Winners and Losers in Globalization

592 Words2 Pages

Globalization is an increasingly close international integration of markets for goods, services and factors of production, labor and capital. Right after the World War II, the world has witnessed a spread of markets and multilateral development from which no country can operate independently. This multi-dimensional process has different impacts on different countries, depending on the level of economic development and political influence, and it has both positive and negative consequences for human development.

New stage of informational technologies, have globalized communications, creating new possibilities of communication and international development. World society tends to common solving of global problems; collectivity and solidarity have reached across national borders and cultural boundaries. Although, world economists try to develop fair and healthy system, for some countries benefits have come at great expense.

It is quite obvious that rich and developed countries of North America and Western Europe, which exercise great influence on the economic and political world processes, are the main gainers of economic globalization.

When multi-national corporations and international financial organizations expand capitalist markets beyond national boundaries, they often do so without monitoring, accountability, or transparency; the market advances at any cost, including increased environmental damage, labor exploitation, and social inequalities. (Human Development Report p. 31)

Economic globalization can also bring the loss of autonomy for less developed states due to historical debts and financial dependence, the economic obedience of developing countries to developed ones, the assimilation of cultural and non-...

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...lization. The only hope is on International Monetary Fund (IMF), and World Bank. If those organizations would provide a fair legislation for both developing and developed countries, if the voices of both sides will be heard, and activity of multi-national corporations monitored, there is a big possibility for globalization to become a powerful curing tool against poverty.

Bibliography

Edward L. Hudgins, The Myth of the Race to the Bottom. New York, Longman (1999)

International Forum on Globalization. http://www.ifg.org/analysis/imf/imf_asia.htm

Paul Streeten, Professor Emeritus, Boston University A Global Game of Winners and Losers

United Nations, Human Development Report. (1999)

Jeffrey Sachs and Andrew Warner, Economic Reform and the Process of Global Integration. Washington D.C. (1995).

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