COMMUNICATION AND GLOBALIZATION

Technological Determinism
- A philosophical standpoint emphasizing the impact of technology upon societies.
- Technology determines societies (social structures and cultural values).
- “changes in technology are the primary influence on human-social relations” – Karl Marx
- Technological Determinism seeks to show technical developments as the KEY MOVER in history
and social change.
TECHNOLOGICAL DETERMINISTIC DISCOURSE
1. The printing press (Gutenberg, 15th Century).
2. Emergence of the ‘imagine community’.
3. Formation of nation states.
4. Democratization of religion -> reformation.
5. Emphasis on vernacular.
6. Computer mediated communication
7. Re-invention of direct democracy
8. Revolutions in education
9. Completely new ways of thinking
10. Knowledge-society
11. No social class
GLOBALIZATION AND COMMUNICATION
- Globalization Is the uprooting of human activities- political, cultural, economic, social.
- Interconnectedness or Interdependencies of many different part in the world.
- From a communication studies perspective:
Why Globalization? - because it is possible to communicate on a global scale.
- “Only in the past couple of centuries, as every human community has gradually been drawn into a
single web of trade and a global network of information, have we come to a point where each of
us can realistically imagine contacting any other of our six billion conspecifics and sending that
person something worth having: a radio, an antibiotic, a good idea” – Appiah, 2006.
TRACING THE HISTORY
- John Thompson stated main points from the book Media and Modernity (1995).
1. Today communication is increasingly globally.
2. This promotes a ‘reordering’ of time and space.
3. This in turn, promotes global interconnections interdependencies= globalization
4. Globalization is a progress, not an end of state. Started mainly with three process during the
19th century.
 1830- The telegraph, electric communication via transatlantic underwater cables. No more
messengers.
 1843- Washington and Baltimore connected.
 1865- Britain and India connected.
  1870- Europe linked to large parts of the world.
 1924- King George V sends a message to himself that circulated the globe in 80 seconds.
THE DIMENSION OF GLOBALIZATION
1. Cultural:
a. Global images
b. Global audiences
c. Value-spreading
d. Neo-imperialism/media imperialism
e. World Culture
2. Social:
a. Global social relations
b. Mobility
c. Tourism
d. Sense of global of community
3. Political:
a. Supranational organizations: UN, WTO, etc.
b. Supra-national governance ‘world-police’
c. Regionalization EU.
d. Cosmopolitanism
4. Economic:
a. Common discourse
b. Trade links
c. Instant money transaction- global business
d. Global exploitation of labor.
Common thread: they all depends on global communication infrastructure
CONCEPTUALIZING GLOBALIZATION

 Appadurai, A. (1996).
o ‘Scapes’ that capture the globalization of all human activity:
1. Ethnoscapes,
2. Financescapes,
3. Mediascapes, and
4. Technoscapes, etc.
 Castells, M. (1996).
o In globalization- new logic of space: from ‘space of place’ to ‘space of flows’.
 ‘Flows’ are purposeful, repetitive, programmable sequences of exchange and
interaction between physically disjointed positions.
 Flows are “expressions of processes dominating our economic, political and symbolic
life.”
EXPRESSIONS OF GLOBALIZATION

 How is the organization of our world different now (in the midst of the process the globalization)
compared to before?
EXPRESSION 1: The Rise of Global Cities

 Mainly located and considered within the economy- dimension of globalization.

 According to Castells ‘trilogy’, in globalization, cities have become increasing important nodes for
all human activity.
 Globalization demands infrastructural nodes.
EXPRESSION 2: Cosmopolitanism

 Political Cosmopolitanism
1. Supra- national governance
2. the lessening power of the nation and the increasing power of supra-national power.
i. Eg. The United Nations.
3. The world as one nation, world citizenship.
 Socio-cultural Cosmopolitanism:
1. A global awareness.
2. Openness towards diversity and multi- culturalism.
3. Lifestyle.
4. Travelling.
5. ‘A willingness to engage with the other’ (Hannerz, 1990; Rantanen, 2005).
EXPRESSION 2: Meditated Cosmopolitanism

 What do we actually do online?

1. Trolling
2. Flaming- irrationality and inhospitality on online public spaces.
3. Same 10 websites over and over again.
4. ‘Not engaging with the other.’
 (Tomlinson, 2001): Technologies of the heart: new technologies are merely new ways in which we
communicate with the same people.
 (Bauman, 2001): Compassion is still local, not global- we can see but cannot/ will not act.