1. POLS 374 Foundations of Global Politics
Lecture 3: Defining Globalization
October 3, 2006
Professor Timothy Lim
California State University, Los Angeles

2. Defining Globalization
Main points of chapter
General notions of global-ness have a long history, but talk of “globality” (the condition) and “globalization” (the trend) has arisen manly since 1980
A clear and precise definition of the global is crucial to advance both knowledge and policy in contemporary society
When taken to mean internationalization, liberalization, universalization or westernization, ideas of globalization reveal little new and can have objectionable political implications

3. Defining Globalization
Main points of chapter
Important new insight is provided when globalization is understood in spatial terms as the spread of transplanetary—and in recent times more particularly supraterritorial—connections between people
Globality in the sense of transworld connectivity is manifested across multiple areas of social life, including communication, travel, production, markets, money, finance, organizations, military, ecology, health, law and consciousness
Notions of globalization as the rise of transplanetary and supraterritorial links between people need to be carefully qualified in order to avoid globalist excesses

4. Defining Globalization
The importance of a clear definition
A clear and precise definition of the global is crucial to advance both knowledge and policy in contemporary society

5. Defining Globalization
A clear and precise definition of the global is especially important given the plethora of confusing conceptions …
… such as internationalization, liberalization, universalization or westernization

6. Defining Globalization
To put it simply, existing conceptions of globalization reveal little new and can have objectionable political implications
Put another way, coining new terms for old phenomena is just like “putting old wine in new bottle”
"Old wine in a new bottle won't sell, friends, unless we value-add with a new bottle-cap."

7. Defining Globalization
By contrast, important new insight is provided when globalization is understood in spatial terms as the spread of transplanetary—and in recent times, supraterritorial—con-nections between people

8. Defining Globalization
Globalization as transworld connectivity
Globalization in the sense of transworld connectivity, or globality, is manifested across multiple areas of social life, including communication, travel, production, markets, money, finance, organizations, military, ecology, health, law and consciousness

9. Defining Globalization
Globalization as transworld connectivity
The notion of globalization as the rise of transplanetary and supraterritorial links between people needs to be carefully considered and qualified in order to avoid globalist excesses
Before the author does this, however, he takes a short, but important detour …
To the importance of definition (in general terms)

10. Defining Globalization
The importance of definition: Main point
Definition is not everything, but everything involves definition.

11. Defining Globalization
The importance of definition
If your first step is misplaced, you may never get on the right path; worse still, you may not even realize you’re headed in the wrong direction
The first step is understand the origins of the “g-word”

12. Defining Globalization
The “G-Word”
Origins of the word global go back at least to the 17th century, but it was only until the 1800s that the meaning, “on a planetary scale” began to be clearly associated with the concept

13. Defining Globalization
The “G-Word”
In the 1940, “global” started to be used as a verb, as in “globalize,” and the term “globalization,” as a process, first surfaced in Another related concept, “globality,” which refers to a condition, began to circulate only the 1980s

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The “G-Word”
Today, the g-word (or some variant of it) is used throughout the world in almost all languages. It has become ubiquitous concept in global society.

15. Defining Globalization
The “G-Word”: Some questions
Does the evolution and spread of the word “globalization” itself indicate a significant development?
Does it mean something, in other words, that everyday conversation in virtually every society on earth incorporates regular references to global markets, global communications, global conferences, global threats, global environment, and so on?

16. Defining Globalization
Starting Premises for Definition: Five Points
First, definition serves or should serve to advance knowledge
Second, no conceptualization is normatively and politically neutral
Third, every definition is relative to context
Fourth, no definition is definitive
Fifth, the variability of definition means that each formulation should be as clear, precise, concise, explicit, consistent and cogent as possible.

17. Defining Globalization
Starting premises for definition
Not all definitions are equal: there are good definitions, and bad ones. A bad definition is one that (following point five) lacks clarity, is implicit, inconsistent, and weak (in terms of relating convincingly to empirical evidence and policy needs)

18. Defining Globalization
Redundant concepts of globalization
What’s wrong with existing definitions?
Short answer: They’re all redundant. That is, they refer to preexisting processes or conditions
The problem? Sort of like call the Angels the Los Angeles Angels. But, in the case of globalization, the implications are a bit more serious.

19. Defining Globalization
Redundant concepts of globalization
Internationalization
The problem here is clear: internationalization—defined as increasing transactions and interdependence between countries—has been going on for a long time, centuries really. It is significant, but it is not new; therefore, it’s redundant.

20. Defining Globalization
Redundant concepts of globalization
Liberalization
As the author writes: “the language of globalization is unnecessary to rehearse arguments for and against laissez-fair economics. People have debated theories and practices of ‘free’ markets for centuries without invoking talk of globalization”, so there’s no good reason to start now.

21. Defining Globalization
Redundant concepts of globalization
Universalization
Universalization is an important process, but it’s not new: it is an age-old feature of world history (consider the spread of Christianity and Islam)

22. Defining Globalization
Redundant concepts of globalization
Westernization
The problem here is not with the concept of westernization per se—the world is certainly become more westernized. But as the author notes, “it is one thing to assert that globalization and westernization have had interconnections and quite another to equate the two developments.

23. Defining Globalization
Redundant concepts of globalization
More about westernization
The bigger problem is that defining globalization as westernization suggests that there are no alternatives: that, in principle, there cannot be non-western alternatives such as Buddhist globalization, Confucian globalization, Islamic globalization, or some other as-yet unidentified type of globalization

24. Defining Globalization
Redundant concepts of globalization
The basic problem with existing conceptions of globalization, to repeat, is that they are redundant: they refer to historical and ongoing processes that predate contemporary processes.
The main point the author wants to make is that we need to understand what is new in order to move forward.

25. Defining Globalization
A way forward
To repeat: the way forward is to conceptualize globalization as the spread of transplanetary and supraterritorial connections between people.

26. Defining Globalization
A way forward
What is a global or transplanetary social relation?
Short answer: It is a social relation that can link persons situated at any inhabitable place on the earth, such as an Internet chat room.

27. Defining Globalization
A way forward
Globalization, therefore, involves reductions of barriers to transworld social contacts.
With globalization people become more able—physically, legally, linguistically, culturally, and psychologically—to engage with each other wherever on planet Earth they might be

28. Defining Globalization
A way forward
In short, globalization refers to shift in the nature of social space: this is what is new about globalization
Think of this concept as a little (a very little) like the movie, The Matrix: If everything about the nature of time/space changes, our world would be a very different place

29. Defining Globalization
Social Space: Short Discussion
Author tells us that “space matters”
That is where we live our lives has a profound impact on how we live our lives. Space is a core feature—as both cause and effect—of social life.
Or, as they like to say in real estate …

30. Defining Globalization
LOCATION,
LOCATION

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Social Space
Space (or location) affects the ways people formulate knowledge, construct identities, form collectivities
Spatial considerations also affect economic arrangements, political relations, culture, and even psychological states
Given all this, a reconfiguration of spatial structures is bound to have a profound effect on society as a whole

32. Defining Globalization
Social Space
The nature of social space, however, is changing.
It is as if real estate no longer has a fixed geographic point: “location” still matters, but it matters in a profoundly different way

33. Defining Globalization
Social Space
This brings our focus back to the concept of globality

34. Defining Globalization
Social Space and Globality
Globality has two qualities:
The more general feature is transplanetary connectivity, which has figured in human history for a long time
The other, more specific quality is supraterritoriality, which is relatively new

35. Defining Globalization
Social Space and Globality
Transplanetary connectivity: Even though this is not a brand new phenomenon, it is much stronger than its ever been:
“More people, more often, more extensively and more intensely engage with the planetary arena as single social space. Volumes of transworld associations, communications, diseases, finance, investment, travel and trade have never been as great”

36. Defining Globalization
Social Space and Globality
Supraterritoriality: Supraterritoriality refers to social connections that substantially transcend territorial geography
In a sense, supraterritoriality means that (physical) space matters less and less, and in some domains (such as global finance) it matters almost not at all

37. Defining Globalization
Social Space and Globality
At the extreme, supraterritoriality has two perfect qualities:
transworld simultaneity (that is, the ability to extend a connection across the planet at the same time) and
transworld instaneity (the ability to move anywhere on the planet in no time)

38. Defining Globalization
Social Space and Globality
An example of transworld simultaneity and transworld instaneity: the Internet