OF BEING CONNECTED

Economic Times
N. Kumaraguru, TNN
15 Sep, 2007, 0344 hrs IST
India

The word globalisation has become so common in our life, in whatever
way we understand the term, that we have come to the conclusion that
the process is the last step to development. Most of us think that
it is altogether a new phenomenon that started with the formation of
WTO. Here we fail to see the bigger picture as we confine ourselves
only to the globalisation of trade and commerce. Webster’s dictionary
in its 1961 edition described globalisation as "making worldwide
in scope and application". In this sense, the spread of humans over
50,000 years ago to almost all parts of the world from East Africa’s
Rift Valley is the first globalisation – globalisation of human
beings. Gradually people moved to other places out of the basic human
urge to seek a better and more fulfilling life. How we see the world
today as a well-connected place, where anyone can do anything in any
field from anywhere, is the culmination of the efforts of so many
people all over the world, that lapped up millennia in the process.

It was not only trade that led to globalisation, but there are other
forces too that spurred the activity.

With the passage of time, four major groups of globalisers emerged –
traders, preachers, adventurers and warriors. As Nayan Chanda puts
it in his book Bound Together – How traders, preachers, adventurers,
and warriors shaped globalisation, "the urge to profit by trading,
the desire to spread religious beliefs, the desire to explore
new lands and the ambition to dominate others by armed might –
all had been assembled by 6000 BC to start the process we now call
globalisation". Then, slowly, empires and new settlements were formed
throughout the world. India also witnessed its rise as a major centre
of activity with the Harappan civilisation and the Chera and Pandya
kingdoms in South India. Arikamedu in Tamil Nadu had been a major
trading centre for the Romans from the first century after Christ
and the Malabar coast for the Arabs, Persians, Armenians and the Jews.

The formation of the Silk Road, that ran through three continents,
was a major inland trade route of that time. It was also a huge
conveyer belt of armies of various nations.

Later, the capture of Jerusalem and Constantinople by Muslims forced
the seafaring nations like Spain, Portugal and Italy to find new sea
routes to the East, which was then the only source of fine-quality
textile, spices and incense. Improvements in ship design and techniques
gained momentum after 1300 AD, and the introduction of steamship in
1780 was another major boost to global trade and colonisation. Until
the Industrial Revolution, Indian-made textiles remained the biggest
major manufacturing export in the world. India’s GDP was 25% of the
world GDP in 1700.

Contact of the western empires was not only confined to India,
but to Indonesia, Jawa, Sumatra and China as well. Portuguese
apothecary-turned-trader Tome Pires wrote about Malacca in 1512 that
"sixty-one nations (are) represented in its trade and some eighty-four
languages spoken at the port".

The spread of major religions like Buddhism, Christianity and
Islam gave another push to globalisation. They were most appealing
to traders, who spread ideas, cultures, foods and languages far
and wide. The religions also helped the growth of languages and
trade. Here, we can relate the growth of vernacular languages, paper
and tea trade with the spread of Buddhism and the growth of Arabic and
coffee trade with that of Islam. As their tenets found ready followers
in traders, these religions began transcending national boundaries
without much difficulties. It is quite in place to quote Chanda here
as he says, "global NGOs like Amnesty International and Human Rights
Watch play the role of old preachers in the present day, by creating
global consciousness about the sufferings of human beings in various
corners of the world. Yale professor of missions and world Christianity
Lamin Sanneh says that "missionary translation was instrumental in the
emergence of indigenous resistance to colonialism" also. Missionary
zeal too led to the discovery of new lands as exemplified in the life
of Scottish missionary David Livingstone, who laid open almost one
million square miles of Africa.

The ambition to control the whole world and greed have been
giving birth to so many empires throughout history – from the
largest contiguous land empire of the Mongols to the largest and
longest-enduring empire of the British. Today, the sole superpower
in the world, the US, has more than 700 military installations
world-over. Similarly, the spirit of adventurism and desire to attain
personal glory had been also driving countless adventurers to find
new places, nations and new routes. Marco Polo, Christopher Columbus,
Vasco da Gama, Ferninand Magellan, Bortolomeu Dias, et al, deserve
notice here.

Now most of the things we use in our daily life – from pens, jeans,
shirts, mobile phone, iPods to bikes and cars – have some parts, or at
least the basic technology designs, made in some other countries. In a
way, we all, as consumers, have become agents of globalisation. Apart
from the traditional groups, new groups of globalisers in the form
of students, patients and doctors have come to add up to the speed.

But what makes the word so new now is the velocity with which products
and ideas are transferred, the ever-growing volume of consumers,
products and their ideas, their variety, and the resultant increase
in the visibility of the process.

Globalisation has been suggested, though not always explicitly,
as a panacea for all the ills of under-development in several
nations. IMF’s first deputy managing director Anne O. Krueger said in
2002: "Globalisation is a process that has been going almost throughout
recorded history, and that has conferred huge benefits. Globalisation
involves changes, so it is often feared, even by those who end up
gaining from it. And some do lose in the short run when things change."

Thomas Friedman in his book The World Is Flat says: "Whenever
civilisation has gone through one of the disruptive, dislocating
technological revolutions – like Gutenberg’s introduction of the
printing press – the whole world has changed in profound ways." He goes
on to say that laying of optical fibre cable across the Atlantic is
one such revolution that helped speed up globalisation, and millions
of youth in developing countries like India and China, who otherwise
were not able to capitalise on their suppressed and neglected talents,
earn unimaginable money through outsourcing of software development
and IT-enabled services. But the picture is not so rosy as Friedman
or Krueger depicts.

As Marx and Engels point out in Communist Manifesto, "the need of a
constantly expanding market for its products chases the bourgeoisie
over the entire surface of the globe….in place of the old wants,
satisfied by the production of the country, we find new wants,
requiring for their satisfaction the products of distant lands and
climes". So, those at the receiving end in the international trade
agreements and those who have not achieved any development through
the industrial revolution naturally feel left out.

Not only in the underdeveloped world that globalisatoion has tilted the
scales heavily against the less privileged, even in developed countries
like the US the gap between the rich and the not-so-rich is widening. A
US Federal reserve survey in 2004 found that the top 1% of the American
families held more wealth than the bottom 90% combined. Similarly,
in China – which is riding high on the globalisation wave tossing
aside the red garb – less than 0.5% of the households now own over 60%
of the nation’s personal wealth. Globalisation has some unintended
effects also.

But for the ‘globalised’ world, the anti-globalisation and
alter-globalisation movements – the former trying to stop the
globalisation train and the latter trying to get the left-out millions
on board- cannot get such wide attention. Only when their views too
are integrated into talks, globalisation can bring the desired results.