GE4

(Contemporary World)
Module 1
Week 1 -2

Topic: Defining Globalization; Dimensions of Globalization; Forms of Globalization; Effects of

Globalization
Learning Objective: In this module, you will be able to:
-discuss what global networks are;
-give examples of activities that show the concrete effects of globalization;
-explain the comprehensive effects of globalization.

Readings:
This module deals with global networks which covers interrelations and interconnections of people, services,
and institutions beyond the local, domestic, or national borders and instead span the whole world. Global
networks appear in many forms such as international production networks, international security alliances,
international amnesty, global network for tropical diseases, and world watch for marine life, among others.
The networks are characterized by actors composed of people, governments, and institutions or firms sharing
common interest and exchanging and interacting with one another.s
Globalize- refers to the rise of global networks of economic systems.
Globalization- is a process involving the interconnections, diffusion, and exchange of goods (production),
services (technology), ideas (communication), and people.
According to Paul James (2014), a social theorist, there are Four forms of globalization, namely:
Embodied globalization; Agency-extended globalization; object-extended globalization; disembodied
globalization.
1. Embodied globalization- refers to the movement or migration of people.
2. Agency-extended globalization- deals with the dispersion and exchange of agents or representatives of
various institutions, polities, and organizations.
3. Object-extended globalization- involves the mobility of goods, commodities, and other objects of
exchange such as machinery, money, and food items.
4. Disembodied globalization- covers the diffusion of ideas, knowledge and information such as the dos and
don’ts of dating, Confusian Philosophy, and good study habits across the world.
The interconnectivity brought about by globalization is manifested by, for example local event in a
country affecting and creating impacts in another country. Sociologist Anthony Giddens (1991) defined
globalization as “the intensification of worldwide social relations which link distant localities in such a way
that local happenings are shaped by events occurring miles away and vice versa.”
The process of globalization is said to have begun thousands of years back but attained its modern
form in the 19th century as a consequence of the Industrial Revolution when dramatic advances in
transportation and communication occurred. Advances in international business followed and in the 1970’s,
globalization evolved to its current meaning. Globalization led to the shrinking of International space and the
increasing consciousness of a whole, single world society as it facilitates the “widening, deepening and
speeding up of global interconnection” (David Held,et.al.1999).
Dimensions of Globalization
1. Economic Globalization- refers primarily to international business which covers all contracts and
negotiations concerning sales, investments, mobilization, and related transactions undertaken by two or more
regions, countries, and nations outside their political territories. These negotiations involve economic
resources, including human power and capital necessary for the production of goods for global consumption
and maintenance of services such as banking, insurance, engineering, construction, information technology,
and other profitable ventures.
 The forerunners of economic globalization are the multinational companies (MNC’s) or transnational
companies (TNC’s) which have branches in two or more countries. Popular MNC’s include sportswear
manufacturers such as Nike, Adidas, and Rebook; Beverage companies such as Coca-cola and Pepsi; Vehicle
manufacturers such as Toyota, Mitsubishi, Ford; and others.
Economic Globalization increases the process of economic integration among countries leading to the
creation of a common market such as European Union (EU) or a Free Trade area such as the North American
Free Trade Agreement, the ASEAN- China Free Trade Area (ACTFA), and Mercosur in South America.
Integration among economies, whether developed or developing, is facilitated by foreign investment,
diminishing trade barriers, reforms in tax and financial policies, and standardization of rules and regulations,
among others.
2. Sociocultural Globalization
This dimension has two components: A. Cultural Globalization; B. Social Globalization.
A. Cultural Globalization- refers to the spread of ideas, values, and meanings across countries, broadening
and increasing social relations.
Religion, language, cuisine, fashion, music and dance, and other ramifications of pop culture are the
elements in cultural globalization. The once isolated communities and unknown indigenous practices are
uncovered and exposed to the world by the opening of a country to foreign researchers, businesspeople,
tourists, journalists and adventurist. People develop their taste and preference for food, architectural designs,
clothing, body accessories, and sports that they encounter from other countries. For instance, American shops
and goods made available around the world resulted in the “Americanization” of buyers, especially the young
generation. The Japanese pop (j-pop) and Korean Pop (K-pop) culture with good looking singers and dancers
have become a phenomenon in many countries across the continents.
Cultural borrowings and convergence have increased through globalization.
B. Social Globalization- covers the diffusion of beliefs, practices, and issues concerning population growth,
media, urbanization, tourism, education, and sports that also drive nations, institutions and governments to
expand social relations.
C. Political Globalization- This involves institutions, public policies, and practices that cut across national
borders to facilitate international agreements and transactions.
Avenues of globalization such as the supranational institutions in the EU, World Trade Organization
(WTO), and the International Criminal Court (ICC) have either partially diminished the sovereignty or
perceived to have reduced the power and importance of the nation-states which created them. As such,
globalization is perceived to be a factor to the erosion of some democratic structures.
Furthermore, Nongovernmental organizations have taken a more active role in influencing public
policy beyond national borders. Women’s group have held global for a to demand equal rights for women in
many developing countries, including China and India. International foundations are now engaged in
supporting or conducting activities that benefit many countries. One example is Bill and Melinda Gates
Foundation that funds immunization of some of the world’s poorest populations.
D. Natural Environment globalization- This concerns the environment where the interaction of the living
species takes place. Many environmental problems such as water and air pollution, overconsumption of fish
and other marine resources, and global warming need a global approach in their solutions. The intense desire
for high economic growth. Foreign capital, and technological advancement of many countries has forced
them to deregulate some of their environment and resource-protection laws. This deregulation has proven to
be detrimental to the national environment.

Module II
Week 3
Topic: International Labor Migration: Changing Families, Communities, and Societies
If you pass by rural municipalities in the provinces, you might observe some houses that
stand out. Most often, these houses are owned by Filipinos working abroad, referred to as
overseas Filipino workers (OFWs). There are some pointed differences between such houses and
the rest. The OFW houses are made of concrete materials, iron sheet roofs, casement windows,
and tiled floors. Others have two stories while most are bungalows. This is a familiar sight in the
Philippines and other developing countries. The OFWs have changed the landscape of the
countryside. They are able to build better homes for their families, send their children to school, and
pay for their monthly bills. Not all of them are fortunate to have earned high income, but their
earnings prove to be much higher than the salary of a local worker. They help address their family’s
daily needs. What comes after when they finish employment contract is another story.
The OFWs are part of the network created by international labor migration (ILM), one of the
early catalysts of globalization and, at the same time, intensified by globalization. ILM refers to the
movement of a labor force from one country to another. The labor force is composed of unskilled,
semiskilled, or professional workers. These workers migrate from the sending (home) country to
the receiving (host) country, where demand for a particular labor force exists.
Studies on ILM reveal its multidimensional consequences on the individuals, families,
societies, and economies. Urgel (2012) mentioned some of the major findings:
1. Evolution of new family and household structures. These concerns the transformation of
transnational family, transnational household, and global household. In a traditional family,
the members cohabit under one roof. In contrast, the members of transnational family,
composed of members related by consanguinity, live apart from one another but remain
connected as one or more of them live or work abroad. Usually, the children remain in the
country of origin while one or both parents are working abroad. A transnational household
has its household located in two or more countries. In other words, there are “homes”
located in more than one country. A global household relies on members to maintain and
sustain the household while loving in separate countries.

2. Utilization of modern technology to sustain family bonds across time and space.
Another consequence is that activities are done with the aid of modern information and
communication technology (ICT). Such activities include long-distance parenting, sending
gifts and remittances, and advising and participating in decision-making like choosing the
child’s school, renovating the house, or opening a bank account. E-mail, video chat, post
mail, video cameras and mobile phones are popularly used to bridge the distance between
the migrant workers and their families. These modern technologies “eliminate” or blur the
expansive space between family members, and make a “presence” despite of the physical
absence of a parent. What is created in the absence of migrant parents is a “virtual home”
which is only a representation of the actual home. Moreover, the frequent gift-giving to
compensate for the migrant parents’ absence has contributed to the development of
materialism among their children. Other view it as turning the parent-children relationship
into a relationship with price-tag.

3. Reconfiguration of family arrangements and roles. In the traditional sense of assigning

work, women are associated primarily with the works of nurturing, caregiving, and providing
service, while men are associated with paid employment and enterprise. With the
proliferation of working women, especially those abroad, the father takes over as the primary
caregiver at home. In some cases, this has affected the husband’s sense of masculinity,
except in Vietnam where the image of masculinity or the “father image” has a caring
component. In the mother’s absence, grandparents, aunts, uncles, and other close relatives
also take active roles on parenting. In some areas such as in the northern part of the
Philippines, the practice of child fostering has gained popularity as a way of raising children
of migrants. In this arrangement, bringing up children is viewed as a shared responsibility of
the migrant parents and their close kin, especially those of women who remain single.
Redistribution, realignment, shifting of functions, and role reversals are undertaken to cope
with the absence of a migrant family member, especially of the mother. An impact of this
function and role arrangement is the existence of plural authority figures at home which
sometimes confuses the children as to whom to obey or listen to.
 4. More political and economic empowerment in the family and community for women.
For families with men as migrant workers, the women attain added political and economic
strength. Aside from being the caregiver, cook, and launderer, the wife takes over some of
the traditional tasks assigned to the husband, including headship. This headship may cover
serving as the household representative in village meetings and other activities, paying bills
and taxes, supervising house repair or construction, or providing labor in some community
projects. The wife may also run for an office in the village or town.
When a woman is working abroad, she becomes economically and politically
empowered through her monthly remittances, the transfer of money by a migrant worker to
the home country. The woman’s financial contribution enables her to become a major
decision maker, a show of political power. She is involved in the choice of real property to
buy, in putting up of a business, in the selection of investments, or in the identification of a
vacation place. Being the breadwinner in the family, she can exert control over the allocation
of funds and family maintenance.

5. Proliferation of families with unstable marriages and separated or divorced parents.

Studies show that higher incidence of divorce occurs among migrant households than
among nonmigrant households. The long periods of living apart because of overseas
employment often lead to marital instability which eventually may ruin the family. There exist
documented cases of migrant men and women having affairs or establishing new families in
their host countries. For some women, extramarital involvements become their coping
mechanism for loneliness or pain upon learning of their husbands’ infidelity back home.
Separation brings emotional suffering in the family, especially if mistrust has developed in a
couple.

6. Culture of migration. In the past, leaving the family for overseas employment was a painful
parting. Nowadays, young men and women express their desire to work abroad when
opportunity knocks. They choose to leave home and live independently abroad regardless of
the risks. It is the tendency of the youth coming from families with migrant workers to want to
leave home and live abroad. Students are encouraged to take college or vocational courses
that are in demand in the international labor market, namely, caregiving, architecture,
teaching, engineering, and nursing. Getting a college diploma now is not a priority as they
are ready to accept any kind of work for a start. Moreover, it has become known that getting
a good-paying job abroad does not necessarily require a college diploma. ILM develops a
culture of migration which is reflected by an outward-looking labor force. This may, however,
have some effect on their sense of nationalism and national identity.

The Globalization of Religion

Globalization has played a tremendous role in providing a context for the current revival and
the resurgence of religion. Today, most religions are not relegated to the countries where they
began. Religions have, in fact, spread and scattered on a global scale. Globalization provided
religions a fertile milieu to spread and thrive. As Scholte (2005) made clear: “Accelerated
globalization of recent times has enabled co-religionists across the planet to have greater direct
contact with one another. Global communications, global organizations, global finance, and the like
have allowed ideas of the Muslims and the universal Christian church to be given concrete shape
as never before” (p. 245).
Information technologies, transport means, and the media are deemed important means of
which religionists rely on the dissemination of their religious ideas. For instance, countless websites
that provide information about religions have been created. This makes pieces of information and
explanations about different religions ready at the disposal of any person regardless of his or her
geographical location. In addition, the Internet allows people to contact each other worldwide and
therefore hold forums and debates that allow religious ideas to spread.
Furthermore, media also play an important role in the dissemination of religious ideas. In this
respect, a lot of television channels, radio stations, and print media are founded solely for
advocating religions. Modern transportation has also contributed considerably to the emergence,
revivalism, and fortification of religion. In this respect, Turner (2007) cited the case of Islamic
revivalism in Asia which “is related to the improvement in transportation that has allowed many
Muslims to travel Mecca, and return with reformist ideas” (p. 163). Modern technology, therefore,
has helped religions of different forms, such as fundamentalist, orthodox, or modernist to cross
geographical boundaries and be present everywhere.
Globalization has also allowed religion or faith to gain considerable significance and
importance as a non-territorial touchstone of identity. Being a source of identity and pride, religion
has always been promoted by its practitioners so that it could reach the level of globality and be
embraced by as many people as possible. Muslims, for instance, aspire to establish the Islamic
Ummah, a community of believers. By paving the way for religions to come in contact with each
other and providing a context for their flourishing and thriving, globalization has brought such
religions to a circle of competition and conflicts.
As Turner (2007) explained:
Globalization transforms the generic “religion” into a world-system of competing and conflicting
religions. This process of institutional specialization has transformed local, diverse and
fragmented cultural practices into recognizable system of religion. Globalization has, therefore,
had the paradoxical effect of making religions more self-conscious of themselves as being “world
religions.” (p. 146)
Such conflicts among the world religions exhibit a solid proof confirming the erosion and the failure
of hybridization. Globalization, as stated in the above excerpt, makes religions more conscious of
themselves as being “world religions” reinforcing their respective specific identities. These identities
are strengthened by globalization and cannot, in any way, intermingle or hybridize. Since religions
have distinct internal structures, their connections to different cultures and their rituals and beliefs
contradict. For instance, Islam and Christianity are mostly incompatible with each other. These
religions cannot be hybridized or homogenized even if they often come in contact.
Though religion is strengthened and fortified by globalization, it represents a challenge to
globalizations’ hybridizing effects. Religion seeks to assert its identity in the light of globalization. As
a result, different religious identities come to the fore and assert themselves. Such assertions of
religious identities constitute a defensive reaction to globalization. Scholte (2005), in this respect,
maintained, “At the same time as being pursued through global channels, assertions of religious
identity have, like nationalist strivings, often also been partly a defensive reaction to globalization”
(p. 245).
It has been difficult for religion to cope with values that accompany globalization like
liberalism, consumerism, and rationalism. Such phenomena advocate scientism and secularism.
This, in fact, pushed Scholte to speak of the anti-rationalist faiths. Since he equated rationalism
with globalization and considered religion anti-rationalist, it can be deduced that religion is anti-
globalization. To quote Scholte (2005):
Transplanetary relations have helped to stimulate and sustain some renewals of anti-rationalist
faith, but global networks have more usually promoted activities involving rationalist knowledge.
Contemporary revivalist movements have largely replayed a long-term tendency – one that well
predates contemporary accelerated globalization – whereby certain religious circles have from
time to time revolted against modern secularism and scientism. (p. 261)
On the other hand, it can be said that anti-rationalist qualities ascribed to religion can be the
characteristics of fundamentalist and extremist forms of religion. We cannot consider religion as
purely anti-rationalist since many religious people reconcile reason and faith and make moderate
trends within their religions. Nevertheless, globalization’s strict rationalism manifested in such
phenomena as liberalism and secularism can be incompatible with the norms and the values of
certain religions.
 Globalization is also associated with Westernization and Americanization. The dominance
exerted by these two processes, particularly on the less developed countries, makes religion-
related cultures and identities take defensive measures to protect themselves. Sometimes, extreme
forms of resisting other cultural influence are being done, such as that of the Islamic State of Iraq
and Syria (ISIS). As Ehteshami (2007) pointed out, “Globalization is not only seen as a rival of
Islamic ways, but also an alien force divorced from Muslim realities. Stressing the negative impact
of the loose morals of Western life is a daily feature of airwaves in the Middle East” (p. 130). The
imperialist aspirations of globalization and its incompatibility with Islam make globalization
completely alien to the Muslim realities. Since globalization is cultural construct at its core and its
meaning is the Western discourse, “promoting and engaging with it on the part of Muslims is like
accepting and promoting Western cultural values and their dominance” (p. 131).
The challenges of globalization to religion link automatically to the challenges of religion to
globalization. In other words, while religion takes caution against the norms and the values related
to globalization, it challenges the latter since religion does not approve its hybridizing effects. The
idea of de-hybridizing effects of religion is approved also by Samuel Huntington’s clash of
civilizations, which maintains that such dehybridizing upshots spring also from the religious
partitioning and clashes.