Globalization- Creating Freedom and Exhausting Democracy
Daniel J. Stone
Ohio Dominican University
Abstract
It is debated that globalization is good or bad for mankind. Positive aspects of globalization are the culture exchange between nations, equal opportunities for minorities, less restrictive giving and sending of information. On the other hand, negative aspects of globalization are losses of cultural identities, more established nations having their resources drained and exhausted, diseases and terrorism. I personally believe that the good outweighs the bad in terms of globalization. The cultural enrichment that I have experienced from living in two states outside of my home state and the five years that I have spent living and working in Asia have shaped my views and was the cornerstone that has allowed me to meet my full potential.
Keywords: culture exchange, opportunities for minorities, less restrictive exchange of information, loss of identity, drain and exhaust of resources, epidemics and terrorism.
The fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989 has made the move to globalization a reality for nearly all nations except for those found on the continent of Africa. Countries are experiencing commercial and trade exchanges which have opened their borders up to the outside. There is a direct correlation between civil and political freedom and higher levels of per capita income. This is no more apparent than in China and India who since the early 1980s had an infrastructure that was in dire straits. Due to China’s and India’s convergence over the past 30 years, there is more hope and less strife with those two nations (Street and Street, 2010). On the other hand, when globalization is not contained, nations lose their identities, cultural and language identities are threatened, and there is a drain and exhaustion of resources from those countries that are more established. Globalization in the 21st Century is the new norm and like the world that we find ourselves in, globalization is a complex issue which has both good and bad aspects (Street and Street, 2010). Globalization is good for mankind. This is due to globalization equating to the endless exchange of ideas. Popular culture has proven to be the best vehicle of idea exchange with such events as the Moscow Music Peace Festival which took place around the fall of the Berlin Wall. This was a two-day event that took place at the Lenin Olympic Stadium and had the goal to raise awareness about drug and alcohol abuse. Not only were there about 20 music groups from the West who participated in this event, there were also doctors from the West who provided treatment to those who were suffering from substance abuse (Lawrence 2002). The rights of minorities have increased due to globalization. For example, in the 1990s, there was resistance to educating females from the very conservative country, The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. Not only are females from the Kingdom being educated, they are also allowed to travel abroad with a male chaperone and study with the intention of completing a degree at an institute of higher education (Schryer, 2012). Information due to globalization has provided knowledge to those within and outside a nation. Inventions such as the Internet and cellular phones put the power of sending and receiving information in the hands of the citizens which was previously controlled by governments. The “Arab Spring” of 2011 had thousands of people of various Middle Eastern nations use social media such at Twitter, Facebook, and YouTube to organize, communicate, and create awareness of issues that were found to be unfair due to their government’s attempts of repression (Howard, 2011). On the other hand, globalization is not good for mankind. By being economically open, one looses their identities such as the currencies of the members of the European
