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 issues related to the global economy, politics, culture, and society. 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, cultural shifts in the global era, the evolution of socialist thought, and anti-globalization movements all attempt to validate the explanatory power and limitations of the globalization analytical framework. The development of socialism with Chinese characteristics serves as the starting point and destination for the author's argumentation on the globalization analytical framework.
While pointing out that the issue of globalization and China first involves a temporal dimension, the author stresses the necessity and importance of China's participation in the wave of globalization from the perspective of the logic of social and historical development. At the same time, 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 do so; replacing the old model of "challenge and response" with the new model of "response and innovation."
Later in the writing process, on March 20th, the Iraq War broke out. This war, the first to be broadcast live on television in human history, brought numerous major issues of the globalization era 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," nor do they simply believe that the United States' advanced aircraft and tanks are delivering "freedom" and "liberation" to the Iraqi people. It can be argued 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 localism; and between universality and diversity. Solving such issues tests the courage and wisdom of humanity in the era of globalization.