Process of Globalisation and its affects. How new communication technologies have influenced the Asian culture

Table of Contents

1. Introduction

2. Globalisation
2.1. The Meanings of Globalisation
2.2. The Engines of Globalisation
2.3. The Dimension of Globalisation

3. The Effects of Globalisation
3.1. Benefits
3.2. Drawbacks

4. Conclusion

References

1. Introduction

Globalisation describes the major changes our society is going through, including the revolution in transport and new technology. All those points go along with each other, therefore a separation of economy and media is not advisable. These changes have contributed towards the expansion of the world economy, caused major changes in the composition and location of production and consumption activities, and reduced the ability of national and local governments to act independently and unobserved. As a result, globalisation has reshaped the way millions of people earn their living and the way societies are organised. This is not at last a result^[1] of the globalisation of the media. The media must be seen as an economical product. Globalisation is a multilateral process influencing everyone. The difference is just the way e.g. Asia deals with it.

This paper will first describe the various meanings of globalisation and their indicators, followed by an analysis of the engines as well as dimensions of globalisation. Next, the effects of globalisation are highlighted. Finally, this paper^[2] ends with a conclusion.

2. Globalisation

2.1. The Meanings of Globalisation

There is a wide range of definitions for globalisation. Norris (2000) understands globalisation as a process that erodes national boundaries, while integrating national economies, cultures, technologies, and governance, as well as producing complex relations of mutual interdependence.

The World Trade Organisation (WTO) defines globalisation as the unity of industrialised, developing, least-developed and transition economies. Mr. Renato Ruggiero (1999), Director of the WTO, states that “the process of global integration is moving on rapidly, and has indeed gone past the point of no return”. He says that the meaning of globalisation can be seen everywhere in our daily lives, and describes information, know-how, and ideas as new forces that are diving the new economy forward. This new economy, he argues, will be different from the old one. This also counts for the media. Knowledge^[3], the new capital of economic growth which can be made accessible to all (e.g. via internet), becomes both a resource and a product. In the economy of the twenty-first century, knowledge, like water, will be an essential resource. The challenge of the WTO would be “to extend and widen the global aqueducts to help to irrigate parched soil”.

Allison (2000) describes globalisation as an “identifiable network, connecting points and people around the global on some specified dimension or medium”, and Griswold (2000) defines globalisation as “the growing liberalisation of international trade and investment, and the resulting increase in the integration of national economies”.

Henderson (2000) expands Griswold’s definition into five related parts:

- The increasing tendency for firms to think, plan, operate, and invest for the future with reference to markets and opportunities across the world as a whole
- The growing ease and cheapness of international communications, where the Internet is the leading aspect
- The trend toward closer international economic integration, resulting in the diminished importance of political boundaries. This trend is influenced partly by the first two trends, but even more powerfully by official policies aimed at trade and investment liberalisation
- The apparently growing significance of issues and problems extending beyond national boundaries and the resulting impetus to deal with them through some form of internationally concerted action
- The tendency toward uniformity (or “harmonisation”), by which norms, standards, rules, and practices are defined and enforced with respect to regions, or the world as a whole, rather than within the bounds of nation-states

2.2. The Engines of Globalisation

Globalisation has been driven by two main forces of economic globalisation. Frankel (2000) identifies, these as, first, reduced costs to transportation and communication in the private sector due to technological progress and innovation, and second, reduced policy barriers to trade and investment on the part of the public sector.

According to Mayer-Schoenberger and Hurley (2000), the first factor is the attributed to four important, unique qualities of new information and communication networks. The most important quality is digitisation. It means that by translating information into a universal binary code, any kind of communication can be handled through time and space by the same medium, as well as transmitted through its infrastructure. Texts, drawings, pictures, sounds, speech, video, and many other types of information, once translated into a binary code, are transmitted through digital networks. As a result, many traditionally distinct information and communication uses migrate from dedicated networks to this universal network, a development referred to as “convergence”.

The development of the information processing capacity and power is another important feature of the new information and communication networks. In 1965, Gordon Moore forecasted that the information processing capacity of microprocessors would double every eighteen months, while cost and power consumption would decrease with similar speed. This forecast was referred to as “Moore’s Law”, and still proves valid.

Network Bandwidth, the amount of information capable of being transmitted over a network, is a third useful characteristic of the new technology. Bandwidth does not just double every eighteen months, as Moore’s Law predicted, but triples every twelve months. Experts expect this annual tripling of bandwidth to continue for at least the next twenty-five years, referred to as Gilder’s Law.

Finally, globally standardised networks with decentralised communication architecture are the other important component of the new technology. The most successful of all digital networks, the Internet, is built on an entirely different paradigm. Its network is decentralised due to its communication standards and protocols. Since its development, it has been adopted globally by the pragmatic choice of millions of Internet users.

The second factor mentioned by Frankel (2000), namely the reduced policy barriers to trade and investment on the part of the public sector, has enabled currency speculation all over the world.

A third force, namely international corporate colonialism, is described by Goldsmith (2001). He claims that the massive effort to industrialise the developing world in the years since World War II was not motivated by “purely philanthropic” considerations. Instead, he argues, it was motivated by the need to bring the developing world into the orbit of the Wester trading system in order to create an ever-expanding market for the Western goods and services, and to gain source of cheap labour and raw materials for its industries.

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^[1] …and has not at last a result on…

^[2] This paper may be a bit more economical than necessary but as media management student in the 5th semester back home I will try to provide some economical facts as the media is a good (information) producing industry.

^[3] The media is a provider and carrier of information and knowledge.