Is the United States Increasingly a Victim of the Globalisation It Once Championed - Coursework Example

Is the United s increasingly a victim of the Globalisation it once championed? By the year 2000, globalisation has become a household in the United States, and the concept of an integrated world economy has permeated the discourse on the American foreign policy, economics, educational reform, among other related dimensions in the national policy-making. The public’s perception on this phenomenon in America can be described as love-hate relationship because of its proven positive and negative effects. This paper will examine this area and, in the process, determine how the United States has been both victimized and benefited by the globalisation phenomenon. Background Globalisation is an American sponsored phenomenon. Although globalisation has existed in various forms in different parts of the world and in different timelines, going as far back as the nineteenth century, the concept as we know today began to emerge in the late 1980s as American analysts tried to describe the rapidly growing integrated world economy. (Brown 2003, p. xviii) In the economic and commercial spheres particularly, the international system that has established promotes the values of the neoliberal regulatory orders, which is essentially American or Anglo-American in origin. Indeed, today, globalisation is associated and perceived around the world as the triumphant capitalism, American style and is equated with progress, and that countries must accept it in order to fight poverty and improve the standards of living especially of the poor. (Jansson 2007, p. 174) In this context, the popular and widespread use of the globalisation concept today always referred to the phenomenon of market-based production and exchange, characterized by the unlimited circulation of goods, services, capital, and labor everywhere throughout the world on a cost basis and is determined by supply and demand. Markets for traded goods, and more recently, financial markets, have merged across national boundaries into a truly international structure while labor markets are in the process of being integrated into an international system, partly through migration, but mainly through trade in the changing global pattern of the international division of labor. (Muroyama and Stever 1988, p. 103-104) Globalisation, for its part, both has positive and negative effects on America. This paper would first outline the benefits, which would mainly be in the context of economic and political areas. The negative effects of globalisation would then follow, focusing on issues on security, anti-Americanism and increased competition. Economic Benefits Lechner and Boli (2004) pointed to the most important defense of globalisation in America, that globalisation makes America richer by increasing efficiency. (p. 11) The argument in this regard is that this phenomenon benefits producers by giving them greater choices over their raw materials, production techniques, and human talent, not to mention the humungous market that becomes available in order to sell their products. According to Gitman and McDaniel (2007), income from US companies and its foreign subsidiaries such as Pepsi, American Express and Microsoft is over $200 billion a year, with many companies enjoying record profits and unprecedented growths. (p. 113) In addition, American consumers benefit as they are provided with better goods at better prices. Since 1997, prices for many heavily traded goods have actually fallen. To underscore the aforementioned point, one only needs to examine the plight of those countries that have resisted globalisation or, at least, those that have tried to insulate themselves from its effects – North Korea, Vietnam, Cambodia, Cuba. These countries are currently economic backwaters, with some finally opening up because they found that they could no longer entirely shut themselves up from the outside world. Then, there is the imperialist argument. Globalisation organized the world financial system in order to benefit American capitalism just as it was organized to support the European capitalism in the period of nineteenth century European imperialism. Here, it is argued that the US enjoys and exploits its position as the “international natural leader of last resort” to borrow indefinitely for domestic purposes and as a result, the US drains savings from other countries, placing pressures on exchange rates and uses its role as the supplier of the world’s key currency to advance its own interests. (Bowles 2008, p. 60) However the case is, there is the economic fact that globalisation is around us. According to Wiarda (2007), most of us benefit enormously from it; almost everything we do has global implications; and that it is woven into the American culture and lifestyles. (p. 60) It is important to underscore that the bulwark of American defense lies in its economic prosperity and here, globalisation has found its most important significance in the US as a country. Other Advantages The US dominates information technology, science of space and land communication as well as the Internet. Because of this, it is in the best position to lead the international cultural system that would inevitably result out of globalisation. The erosion of the geographical boundaries and historical factors that hinder the cultural communications among nations would open societies to interact with each other. Here, the US enjoys the advantage and could logically dominate cultural and political globalisation. The American cultural products such as films, TV, books, magazines, music, computers and their softwares are encroaching on the global market. It is in this way, wherein the single-culture concept, with the US at the helm, would be realized, reinforcing the American status as a global power not just economically but in all its dimensions. National Security Globalisation could function as some form of double edged sword or some paradoxical phenomenon, wherein a benefit could also function as a disadvantage. Here, as the US is able to shift the distribution of relative power in its favor as well as for its allies through globalisation, the phenomenon also constrains the autonomy of the country and increasingly limits its absolute capacities even as the hegemon. In this context, one of the specific problems that emerge as a consequence of globalisation for the US is security. The US national security problem brought about by globalisation could be classified into two areas. The first of which is that because globalisation is increasingly seen as a tool for US imperialism, there are states and groups that increasingly resent America as the phenomenon bring about a number of disadvantages in their own respective experiences. This results to the attacks against the symbols of American power and prestige as demonstrated by the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks in New York. The second classification of security threat is its supposed globalisation demonstrated in the US response strategy to address them. According to Forest, this is discussed in two ways: First, there is an element of pressure to comply with American thinking. In this sense other countries are “required” to conform to American policies both by accepting the notion of the threat as defined by the US government and by responding to it along lines largely subscribed by its Administration. Second, following the vulnerability of the US heartland exposed by the 9/11 attacks, there is now an expectation that other states will have to consider how best to ensure US security in their national security planning. (p. 47) What the above situation/strategy means is that the US is globalizing its national defense strategy by passing or sharing its national security responsibility outwards, beyond the national boundaries and well into the hands of others – allies, new friends, friends of convenience, and partners. In this way, the US response to the threats to its national security will always be constrained because the strategy relies on multilateral cooperation in order to succeed. This complicates matters and renders the US more vulnerable than ever to external dangers. What is significant here is that globalisation has facilitated this situation. Anti-Americanism The previously discussed problem resulting from globalisation is tied with the growing anti-Americanism across the globe. As stated elsewhere in this paper, there is a growing perception that globalisation benefits the US at the expense of other countries. The numerous negative effects associated with globalisation, hence, such as economic inequalities, increased poverty, the issue of equity, the exploitation of workers, the spread of disease, among others, are blamed on the US. For some, the movement against globalisation is equated with the movement against America. Some of these arguments maybe true but some are unfounded and baseless but continually emerge nonetheless. Recent developments have demonstrated the present large overlap between antiglobalisation and anti-Americanism, although they are certainly different in orientation. According to Berman (2004), antiglobalisation, strictly speaking, may entail an economic protest (no matter how dubious the economics) against capitalism, but in practice, it is inseparable from hostility to the spread of American political influence as well. (p. 118-119) All in all, it appears (however complicated and illogical the case is) that antiglobalisation has become entrenched in the type of political culture that permeates around the world that combines anti-Americanism with anticapitalism as well as other non-related variables such as anti-Semitism and the generalized resistance to modernity and the liberal concept of the free market. As states and institutions - whether from incompetence or from their disadvantaged positions in the global economic system - fail to reduce and manage the sharper and urgent problems that globalisation produces, more and more people are immediately pointing their fingers on America when issues of culpability is being determined. This has serious and dangerous ramification for the US and its interests. The foremost of which is the issue of security, which was discussed in the earlier section. Increased Competition and the Diffusion of Power As the sole and unchallenged global power, the US has the most to lose when globalisation strips the power of the state in the emerging international political order. Kirshner (2006) maintained that as globalisation is the growth of forces beyond the controls of states, its advance must necessarily imply some measure of erosion of the US hegemony, especially in the context of the ability to shape the world as it desires. (p. 145) Globalisation empowers other countries to acquire wealth and wield considerable economic and political power to the point that it robs the US of opportunities in the global economic system. A case in point is China. The country sees globalisation as an opportunity to replace great power rivalry with win-win competition but most importantly to restrain the US unilateralism and coercive use of power. (Deng and Wang 2005, p. 13) Here, the country poses a potential threat to the US economic and security interests because it is increasingly eroding the US leadership in technological innovation and international competitiveness, particularly in advanced technology industries. (Bergsten 2005, p. 122) Accountability An important issue in regard to globalisation is in the area of accountability. Globalisation, wrote Lechner and Boli, may have “liberated us from the onus of having to get our television programs – or our health care and pensions – from our governments, but it has forced us to get the same things from giant companies that are just as remote but even less accountable.” (p. 12) As the man in the Whitehouse is replaced by the knucklehead in the boardroom or the stupid Hollywood executive, people are left with fewer choices and power in making their voices heard. Conclusion In the discourse of globalisation in the context of the US experience, the issue about its positive and negative effects is not debated upon for the purposes of the abolition or rejection of the economic model. Even the so-called antiglobalisation sector in the country does not advocate its demise. The debate is mainly undertaken in order to identify its weaknesses so that it could be corrected because all in all, globalisation is not a full-proof economic model. However, as this paper has emphasized it is considered by many as the best system ever and that it is still on the process of development, with its components, elements and dimensions, constantly fine-tuned in order to achieve the best possible result in addressing economic problems such as poverty and other inequalities. It must be underscored that the US sponsors globalisation and works hard to maintain it because it is in consonance with its fundamental value and objective, which is capitalism and the free market system. The emergence of the global economy is seen as the triumph of capitalism over other types of economic and political models. Merson, Black and Mills (2006) stressed that, now, globalisation in the context of the liberal capitalist model is seen as the final form of human government and that there is no viable alternative available. (p. 684) Through globalisation, the US is better poised for continuous hegemony over the modern world through its economic, political, cultural and information power. As a wealthy and powerful country, the issue in regard to the balance of gains and losses is tipped rather more toward the positive in the case of the US. The thesis that the US benefits more from globalisation than any other country or major power across the globe is fundamentally correct. The sheer scale of the American economy as well as its population and resources is the most basic factor that guide the differential effects that globalisation forces on it. These variables provide the insulation for the country against the disruptive forces of globalisation. References Bergsten, F 2005, The United States and the world economy: foreign economic policy for the next decade. Washington, DC.:Peterson Institute. Berman, R 2004, Anti-Americanism in Europe: a cultural problem. Hoover Institution Press. Bowles, P 2008, National currencies and globalisation: endangered specie?. New York: Routledge. Brown, C 2003, Globalisation and America since 1945. Rowman & Littlefield. Deng, Y and Wang, F 2005, China rising: power and motivation in Chinese foreign policy. Rowman and Littlefield. Gitman, L and McDaniel, C 2007, The Future of Business: The Essentials. Mason, OH: Thompson Southwestern. 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