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The challenges of global capitalism
Scott Burchill
The world economy today
- The world is unified for the first time under a common economic system - the globalisation of capitalism
- First time in human history we also live in a universal society of states, more culturally diverse than its predecessors, more deeply divided by inequalities of military & political power, wealth & opportunity
- Alternative economic systems (eg central planning of communist states) have failed and are discredited - ‘TINA’ (There Is No Alternative)
- Even China, which retains a closed communist political system, has a thriving and increasingly open capitalist economy
- Economic debates centre around what is the optimal mix of state (ie government) intervention in the economy & if market forces should have a free reign in the economy
- A triumph for economic or neo-liberals?
What is globalisation?
- Processes of economic, technological and cultural change that have escaped the sovereign control of states
- These processes make the world more economically interdependent than ever before
Examples of globalisation
- Communications (eg email, websites, computer viruses, mobile phones, SatNav, GPS)
- TV (eg satellite, cable, CNN-effect, war in real time, entertainment, information, Google earth)
- Economy (eg credit cards, net banking, 24 hour trading, currency trading, exposure to external shocks, global stock markets, loss of sovereignty)
- Culture (eg Hollywood, McDonalds, Coca-Cola, cultural imperialism, soft power of US, homogeneity v cultural diversity (Americanisation), organised crime, terrorism, organised religion)
- Time & Distance (eg time is compressed, communication is instantaneous, overcoming distance - travel, speed, technology, transmissible diseases, few dark corners, surveillance)
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