"Underbelly of Globalization"
Trade barriers are becoming a redundant concept, constraint on time and distance is being conquered. Moreover, mankind reveals their goodness through extensive international assistance, and abundant cultural exchanges are contributing to the splendor of civilization. Advancement in technology, medicine, knowledge, and so much more is uncomparable to any progressive time. Arguably, we benefits from this so-called "Globalization" in many ways, even unawarely. However, there are drawbacks, shortcomings to this extremely advantageous phenomenon and those could be presented with three apparent aspects.
A growing inequality can be one of them, and the intensified competition is deepening this injustice. Not only an economic polarization, a gap between rich and poor, but discrimination against talent of no use has been also caused by multiple shapes of competition. As social tendency rapidly swifts, requirements for capacity changes from moment to moment. Every moment welcomes each different abilities, and that makes furious competition, and that makes inequality of talent. Poor and rich both still exist, needless to say, even though we are living in this much amazingly progressed era.
Another drawback is standardization of culture, collapse in cultural diversity. Advance means the existence of top bottom concept which implies that something has lagged behind and something is winning mainstream. This can be easily proved when we think of few examples. We can see skyscrapers in everywhere, every country without any great effort, and we know that initial high-rise was in United States. Frequency and leverage of sharing the superpowers' culture, obviously, exceed that of small and weak nations'. But we must understand that every each culture should stand even, impartially.
Last but not least, brittleness by complexity could be a Achilles' heel of globalization. Putting it simply, what happens in one place very quickly affects everything else. A great number of elements are weaved like tapestry and this give rise to domino effect. Entanglement causes a systemic risk, and we've seen it in the financial crisis, in the pandemic flu. We couldn't decide anything unto ourselves, independently, because there would be too much factors to consider in every matters. Since this will become virulent, we have to build resilience against it.
To conclude, we should be aware that globalization is not wholly good. There are shortcomings; Inequality with Competition, Standardization of Culture, and Brittleness by Complexity. All of this is not something could be overlooked just thanks to its merits. Then, what shall we do and what can we do? Asking us for remarkable changes, society-level changes would be unreasonable demand. Then what? We could just think about our globalized time, and we should not deem this as the affairs of another. Also, considering our future and getting ready for it can be our mission, and that's enough. Maybe, that's more than enough.
Eunsol Lee/ Final draft/ Wed 3-4
ReplyDelete"Underbelly of Globalization"
Trade barriers are becoming a redundant concept, constraint on time and distance is being conquered. Moreover, mankind reveals their goodness through extensive international assistance, and abundant cultural exchanges are contributing to the splendor of civilization. Advancement in technology, medicine, knowledge, and so much more is uncomparable to any progressive time. Arguably, we benefits from this so-called "Globalization" in many ways, even unawarely. However, there are drawbacks, shortcomings to this extremely advantageous phenomenon and those could be presented with three apparent aspects.
A growing inequality can be one of them, and the intensified competition is deepening this injustice. Not only an economic polarization, a gap between rich and poor, but discrimination against talent of no use has been also caused by multiple shapes of competition. As social tendency rapidly swifts, requirements for capacity changes from moment to moment. Every moment welcomes each different abilities, and that makes furious competition, and that makes inequality of talent. Poor and rich both still exist, needless to say, even though we are living in this much amazingly progressed era.
Another drawback is standardization of culture, collapse in cultural diversity. Advance means the existence of top bottom concept which implies that something has lagged behind and something is winning mainstream. This can be easily proved when we think of few examples. We can see skyscrapers in everywhere, every country without any great effort, and we know that initial high-rise was in United States. Frequency and leverage of sharing the superpowers' culture, obviously, exceed that of small and weak nations'. But we must understand that every each culture should stand even, impartially.
Last but not least, brittleness by complexity could be a Achilles' heel of globalization. Putting it simply, what happens in one place very quickly affects everything else. A great number of elements are weaved like tapestry and this give rise to domino effect. Entanglement causes a systemic risk, and we've seen it in the financial crisis, in the pandemic flu. We couldn't decide anything unto ourselves, independently, because there would be too much factors to consider in every matters. Since this will become virulent, we have to build resilience against it.
To conclude, we should be aware that globalization is not wholly good. There are shortcomings; Inequality with Competition, Standardization of Culture, and Brittleness by Complexity. All of this is not something could be overlooked just thanks to its merits. Then, what shall we do and what can we do? Asking us for remarkable changes, society-level changes would be unreasonable demand. Then what? We could just think about our globalized time, and we should not deem this as the affairs of another. Also, considering our future and getting ready for it can be our mission, and that's enough. Maybe, that's more than enough.