Globalization: A Critical Examination

Author: Yu Jianxing
Publisher:
Publish Date: 2003-03-01
Features: In this book, the author focuses on examining globalization as an analytical framework. Starting from the fact that globalization is an extremely important, objective reality and trend in the contemporary world, the author emphasizes that establishing an analytical framework for globalization should become a crucial premise for observing, thinking about, and solving global economic, political, cultural, and social issues. The book's examination of the new changes in the role of nation-states in the era of globalization, the transformation and development of public administration, the transformation and development of global cultural change, the fluctuations of socialist thought, and the anti-globalization movement all attempt to validate the explanatory power and limitations of the globalization analytical framework. The development of socialism with Chinese characteristics is the author's starting point and destination for discussing the globalization analytical framework.
While pointing out that the issue of globalization and China first involves a temporal dimension, and that we must recognize the necessity and importance of China's participation in the wave of globalization from the perspective of the logic of social and historical development, the author particularly emphasizes that in the era of globalization, socialism must take on a new form to transcend capitalism and address global challenges. We must not only dare to integrate into globalization but also skillfully integrate into it; replacing the old model of "challenge and response" with the new model of "response and innovation."
Later in the writing of this book, on March 20th, the Iraq War broke out. This war, the first in human history to be broadcast live on television, brought many major issues of the era of globalization to the forefront of everyone's attention. As many television program commentators pointed out, the warring parties were not living in the same era. In chronological terms, Iraqis and Americans were undoubtedly contemporaries. However, in terms of social development levels, they were not. Iraq's weaponry belonged to the pre-industrial and semi-industrial period, while the United States belonged to the post-industrial and information age. Yet, just as people do not simply assume that the sovereignty of a nation-state being weakened means it has been "invaded," they also do not simply believe that the high-tech aircraft and tanks of the United States are bringing "freedom" and "liberation" to the Iraqi people. It can be said that the Iraq War vividly highlighted the tensions between globalization and its variant, Americanization, on the one hand, and the sovereignty of nation-states on the other; between globalization and locality; and between universality and diversity. Solving such issues tests the courage and wisdom of humanity in the era of globalization.