain focused on a single aspect of globalization.

Roland Robertson, professor of sociology at University of Aberdeen, was the first person to define globalization as "the compression of the world and the intensification of the consciousness of the world as a whole."

Sociologists Martin Albrow and Elizabeth King define globalization as:

…all those processes by which the peoples of the world are incorporated into a single world society.

In The Consequences of Modernity, Anthony Giddens uses the following definition:

Globalization can thus be defined as the intensification of worldwide social relations which link distant localities in such a way that local happenings are shaped by events occurring many miles away and vice versa.

In Global Transformations David Held, et al., study the definition of globalization:

Although in its simplistic sense globalization refers to the widening, deepening and speeding up of global interconnection, such a definition begs further elaboration. … Globalization can be located on a continuum with the local, national and regional. At one end of the continuum lie social and economic relations and networks which are organized on a local and/or national basis; at the other end lie social and economic relations and networks which crystallize on the wider scale of regional and global interactions. Globalization can be taken to refer to those spatial-temporal processes of change which underpin a transformation in the organization of human affairs by linking together and expanding human activity across regions and continents. Without reference to such expansive spatial connections, there can be no clear or coherent formulation of this term. … A satisfactory definition of globalization must capture each of these elements: extensity (stretching), intensity, velocity and impact.

Swedish journalist Thomas Larsson, in his book The Race to the Top: The Real Story of Globalization, states that globalization:

is the process of world shrinkage, of distances getting shorter, things moving closer. It pertains to the increasing ease with which somebody on one side of the world can interact, to mutual benefit, with somebody on the other side of the world.

The journalist Thomas L. Friedman popularized the term "flat world", arguing that globalized trade, outsourcing, supply-chaining, and political forces had permanently changed the world, for better and worse. He asserted that the pace of globalization was quickening and that its impact on business organization and practice would continue to grow.

Economist Takis Fotopoulos defined "economic globalization" as the opening and deregulation of commodity, capital and labor markets that led toward present neoliberal globalization. He used "political globalization" to refer to the emergence of a transnational elite and a phasing out of the nation-state. "Cultural globalization", he used to reference the worldwide homogenization of culture. Other of his usages included "ideological globalization", "technological globalization" and "social globalization".

In 2000, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) identified four basic aspects of globalization: trade and transactions, capital and investment movements, migration and movement of people and the dissemination of knowledge. With regards to trade and transactions, developing countries increased their share of world trade, from 19 percent in 1971 to 29 percent in 1999. However, there is great variation among the major regions. For instance, the newly industrialized economies (NIEs) of Asia prospered, while African countries as a whole performed poorly. The makeup of a country's exports is an important indicator for success. Manufactured goods exports soared, dominated by developed countries and NIEs. Commodity exports, such as food and raw materials were often produced by developing countries: commodities' share of total exports declined over the period. Following from this, capital and investment movements can be highlighted as another basic aspect of globalization. Private capital flows to developing countries soared during the 1990s, replacing "aid" or development assistance which fell significantly after the early 1980s. Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) became the most important category. Both portfolio investment and bank credit rose but they have been more volatile, falling sharply in the wake of the financial crisis of the late 1990s. The migration and movement of people can also be highlighted as a prominent feature of the globalization process. In the period between 1965–90, the proportion of the labor forces migrating approximately doubled. Most migration occurred between developing countries and Least Developed Countries (LDCs). The flow of migrants to advanced economic countries was claimed to provide a means through which global wages converge. They noted the potential for skills to be transferred back to developing countries as wages in those a countries rise. Lastly, the dissemination of knowledge has been an integral aspect of globalization. Technological innovations (or technological transfer) benefit most the developing and Least Developing countries (LDCs), as for example the advent of mobile phones.