Globalization

[Longinthetooth]

I have written before about the way in which events have developed over the past few months being like clicking the minus (zoom out) button on a Google Earth map. What may have initially have been perceived as local issues became more ubiquitous as each drama unfolded. Others may think differently but it appears clear to me that governments have no control of what's going on whatsoever. I firmly believe that we have allowed a monster to be born and it is benignly called 'globalization'. It is entirely non-territorial and does not have any moral restraint. If we are going to win this war we first need to identify the enemy.

[Sourman]

Globalization... the favourite catchword of the World Bank and it's backers Wall St.

[Fudge]

I have written before about the way in which events have developed over the past few months being like clicking the minus (zoom out) button on a Google Earth map. What may have initially have been perceived as local issues became more ubiquitous as each drama unfolded. Others may think differently but it appears clear to me that governments have no control of what's going on whatsoever. I firmly believe that we have allowed a monster to be born and it is benignly called 'globalization'. It is entirely non-territorial and does not have any moral restraint. If we are going to win this war we first need to identify the enemy.

Yes. It looks like the anti-globalisation brigade were correct. I wonder where the G7 meetings will be held in the future?

somewhere safe, like Mars.

[Si1]

there will be an acid test here - IF this mess settles down (I'm not saying recovers) inside 2 years or thereabouts, and IF international trading restrictions are not increased, ie IF globalisation is not reduced significantly, then a globalisation enthusiast such as myself would anticipate a strong recovery, much stronger than happened during the protectionist Great Depression.

This will eb the acid test of globhalisation, to see if it can pull us out of the mire with a nice bit of Ricardo-esque free trade.

[interestrateripoff]

Greed is the cause.

Globalization has been manipulated to encourage greed and free trade.

However I doubt whether globalized free trade can pull us out of this mess.

[Bloo Loo]

globalisation.

It Started in Amerwicka but it has strong fundamentals and its getting on with the job of SPENDING ALL THE DEBT THATS FRACKING UP THE WORLD FFS

[Si1]

Greed is the cause.

Globalization has been manipulated to encourage greed and free trade.

However I doubt whether globalized free trade can pull us out of this mess.

free trade does require a degree of control, I think it's pretty much established that unfettered markets have inate inefficiencies. Doesn't make globalisation a bad thing, or capitalism for that matter - anti- arguments for these must be based on something else.

There's a parallel here - on another thread some have said that the reason that Cuba is relatively poor is because it is not allowed to trade with other coutnries. It seems that everyone agrees that SOME degree of international trade is a good thing, simply allowing better use of division of labour etc. So at what point is that not some kind of globalisation?

[SMAC67]

Globalization will ultimately fail due to the simple fact that it requires cheap and plentiful energy combined with unrestrained growth. Globalization is the result of a unique set of conditions and will disappear sooner rather than later. Unless of course we discover more oil..........

Much like cancer, it eventually kills it's host. There is no avoiding it I'm afraid.

[The Atomic Bull]

In the coming weeks capitalists will urge that further globalisation is the solution.

[Rich1965]

Diversification is the Financial Worlds mantra.

How is it possible to Diversify if there is only 1 market ,so I think yes.

[SMAC67]

The solutions presented by our so-called elites, will simply accelerate the demise of the whole system. They aren't rescuing anything, but rather bludgeoning the whole economic and fiscal system to death. I would find it rather amusing except it will directly to disruption, shortages, unemployment, death, and mayhem, on a rather large scale. And their is nothing I can do about it except watch in horror and amazement.

[gravity always wins]

I have written before about the way in which events have developed over the past few months being like clicking the minus (zoom out) button on a Google Earth map. What may have initially have been perceived as local issues became more ubiquitous as each drama unfolded. Others may think differently but it appears clear to me that governments have no control of what's going on whatsoever. I firmly believe that we have allowed a monster to be born and it is benignly called 'globalization'. It is entirely non-territorial and does not have any moral restraint. If we are going to win this war we first need to identify the enemy.

I think Globalisation is merely an extension of the division of labour that has been going on for millenia.

It is the phenomina of the division of labour crossing boundaries so we call it globalisation.

This phenomena is a direct result of the abundance of energy which allows our economies to become more and more entangled and the demand for a medium of exchange to become greater (as barter becomes more and more impossible as goods and services are traded over greater geographical distances).

Without external (oil) energy you have minimal transportation without this transportation you cannot have "globalisation" the whole phenomenon is about the division of labour going on to steroids during the oil age.

Unless we are able to find an energy substitute for oil going forward we will see the start of localisation or the undivision of Labour.

Maybe knowing, helping and trading with your neighbours may not be a bad thing for the soul but catastrophic for the banks.

Of course the division of labour breeds experts in niches but fools overall not good in the long run.

[Nelly]

Greed is the cause.

Globalization has been manipulated to encourage greed and free trade.

However I doubt whether globalized free trade can pull us out of this mess.

I was just thinking of starting a thread saying that!

Greed is the absolute bottom line to all of this.

[SMAC67]

Remember, the endgame for capitalism is for one person (the strongest) to own everything, whilst everyone else dies-off. It is a system, that as Karl Marx pointed out, has the seed of it's own destruction......

[Longinthetooth]

Perhaps I'm using the word 'globalisation' slighty out of context. The point I was making was that although economic entities (lets take Goldman Sachs as an example) are restricted to earthly locations such as London, New York and Hong Kong their business ethos is more consistent with an orbiting space station. I believe that they have been able to get away with what they have done because they have no real partisan loyalties and no one country has been able to effectively control them. Reality has now hit home and it would appear that only concerted world action will work.

[Sourman]

free trade does require a degree of control, I think it's pretty much established that unfettered markets have inate inefficiencies. Doesn't make globalisation a bad thing, or capitalism for that matter - anti- arguments for these must be based on something else.

There's a parallel here - on another thread some have said that the reason that Cuba is relatively poor is because it is not allowed to trade with other coutnries. It seems that everyone agrees that SOME degree of international trade is a good thing, simply allowing better use of division of labour etc. So at what point is that not some kind of globalisation?

Globalization as it has been for the past 30 years or so has meant that the opening up of soft markets to those with lots to gain and little to lose, it is and has been an unmitigated disaster for much of the developing world, and now the developed world.

It has only ever been driven by the greed of Wall St.

Nothing else.

[LazyDay]

Globalization will ultimately fail due to the simple fact that it requires cheap and plentiful energy combined with unrestrained growth. Globalization is the result of a unique set of conditions and will disappear sooner rather than later. Unless of course we discover more oil..........

Much like cancer, it eventually kills it's host. There is no avoiding it I'm afraid.

Some people here amaze me. They drive German cars, sit behind Swedish or Italian or Romanian-made desks wearing Chinese clothing having left their kids with a polish babysitter, then they come back home to their Korean TVs to watch international news, turn on their Ipods made in 13 different countries, power up home PCs made in 6 different countries to moan about globalization. Thats just hilarious.

Perverse incentives are bad in any context, you dont need to look any further than recent developments in the business models of rating agencies to see this. Alternatively, you can blame globalization and grow your own bananas in the back garden. To me, it is cheaper to buy them in the supermarket.

[Si1]

Globalization as it has been for the past 30 years or so has meant that the opening up of soft markets to those with lots to gain and little to lose, it is and has been an unmitigated disaster for much of the developing world, and now the developed world.

eh?

Africa has gone from medieval to victorian states of development within the last 50 years or so, compressing social welfare improvements that took at least 4 centuries in Europe, into decades, sure there are inequalities, but that's a pretty impressive record.

[steve99]

Globalisation was designed and encouraged because it allowed multinationals to do in other countries what they were not allowed to do at home, yet still keep a clean, happy family profile in their home countries. Examples would be the likes of sports clothing/shoe manufacturers who use semi slave child labour in so called developing countries. This has been encouraged by our so called Labour government and Extreme right wing governments in the USA for eg, in order to keep CPI figures down in the UK/USA/etc. They all seem to be capable of turning a blind eye to such blatant injustice while at the same time talking big about world poverty. If these workers were paid enough in order to live decent lives then it wouldn't be the immoral scam that it now is, in fact the companies that subscribe to this sort of thing are no better and in fact worse than sex tourists. This isn't a rant about global trade, just extreme exploitation used by the rich pigs running the system even richer.

You've now got the USA complaining about the rise of China, when at the same time their government has fully encouraged US companies to shut shop in the USA (to kill the unions) and move over there, leaving their own people to take up McJobs in the real world of retailing and selling mortgages.

Their aim of course is to get all workers on the same wages wherever they are in the world, however it wont quite work here until we are allowed to build tin huts around the perimeter of Hyde Park and camp out on the stations like they do in India. So much for progress, these w*nkers not only want infinite wealth, they also demand defacto human ownership.

Edited October 10, 2008 by steve99

[gravity always wins]

Some people here amaze me. They drive German cars, sit behind Swedish or Italian or Romanian-made desks wearing Chinese clothing having left their kids with a polish babysitter, then they come back home to their Korean TVs to watch international news, turn on their Ipods made in 13 different countries, power up home PCs made in 6 different countries to moan about globalization. Thats just hilarious.

Perverse incentives are bad in any context, you dont need to look any further than recent developments in the business models of rating agencies to see this. Alternatively, you can blame globalization and grow your own bananas in the back garden. To me, it is cheaper to buy them in the supermarket.

SMAC67 wasn't moaning about globalisation they were merely pointing out fact to anyone who has taken time to understand how the world works. Understand how globalsation works and you will understand what we are at the beginnning of.

Go buy your bananas from the supermarket whilst you can.

By the way people who understand how the world works and what the future holds probably haven't been wasting all their money on the crap you acused them of using.

[applesauce]

Who wants to start again on an unpopulated island somewhere?

Sounds good doesn't it, until you realise that any population you choose to take with you will have people in it. People are dumb, people are selfish, everyone has their own slightly different set of right and wrong and everyone has a slightly different opinion on how things should be done and organised. Before you know it you'll be having similar conversations to that in the last tv episode of hitchhikers guide to the galaxy, with the B-arc folk :

http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=wTsdrVHKGlk

4 minutes in.

Globalisation is this magnified a million times.

Im off to go live in a cave.

[steve99]

Some people here amaze me. They drive German cars, sit behind Swedish or Italian or Romanian-made desks wearing Chinese clothing having left their kids with a polish babysitter, then they come back home to their Korean TVs to watch international news, turn on their Ipods made in 13 different countries, power up home PCs made in 6 different countries to moan about globalization. Thats just hilarious.

Perverse incentives are bad in any context, you dont need to look any further than recent developments in the business models of rating agencies to see this. Alternatively, you can blame globalization and grow your own bananas in the back garden. To me, it is cheaper to buy them in the supermarket.

We've always had international trade, that's good. Globalisation is a completely different agenda. The aims of globalisation is about bringing the workforces down to a very low and common level. Its not there to benefit already poor people and its not there ultimately to benefit the average UK/European/US worker.

[gravity always wins]

eh?

Africa has gone from medieval to victorian states of development within the last 50 years or so, compressing social welfare improvements that took at least 4 centuries in Europe, into decades, sure there are inequalities, but that's a pretty impressive record.

When you say development do you mean increased dependency on declining fossil fuels? increased levels of obesity? increased levels of mental ilness? or increased dependency on heavily subsidised US rice whilst at the same time seeing their own farmers destitute?

What is your definition of development and are you sure its right?

[Si1]

It's hard to respond to people who actually think that the 3rd world is worse off than it was 50 years ago.

If you don't accept that things like child labour and low paid manual jobs are a step on the way to greater development, then you must, somehow, subconciously, WANT the child prostitution, slavery, sold-into-marriage and other terrible alternatives, not to mention starvation, that comes in its place if normal development is halted by do-gooders.

The reality is that just because you stop these basic steps on the way to development, doesn't mean they get a nice middle class job in the interim in the local tax office. They get something much worse.

Sickos.

[Sourman]

eh?

Africa has gone from medieval to victorian states of development within the last 50 years or so, compressing social welfare improvements that took at least 4 centuries in Europe, into decades, sure there are inequalities, but that's a pretty impressive record.

Sorry I thought you just said Africa was a net gainer in globalization? I'm sure there are plenty there who disagree. Those welfare improvements have come at a greater cost than the sum of them. Africa has been diced up and sold so they can buy enough rice to not starve to death.

Yep... that is Globalization at it's very best.