For hundreds of thousands of years, humans have been tribal. Being tribal probably started as a pure survival strategy but evolved to become a primary factor in the success of humans as the dominant species on earth. It is embedded in our DNA.
All tribes have their own cultures which evolve over long periods of time. Cultures generally do not change or adapt to change quickly. And then globalization happened - very quickly. Indeed, it has largely happened within the last 50 years or so and has accelerated over that time. This is a very short time period relative to the evolution of humans and the time required for cultures to change and adapt. No wonder there is a sudden surge in xenophobia, racism, and other nasty behaviours. There is a heightened fear of change, Metathesiophobia. The pace of change of technology, the global movement of goods and services, and jobs, and thoughts and cultural practices, and above all, the global movement of people all contribute to Metathesiophobia. Many people cannot even verbalize their unease but there is a general angst among people which has been manifesting itself in many uncivil ways. Baring the complete collapse of civil society, globalization is not going to go away. We must adapt, and adapt quickly, to survive. Adapting to globalization is the biggest test of survival the human species has ever faced. In the past, the success of the human species can be attributed in large part to our ability to adapt to changing conditions and situations. We are unique in our ability for complex reasoning and our innate desire to cooperate, and so we should have the capacity to adapt to globalization. Somewhat paradoxically, technology might even help us. We now have an unprecedented ability to communicate instantaneously among different languages of the world and to see current events in the context of a wider history. We might still be a collection of tribes, but increasingly we are understanding that we are part of the same species. I'm optimistic that we will survive globalization. It will not happen automatically. There will have to be a lot of dialogue and education. We will all have a role to play. Canada can potentially be a role model for the rest of the world. In addition to our individual responsibility, our governments should also promote and support a vision of this possibility.
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There is an ongoing debate amongst historians as to when Globalization actually started. Some argue it started when Christopher Columbus discovered the Americas, and yet others argue it started long before then. 1750 is cited as the start of “modern waves of globalization”.
There is no question however that globalization had a significant uptick after WWII with the most significant growth occurring with the advent of the technological era in the late 1900’s. However you define globalization, it has never been a smooth progression. There have been periods when globalization actually appeared to have declined. There are wide-ranging debates about the pros and cons of globalization, however, I am going to focus on one clear benefit - the expansion of economic activity facilitated by trade deals around the world due largely to globalization. What Donald Trump and his administration do not seem to understand it that this aspect of globalization helped lift over a billion out of poverty and into middle classes in countries all around the world. It is a form of wealth distribution that benefits all parties. The US now has the potential of over a billion new global customers. The US has benefited from low cost technology (from global manufacturers) which has helped it grow and become even wealthier (albeit poorly distributed within the US which is now a source of many problems for them). Donald Trump and his administration is trying to preserve jobs which are going to be lost to rapid developments in technology. The majority of jobs in the USA today did not even exist 50 years ago and that change is just going to quicken. What Donald Trump and his administration should be doing is focusing on educating people in a way that allows them to benefit from the rapid and disruptive changes in jobs due to technology. The USA should be focusing on developing industries that will create these future jobs, many of which could benefit from open global markets. As it is, Donald Trump is focused on tearing up trade deals and building walls, both of which will cut off the USA from dramatically increasing global markets as more and more people rise out of poverty and into the middle classes. In many respects, the USA is no longer “great” nor “good”, and Trump is going to make that even worse. The decline of the American empire started in the early 2000’s and that decline is about to quicken under Trump. |
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February 2024
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