ASIA

ASIA AS A SITE
AND AGENT OF
GLOBALIZATION

Global cross-border flows are shifting towards

Asia on seven of eight dimensions, and the
region’s growth is becoming more broad-based
and sustainable as its constituent economies
increasingly integrate with each other.

ECONOMY
Asia led the global economy only ‘falling behind’ from the
eighteenth century. For much of the early modern era, Asia
was the site of the world’s most important trade routes. The
earlier discussion of Japan suggested that the end of World
War II and the rise of the Cold War helped bring Japan into the
global economy. medicine. China, of course, had a historically
unprecedented maritime fleet in the early fifteenth century
under admiral Zeng Ho which traveled within the region and as
far as Africa (Levathes, 1997).

IMMIGRANTS
India and China, among others in the region, have also
become a major source of international migrant labor,
which is also one of the fundamental characteristics of
the era of globalization. This includes the migration of
highly skilled labor into the high tech industry based in
Silicon Valley, which includes a dis-proportionate number
of immigrants from India and China. But much more
prominent is the flow of domestic workers to other places
in the region, or to the Middle East, Europe,
and the United States.

OPEN
REGIONALISM
One of the distinguishing features of regional institutions
in Asia Pacific and South Asia has been the adoption of
‘open regionalism’ which aims to develop and maintain
cooperation with outside actors. This form of regionalism
was meant to resolve the tension between the rise of
regional trade agreements and the push for global trade
as embodied by the WTO
(Bergsten, 1997). ‘Open’ refers to the principle of non-
discrimination, more specifically an openness in
membership and openness in terms of economic flows
(Sutton, 2007).

ENTERTAINMENT
MTV-ization and McDonaldization

‘Hello Kitty’, created in Japan by the Sanrio Group in 1974,

for example, has become a massive global success.

Anime

Pokemon, Mario Brothers, Astroboy, and Power Rangers

ABARQUEZ, FRANCES NICOLE

BSMA 1
1797