Anti Globalization Movement
The anti-globalization movement is a social and political movement that emerged in the late 20th century, advocating for the protection of local economies, cultures, and environments from the negative impacts of globalization. It is characterized by protests against international trade agreements, corporate power, and economic inequality. The movement seeks to promote fair trade, sustainable development, and social justice.
6 Key excerpts on "Anti Globalization Movement"
eBook - ePub- Luke Martell(Author)
- 2016(Publication Date)
- Polity(Publisher)
...The movements are also sometimes referred to as alter-globalization. Anti-globalization The oppositional character of the anti-globalization movement is captured by the ‘anti’ in its name. What specifically are its concerns, what is global or anti-global about it, and how has it come about (see Gill 2000)? The movement is principally against neoliberal globalization. This is seen as giving power to big corporations and the state in rich countries so that they can gain access to developing world markets, exploit cheap labour and loosen environmental standards. The actions of big corporations globally lead to cultural globalization and a loss of cultural diversity, as argued in chapter 4. These corporations override the rights of indigenous peoples and can exploit local areas and then move on if, say, local environments are exhausted or polluted, leaving the consequences for the local inhabitants. Some anti-globalizers want greater equality of mobility, with free movement for people as well as capital, or perhaps greater constraints on capital. However, nationalist anti-globalizers want more restrictions on immigration. Free trade is seen to occur in a relationship of inequality between rich and poor countries, and inconsistently, as rich countries maintain protection or subsidies for their own industries and agriculture while expecting openness from the developing world. As far as capital mobility goes, anti-globalizers want to see greater fairness and justice in corporate behaviour, especially towards people in developing countries. Organizations or treaties which are seen to facilitate free trade and the freedom of capital to exploit local communities are strongly opposed, for instance the World Bank, the IMF, agreements of the G8 and WTO, the NAFTA area, the OECD’s Multilateral Agreement on Investment and TTIP. A related key concern is with democracy. Anti-globalization movements want to rescue democratic control for ordinary people...
eBook - ePubThe Rise of Lifestyle Activism
From New Left to Occupy
- Nikos Sotirakopoulos(Author)
- 2016(Publication Date)
- Palgrave Macmillan(Publisher)
...13). Thus, at a time when the left was in soul-searching mode, the cause of global inequalities and of resisting a new opponent, ‘neo-liberalism’, led to the building of a global movement targeting the perceived malfunctions of globalization: the so-called ‘anti-globalization, or ‘alter-globalization’, or ‘Global Justice’ movement. One main characteristic of this movement is its diversity and the multiple forms it took. Carter and Morland describe it as a heterogeneous network, linking local, national and international campaigns and addressing a variety of issues (2004, p. 86). This multiplicity has to do with the fact that the movement, rather than having specific tangible goals, aimed to oppose the various alleged evils of globalization, which according to Kiely are the following (2006, p. 166): (a) intensified exploitation of labour (an alleged global ‘race to the bottom’ in terms of wages and social welfare) (b) increasing social inequality (c) political inequality (within a state and among states) (d) cultural homogenization, based on the Western consumerist model (e) increased environmental degradation. Setting a date for the beginning of this movement is a difficult task; however, since the Zapatista uprising in the Chiapas province of Mexico against the NAFTA agreement has been iconic for a new generation of activists, one might identify 1994 as the symbolic starting point. In 1995 the Corporate Watch network was established in the UK as a watchdog for the activity of multinational corporations, in order to raise awareness and organize campaigns and boycotts on a global scale. In the following two years, the Zapatistas called two international meetings (encuentros) for diverse groups of people, institutions and politicians opposing ‘neo-liberalism’ to gather, join forces and multiply power through a global solidarity network (Wall 2005, pp...
eBook - ePubIntroduction to Sociological Theory
Theorists, Concepts, and their Applicability to the Twenty-First Century
- Michele Dillon(Author)
- 2019(Publication Date)
- Wiley-Blackwell(Publisher)
...Sklair argues that the movement’s success to date lies in its strategic ability to make connections between the twin crises of capitalist globalization: class polarization and ecological sustainability/environmental issues (Sklair 2002 : 278). The antiglobalization movement challenges the globalization practices of transnational corporations, the activities of the state and the transnational capitalist class, and the culture and ideology of consumerism (2002: 278). Many antiglobalization efforts are highly localized (e.g., opposition in particular towns/neighborhoods to Walmart and to other “big box” stores). However, as Sklair contends, “Precisely because capitalist globalization works mainly through transnational practices, in order to challenge these practices politically, the movements that challenge them have to work transnationally too” (2002: 280). This entails political confrontation with local, national, and transnational politicians and officials as well as political activism centered on strategic national and international symbolic sites (e.g., the WTO; the G20 summit and World Bank meetings; and annual World Economic Forum meetings at Davos, Switzerland). One such transnational activist channel is the (“antiglobalization”) World Social Forum (WSF), in which Wallerstein, concerned about the globalization crisis (discussed previously), is active. The WSF sees itself as a counterforce against the “pro‐globalization” World Economic Forum of the financial and political elite...
eBook - ePub- Michele Ford, Michele Ford(Authors)
- 2012(Publication Date)
- Routledge(Publisher)
...8 The anti-globalization movement in the Philippines Dominique Caouette and Teresa S. Encarnacion Tadem In November 1996, the Philippines hosted the Eighth Annual Summit of the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC). At least five different parallel and counter-summits were organized, including the Manila’s People’s Forum, the People’s Conference Against Imperialist Globalization and the Asia-Pacific Initiative for Sustainable Development. 1 Each reflected the approaches of different elements of the burgeoning anti-globalization movement in the Philippines and their different positions on whether to resist, reject or reform the APEC process. These, in turn, reflected the broad divisions that characterize the vibrant, yet divided, Philippine Left – which has been dominated by an internal crisis within the Communist Party of the Philippines and its National Democratic Front since 1992 and the subsequent emergence of several contending political blocs, which joined existing social democratic and other left-leaning Christian democratic parties and organizations (Caouette 2004 ; Quimpo 2008 ; Reid 2000 ; Weekley 2001). In this chapter, we examine the way the anti-globalization movement in the Philippines is organized in order to highlight its rich and variegated character and the underlying tensions that exist within it. What emerges from this analysis is a picture not of a unified social movement, but of a highly segmented and fractured field of contention, divided by ideology and political affiliation. Theoretically, this chapter confirms what Della Porta and Tarrow (2005) and others have argued, namely that social movements and activists are ‘reflective’ social actors that constantly assess their international experiences, oftentimes resulting in the institutionalization of ‘tactics and frames that appear to succeed in more than one venue’ (Della Porta and Tarrow 2005 : 8)...
eBook - ePubGlobal Justice Movement
Cross-national and Transnational Perspectives
- Donatella Della Porta, Massimiliano Andretta, Angel Calle, Helene Combes, Nina Eggert, Marco G. Giugni, Jennifer Hadden, Manuel Jimenez, Raffaele Marchetti(Authors)
- 2015(Publication Date)
- Routledge(Publisher)
...Since the last decade, in fact, reactions to what activists refer to as “hegemonic neoliberalism” have brought about a resurgence of social issues, although blended with “new social movement” issues. In this sense, the GJM refocuses attention on the structural nature of social conflicts, dismissing the hypothesis of a definitive institutionalization of the “class cleavage” (Rokkan 1982). At least some of the various streams of protest that, as the contributions to this volume demonstrate, converged in the formation of the GJM can be interpreted as a reaction to the retrenchment of the welfare state and the increasing inequalities, revitalizing a social cleavage that had appeared as tamed, if not pacified. Globalization—in its different meanings and understandings—has also produced increasing conflicts at both the local and the transnational levels. Economic globalization has raised specific problems that mobilize actors, both old and new. Signs of emerging political opposition to the consequences of a forced convergence of socioeconomic models of development were noted as developing already in the first part of the 1990s (Berger 1998, 37). Globalization tends to favor if not a homogeneous and selfconscious global working class, at least growing contacts among workers in different states (Silver 2003, 10). In the North of the world, the increase in unemployment and especially in job insecurity and unprotected working conditions brought about frequent mobilizations of both industrial and agricultural workers. In the South, unions seemed capable of taking advantage of globalization, with labor conflict developing in at least some of the countries where capital was now invested—as Beverly Silver (2003, 164) observes, “the deep crisis into which the core labor movement fell in the 1980s was not immediately replicated elsewhere...
eBook - ePubThe Conservative Challenge to Globalization
Anglo-American Perspectives
- Ray Kiely(Author)
- 2020(Publication Date)
- Agenda Publishing(Publisher)
...7 Conservatism and the political economy of (anti-)globalization: a critique This chapter expands and extends the critique of conservative responses to globalization outlined in the last chapter. This chapter focuses specifically on the political economy of actually existing globalization. It does so in four sections. First, conservative (and other) arguments both supportive and critical of free trade are considered, through a detailed analysis of the case for comparative advantage and free trade. This opening section problematizes this case, but equally suggests that at least some of the conservative critiques of free trade, including those associated with the Trump administration, are unconvincing and likely to make matters worse. In keeping the focus on the US, the second section then considers the question of US decline and asks whether US (capitalist) hegemony in the international order has declined, or whether in fact it has globalized. The section suggests that it is more a case of the latter than former, and this informs the discussion in the third section. This examines the practice of the Trump administration and questions the viability of protectionism for securing the goal of “making America great again”. Equally, however, the section questions the extent to which the Trump administration is not so much isolationist or protectionist, as opposed to using the threat of tariffs to extract concessions from countries on a largely bilateral basis. The section concludes that there are both protectionist and bilateral tendencies in the administration, but neither of these are likely to secure the goal of increasing high-wage manufacturing jobs on a scale envisaged by Trump. The fourth section then returns to the case for free trade through consideration of the argument that Brexit will involve a return to a global Britain, based on spontaneous free trade with countries across the globe, and reinforced by cultural similarities between Anglosphere countries...
