One might think that smaller place is good, and actually it is, if not for the disadvantages of globalization. I will not say that I am against globalization, I am not. I do believe that globalization together with the development of technologies is very important for human welfare, but I feel that the misuse of those technologies and the fact that policy making is in the hands of elite countries (capitalists and developed countries), together with the fact that world ethics are heading towards materialistic and the inequality in distribution of sources and income as people tend to exploit the opportunities as soon as they arise. . All this and others are why globalization have many bad effects.
What is Technology?
Technology as on of the main driving forces of globalization can be defined as human innovation in action that involves the generation of knowledge and processes to develop systems that solve problems and extend human capabilities. Technology involves also he innovation, change or modification of the natural environment to satisfy perceived human needs and wants.
Many new technologies and innovations emerged in the last 30 - 40 years, some of which played major role of underpinning the globalization. The advancement of technology and its increased availability has emerged as a significant result of the processes of globalization. An example would be transportation and telecommunications technology which have greatly reduced the barriers of space and time. Transportation and telecommunications development led to what is known know of economic globalization and free trade. Free trade leads to increasing of production to cope with competition, and eventually more depletion of natural resources and more environmental damage.
Features of globalization:
Although globalization is wide spread phenomenon, still it is constraints by some factors such as political affairs, economical abilities and cultural differences.
But despite these constraints, globalization’s image is very obvious in our world, whether economically, politically or socially. The argument is weather the earth’s limits/ finite nature can cope with the globalization. Some of the main effects of globalization are:
* The efficiency effect:
Free trade and de-regulated market are the image of the economic globalization. Underpinned with technological development, increased competition in efficiency in production and selling has occurred. The competition drives countries to increase production and their exports / imports practices, especially the developing countries, in order to survive among the others. It is a result of this above scenario that the depletion of natural resources and emission of industrialized wastes have increased.
But this factor can be reached from another angel; resources efficiencies is an advantage as using more efficient technologies will eliminate wasting resources and losing energy.
* The expansion effect:
This factor is determining another side of the efficiency factor. It is a fact that efficient technology together with wide spread of cheaper means of transport lead to increase in the use of the sources or the technology in enormous numbers. This eventually has more environmental impact than using polluting devices in a limited numbers.
* Competition effect:
This can be demonstrated by the effect of globalization and developed technologies in countries compete to enhance their infrastructure build and cope with the modernization. Building more roads, buildings, Dams, highways, airports, etc definitely has environmental impacts of increased waste and emissions.
* The sell-out effect:
This effect, as I believe has the major impact on environment in addition to what it causes of exploitation and inequalities between people.
As agreed between academic and commentators globalization resulted of enlarging the gap between the rich and the poor countries. Poor or better call them developing countries, in order to provide the countries need, tend to import many goods and services. Paying for those goods and services is done from the income of exporting the country’s primary commodities. This is clearly applied to the countries with weak manufacturing base.
But, and for reasons like; the rapid technological development in rich countries, the move of the rich country’s economic activity towards services instead of manufacturing and because protectionist trade policies are operated by rich countries. For those reasons, the demand for primary commodities from the poor countries is deteriorating and eventually their prices go down.
For overcoming this, the poor countries respond by increasing their production and sale. “Thus, at its most basic level, there is increased resource exploitation either directly (e.g. mineral mining, logging in the tropical rainforests), or via degradation emanating from the processes used to create or extract the primary commodities (e.g. land degradation in agriculture, and air and ground pollution from mineral extractive processes)”. [Working with our environment, Them 4, page 28].
* The transport effect:
The interconnected expanding world lead to growing in transportation infrastructure, with all the environmental implication related to travel and transport.
* The geographical effect:
The economy situation and the global division, together with the use of technology in manufacturing and transportation enabled multinational companies to relocate significant part or all of their manufacturing operations to cheaper labour countries. (e.g. Nike subcontract the manufacturing process to factories in Southeast Asian countries). Hazardous wastes, which accumulate from the production are both difficult and expensive to dispose and hence are often dumped in those countries. The shifting part also includes exporting the wastes to poor countries.
Conclusion:
Globalization has a dark side. But it can also bring tremendous opportunities and benefits. Technologies can also be beneficial to the environment; this is particularly true of the biotic pesticides and the new technologies of saving land and water. There are vast possibilities in terms of energy and material conservation, new environment-friendly products applications in non-crop agriculture such as newer possibilities of agro-processing and waste recycling.
The real issue is not technology or globalization as a technological paradigm. It is institutions and rules that create powerful incentives and preconditions for sustainable development to take place. Equally important is the nature of incentives and deterrents for positive and negative behavior.
References:
- Working with our Environments: Technology for a Sustainable Future (T172), Theme 4, Sections 1 – 5.
