Globalization and Latin America

Despite the oppressive military regime in Burma tries to lie true face of cyclone disaster, people around the world are watching photos of victims and their tragic lives from television screens and internet. In Beijing, many Chinese student wearing American jeans are crowed in the McDonald’s restaurant and listening Rolling Stone’s music. Advanced technologies are touching breathes of other part of the world and break through even isolated societies. At the octagon stage of Ultimate Fight Night in Las Vegas, bloodshed bodies are sharing and contesting different material arts all over globe. The world becomes shrinking. In short period, people realize what is going on in other places. Globalization is the increasing interconnection of all part of the world, particularly in communication and commerce but in culture and politics as well.

Globalization means openness to exchanges around the world. The concepts of globalization and interdependency may be similarly, but the globalization places are more focusing on the growing similarity of people, places and things is borderless world. Many people define that globalization is an increase in interconnection or a rise in transition flows. In fact, the globalization is the processes of reaching the single place, global village. The global homogenization processes drive the people, things and places in different places more similarity in interrelated areas. The revolution in technology is the one of the primary factors in contemporary globalization. Distance-shrinking technologies create different parts of the world to be connected. People can talk each other easily and cheaply. They can travel to various part of the world more quickly and share information across borders instantaneously. Information technologies especially computers and internet have abilities to transform the way people around the world communicate and interact. Indeed, it also becomes an impact on politics. In authoritarian Yugoslavia, for example, when the Serbia president Milosevic had shut the radio station down, Serbia opposition at Radio B92 used the internet to go their message out. At the same time, student resistance sent encouragements and demonstration schedules from the phone text messages. After the cyber broadcast, international pressure led the reopening of the station. In 1994, when the Chiapas rebellion broke out in southern Mexico, within hours of the first gunshots of the rebels, the internet news were full with messages from human rights groups. The world wide media, human rights groups and international organizations focused on Chiapas rebels and also sharply limited the Mexico government’s response. As a result, the bloody insurgency changed to largely non-violent conflicts. Mexico foreign minister, Jose Angel Gurria, later remarked “The shorts lasted ten days, and ever since, the war has been a war on the internet.” In addition, technology development is also protecting the nature of security threats and political relations among states. After Saddam invaded to Kuwait, he realized that the Kuwaiti government had already transferred all of the money from their accounts. Communication revolutions are also a main factor for cultural globalization. New music, programs and performance arts can be better shared on satellite or cable televisions. During the cold war, many young Russians had watched performance of the Battle band behind the Iron curtain of the Soviet Unions, and thought social changes in their communist system.

Free trades and open markets are some kinds of economic globalizations and those create many multinational corporations. The multinational corporations also need division of labors on a worldwide basis when the corporations extend their business across political boundaries. At the end of the 1990s the German Volkswagen firm introduced an updated version of automobile known as bug. Its production facilities were entirely based in Mexico, but its markets were in the United States and around the world. In the same way, American factories are located in northern Mexico, China, Vietnam and other developing countries to produce goods for sale back in the United States. The owners of these factories unquestionable sought cheap labors and lax regulations. Despite wages were barely 10 % of what American workers would earn, many workers, including large members of women found the labor policies more enlightened and foremen better behaved in foreign firm. In addition, those lower wages are even better than Mexican counterparts. On the other hand, foreign multinational corporations created more job opportunities for local residents. When the biggest Nike Company opened in Saigon, many local residents benefited from its workplaces. But will poverty level wages improve for worker in such factories? Lack of labor unions and insurance are forcing workers to insecurity, and sometimes, the factories often leaked chemical waste. Not only global competition and reduction in government services, in the name of the free market principles, contribute to new problems. Some parts of Africa lost traditional manufacturing jobs to new global competitions, “unemployment rates of 30 percent or more were common.” Prostitution and even the sale of body organs showed the increasingly desperate poverty in some society. In south and Southeast Asia, rate of child labors rose. On the other hand, new global opportunities permitted an increase in per capita income in places like China and India, and a growing middle class develop in Latin America, India and China, but urban slum and exploited labor expand as well.
In 1994, when the North American Free Trade Agreement ( NAFTA) between Canada, Mexico, and the United States was formed, many supporters and critics of NAFTA have been debating consequences of economic globalization and free trade agendas. According to its supporters, the agreements will bring benefits to all three countries. It can speed up their productive energies and create better-pay jobs in efficient economic liberalism. In 1999, Mexico replaced Japan as the United States’ second largest partner after Canada. Supporters of NAFTA point out that Mexico economy is benefiting from foreign investments. Mexico economy grew at a healthy 6.9 percent rate in 2000, and inflation and interest rates were down in 2001. Overall, NAFTA supporters believe that Mexico has successfully emerge in better economic stage from old boom-and-bust , high inflation, debt-ridden model that characterized it and much of Latin America. However, critics argued that hundreds of thousands of US jobs would be lost as industries relocated at Mexico to take advantage of the lower wages there. On the other hand, despite unemployment rate in Mexico has declined since NAFTA went in effect, more Mexicans are underemployment in low-paying jobs and overall income inequality in Mexico has increased. Critics also argue that NAFTA does not provide the promised benefits to workers and its original goals have been attained. Indeed, in dependency theorists’ eyes, North gets a lot of profits and cheap raw materials from poor South , and the gap rich and poor between South and North becomes wider. However, despite many people are arguing on negative and positive effect of free trades policies of NAFTA, it is still attractive to other Latin America developing states. Chile has already expressed his desire to join NAFTA, and Chile and the United States singed bilateral free trades in 2003.

Another emerging global norm is democracy, and the growing democratization of the world is one of the faces of political globalization. According to economic liberalism, free trades and open markets could promote democratic regimes in globe. Therefore, in the five years after Second World War, the United States created Bretton Woods systems to manage the political economy. Three years later, the rules of the international economic game were set up. Its three pillars of international institution such as the WTO, IMF and the World Bank are some forms of political globalization. From its loans and aids, the institution contributes reconstructions and economic stability of developing countries. And later, the influences of institutions set up norms for democratic atmospheres and balanced communist empire Soviet Unions during Cold War. However, critics argued that interest rates of IMF and World Bank are too high and gives abundance on poor countries. In addition, critics believe that loans and aids of IMF and World Banks are pulling the strings of political stages of developing countries to follow political hegemony of the United States and its neo-imperialism. Among critics, Cuban president Castro and Venezuelan president Hugo Chavez, Nicaraguan president Daniel Ortega and Ecuador president Rafael Correa are significant figures in Latin America. Nicaraguan President Daniel Ortega said Sunday that he hopes to “get out of that prison” of IMF debt and that “we are negotiating with the Fund to leave the Fund.” President Hugo Chavez announced he would pull Venezuela out of the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund and said “We will no longer have to go to Washington nor to the IMF nor to the World Bank, not to anyone,” Indeed, socialism based on welfare and medical system in Latin America countries are still challenging liberal democracy order, the political globalization and its institutions. On the other hand, some critics point out that Bretton Wood system, and its institutions could not bring democracy according to experience of Chile and China. During dictator Pinochet era in Chile, many human rights violation and series of brutalities were committed by corrupted murdered Chilean government despite Pinochet had Chicago graduated economics experts and received economics aid packages from the United States and Britain. Although China became a member of WTO in 2001 and special economic zones improve lives of Chinese people, his human rights violations and oppression are still been breaking out.
However, another global governance, the United Nations has played more active role since the end of the cold War. Peacemaking forces and humanitarian interventions are trying to help victims in civil war regions and natural disaster areas. International organizations such as Red Cross, human right watch and doctors beyond the borders also contact with people under oppressive governments in Burma, China and Zimbabwe forced to change the prison condition and human right abuse and tortures. Nevertheless, helping victims of earthquakes in China and Pakistan, countries struck by Tsunami and Hurricane Katrina are symbols of political globalization. The Burmese military government response on cyclone victims are strongly condemned by the United Nations, and the political globalization send the message “people around the world have responsibilities to help suffering people.” In addition, the United Nations also created International Criminal Court to deal with cease of genocide, crime against humanity, and war crime. Bringing Serbia president Milosevic to war crime court is one of the successes of the political globalization. At the same time, the growth of NGOs and their capacities to influence world politics are striking characteristics of today’s global system. Civil societies and NGOs, sometimes, help to topple the dictators, and involvements of civil societies in Philippine democracy movement is also one of the successful evidences of political globalization. Therefore, the authoritarian regimes such as North Korea, China and Burma are still refusing forming of civil societies and free moves of NGOs in their countries.
Spread of democracy as a political system is also related with spread of democratic values and norms which are parts of cultural globalization. At the same time, reduced political barriers, the pace of cultural exchange around the world accelerated at the end of the 1990s. Art Shows, symphony exchanges, scientific conference, and Internet contact increased as well. Within single season in cities like Tokyo, New York, Berlin, Paris and Bangkok, musicians and artists held posts literally. Cultural globalization obviously involved increasing exposure to American movies and television shows. Series like “Baywatch” won massive foreign audience. MTV also spread Western images and sounds to youth audience almost everywhere. Western beauty standards, based on the models and film stars, won wide exposure, expressed among other things in widely sought international beauty pageants. Holiday presents are also in international air. American style Christmas trappings, including gift giving, lights, and Santa Clause, spread not only Christian background, like France, but also place like Muslim Istanbul and Buddhism Thailand. The spread of fast food restaurants from the United States, headed by McDonald’s and Sushi from Japan are most striking international influences of cultural globalization. In addition, American- style blue jeans showed up almost everywhere, and dress was internationalized. A major export items for Chinese manufacturing involved Western clothing pirated from famous brand names. Indeed, the penetration of cultural globalization creates the cities to urbanization.
However, many countries opposed the erosion of tradition by global cultural patterns. When so many Japanese children seemed to be relying on folks and fast food instead of traditional customs, the Japanese government subsidized training the use of chopsticks. The French government periodically resisted the incorporation of English words into French language. Many European countries try to regulate the member of immigrants from Africa, Asia and the West India, in the interest of preventing dominance for families and workers for European backgrounds. In some Islamic countries, fundamentalist denounced girls dressed like European-style and shouted “We are not on sale for West.” Peasants in small village of France smashed window glasses of McDonald’s restaurants and threatened to manager to get Mc Donald’s out from French‘s soil; they believed that Mc Donald’s represents American culture. On the other hand, the United States rejected a wide variety of international treaties, including a provision for regulation against war crimes, because they might interfere with national sovereignty.
Many critics claimed that globalization is working to the benefits of rich nations and the wealthy generally, rather than the majority of the world population. They also pointed out that growing inequality of wealth, with the top quarter of the world’s population growing richer during the 1990s while the rest of the people increasingly suffered. Those evidences and experiences lead to the challenge between Latin America especially in Venezuela and Cuba and the United States. The government’s intervention on economy and social welfare programs, restriction on free trades and refusal of liberal democracy order are showing rejection to some aspects of globalization. Religious fundamentalist see the United States’ dominance in international politics as behaviors of Great Satan to their societies. However, Latin America or a third world country or different cultural societies can not stay alone at their homes. When the high technologies bring cultural patterns and social-change philosophies, freedom of creation, the globalization is inevitable. Countries need to negotiate for interests of majority people to maintain the peace.