Globalism

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The concept of globalism comes from the theories of international relations and assumes that the states will lose a massive amount of importance as international actors as a result of globalization and that new transnational actors (such as companies as global players) will emerge, so that a worldwide multilevel system is emerging , in which problems must and can be solved through cooperation between all actors through global domestic politics or global governance . The term can be assigned to the major theory of liberalism and is explicitly directed against the state-centered basic ideas of realism and neorealism , which he criticized in the so-called globalism-realism controversy .

Apart from this, it is used in public and sociological debates to criticize the basic assumptions of market-liberal globalization as “neoliberal”. In this usage, “globalism” appears as a polemical synonym for an ideology of globalized market radicalism.

Ulrich Beck's concept of globalism

For Ulrich Beck , globalism is accordingly a political idea that assumes that political action is only possible as a comprehensible adaptation to the laws of the world market. This premise underlies a political discourse, according to which the only thing that matters is that a company and an economy become competitive and to do so must undergo irrefutable structural reforms.

He sees a one-sided and monocausal fixation on the economic. He tries to make the negative aspects of globalism clear and to show the positive perspective of multi-dimensionality (globalization and further globality ).

Some of Beck's criticisms are:

  • Beck disputes the assumption that free world trade leads to a reduction in costs and thus to prosperity for all, since he is of the opinion that cost reductions can be achieved through violations of decent work and production standards (e.g. child labor, working below the poverty line , not decent working conditions) and not, as assumed by neoliberalism , by increasing economic efficiency.
  • Through the primacy of the economy, the multidimensional world society is reduced to the (almost) one-dimensional world market society . On the pension system in Germany z. For example, according to Beck, this would have the effect that old-age provision would be privatized and only people who pay into the pension fund would receive pensions, so that the current solidarity in the pension system would no longer exist.
  • He assumes that globalism has a tendency towards cultural unification (e.g. that the whole world also consumes the same or very similar things), whereas Beck believes that cultural development is and remains plural, but that it crosses local and national borders .
  • Globalism considers economic thinking to be generally valid, so that world market laws seem to prevail in all areas. Beck, on the other hand, claims that economic globalization is not a mechanism based on such world market laws, but a political project, that is, politics has pushed the process of globalization forward, with globalism increasingly disempowering politics.

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ cf. Reinhard Meyers: Theories of International Relations, in: Wichard Woyke (Ed.) Handwortbuch Internationale Politik, Opladen: Budrich, 2006, 10. durchges. Ed., P. 472 and Ray Magroohri / Bennett Ramberg: Globalism versus Realism. International Relation's Third Debate, Boulder Colorado, 1982
  2. ↑ Ulrich Beck: The opening of the world horizon: To the sociology of globalization. Editor's Notice. Soziale Welt, 47, 1997, pp. 3-16. P. 5.
  3. ^ Louise Amoore: Globalization, the Industrial Society, and Labor Flexibility. A sense of déjà vu? Global Society, 12, 1, 1998.

literature

  • Ulrich Beck : What is globalization? ISBN 3-518-40944-1 .
  • Jeffry Frieden: Will Global Capitalism Fall Again? In: Bruegel Essay And Lecture Series . Brussels June 2007 (English, bruegel.org [PDF; 22 kB ; accessed on September 29, 2011]).
  • Christoph Henning: Narratives of globalization . On the Marx renaissance in globalism and globalization criticism. In: Study Center Karl Marx House of the Friedrich Ebert Foundation, Trier. Beatrix Bouvier (Ed.): Discussion Group Politics and History in the Karl Marx House . tape 5 . Friedrich-Ebert-Stiftung, 2006, ISBN 3-89892-483-1 , ISSN  1860-8280 ( fes.de [PDF; 212 kB ; accessed on September 29, 2011]).
  • John Ralston Saul : The Collapse of Globalism. And the Reinvention of the World. Viking Canada. ISBN 978-0-670-06367-3 . on Global Policy Forum .
  • Stephan Schulmeister: The neoliberal worldview - scientific construction of “practical constraints” to promote and legitimize social inequality . In: Friedrich Klug, Ilan Fellmann (Eds.): Black Book and Globalization, Municipal Research in Austria, IKW series of publications . No. 115 , 2006 ( wifo.ac.at [PDF; 1.7 MB ; accessed on September 29, 2011]).

Web links

  • Ulrich Beck: Globalism and Globalization. Against the assumed dominance of economic globalization. In: Telepolis. July 3, 1997, accessed September 29, 2011 .