INTRODUCTION

• Globalization is a central concept in the present-day international scenario, but it is difficult to define.

• Scholars have attempted to provide a basic understanding of the concept, which is linked to the process of transformation affecting social, political, and economic development worldwide.

• Globalization can be seen as a process where the population of the world is increasingly bonded into a single society.

• Socially, globalization signifies closer interaction of people and homogenization of culture and values, turning the world into a ‘global village’.

• Politically, globalization refers to complex networks of global governance and shared political values, leading to the homogenization of global political culture.

• Economically, globalization is manifested through liberalization, privatization, and deregulation, resulting in a free market regime.

• On a larger scale, globalization has posed challenges to the raison d’être of states, the dominant actors in international relations.

CONCEPT OF GLOBALIZATION

• Scholars like Anthony Giddens (1990) define globalization as “the intensification of worldwide social relations” that link distant localities, where local events are shaped by events occurring far away and vice versa.

• Robert Cox (1994) views globalization from a different perspective, focusing on characteristics like the internationalizing of production, the new international division of labor, migratory movements from South to North, a competitive environment accelerating these processes, and the internationalizing of states, making them agencies of the globalizing world.

• Some see the world as becoming a global shopping mall where ideas and products are available simultaneously.

• According to Scholte, globalization refers to processes by which social relations become distanceless and borderless, leading to human lives increasingly playing out as if the world is a single place.

• Deepak Nayyar, an eminent academic, defines globalization as “a process associated with increasing economic openness, growing economic independence, and deepening economic integration between countries.”

• David Held, a British political scientist, and others argue that globalization is a process rapidly moulding the world into a shared social space driven by economic and technological forces, where developments in one region can profoundly affect lives in distant regions.

• Held and fellow scholars see globalization as the “widening, deepening, and speeding up of worldwide interconnectedness in all aspects of contemporary social life.”

• The central point of globalization is that much of social life is increasingly determined by global processes, causing national cultures, economies, and borders to integrate under a universal umbrella.

• The term “globalization” encompasses aspects like expanded international trade, telecommunications, monetary coordination, multinational corporations, cultural exchanges, migration, refugee flows, and relations between the rich and poor countries.