Multinational Corporations and Globalization: Necessary Evils - Essay Example

It describes the growing economic, political, technological, and cultural linkages that connect individuals, communities, businesses, and governments around the world. Globalization also involves the growth of multinational corporations (businesses that have operations or investments in many countries) and transnational corporations (businesses that see themselves functioning in a global marketplace). The international institutions that oversee world trade and finance play an increasingly important role in this era of globalization (Tabb, 2005).

Recent protests about the issue of globalization have sparked much debate whether these changes going on within our midst are advantageous or deleterious to most people around the world. In cognizance with the need to explore the burning issues, it is but right to carefully study both sides. Most protestations point their fingers at the multinational companies which are virtually thwarting locally-operated small businesses. Could globalization go bad because of these multinational companies Basically, worldwide globalization is important because it will benefit everyone in the world to adapt to new ideas of international cultures.

Also, it helped more regions where abject poverty is prevalent and it offered more diverse economic options to other countries (Rugman, 2001). However, the presence and activities of multinational corporations in the developing world has been the subject of controversy in discussions on development policy of developing countries. The anti-globalization movement concentrates the quest to combat the globalization of corporate economic activity and the free trade with developing nations. Anti-globalizationists are sometimes perceived to be marginalized by mainstream media and governments because of their strongly anti-business views.

Activists claim that most media across the world are owned by wealthy individuals or large corporations, who therefore have conflicting interests with the activists (Wikipedia Website). They often accuse multinational companies of slowly killing small business enterprise by making goods and services cheaper that most of these small businesses could muster.Barbara Epstein (2001) asserts in her article that the main target of the anti-globalization movement is corporate power, not capitalism. However, these perspectives do not necessarily exclude one another.

Some activists want regulation of the corporations, forcing them to comply with human and environmental rights; while other activists want corporations abolished. These aims are not necessarily incompatible. Depending on how one defines the limitations to be imposed on corporations, the line between regulation and abolition can evaporate. Members of the anti-globalization movement generally advocate socialist or social democratic alternatives to capitalist economics, and seek to protect the world's population and ecosystem from what they believe to be the damaging effects of globalization.

Many of the protesters are veterans of single-issue campaigns, including anti-logging activism, living wage, labor union organizing, and anti-sweatshop campaigns. Although movement members see most or all of the aforementioned goals as complementary to one another, the number of different issues they tackle has been a point of annoyance for the people they are protesting