At the risk of sounding pedantic, and being accused of methodological
individualism, globalisation isn't a cause of anything; it's a material and
discursive effect - which doesn't make it any 'better', but does remove the
odious impression given by Giddens and other self-appointed social-moral
philosophers that globalisation is some kind of transcendental supernatural
force unconnected to decisions made by people who could have chosen to do
something different, and that it is their task to 'guide' people through by
publishing lots of books recycling social theory that they've ripped out of
context and present as fact...just go to your nearest Waterstones or
Ottakers and browse the 'business' or 'social sciences' section...
Graham
At 12:18 PM 2/20/01 +0000, you wrote:
>I may have missed it, but the G word globalisation, seems to have
>been notable by its scarcity (scare-city?) in all of this. 2 reasons
>for its presence here. One because even crit geographers must
>however radical be also pragmatic somewhat, G isnt going to go
>away tomorrow, however much some of us would like it to, and two
>because it permeates through its subsidiary effects so much of
>what has been said on this debate.
>G'sation is terribly seductive in that econs of scale buying power
>etc etc give so many people seemingly cheap goods. What the
>shopper doesnt see is the externalised costs, the cutbacks in govt
>spending, the work pressure, the redundancies deskilling
>envirinmental cutbacks, loss of tax power by govts on co'ys, and
>on well paid chief executives, non-democrativ pressures on govts to
>do other than they were elected for, incresased use of transport,
>more env damage, pressure like New Deal on the unemployed,
>more govt surveillance to keep"order" i.e. an order favourable to
>sweatshop prodn at min wages for large co'ys, who thah can sell
>cheap and still make astronomical profits.
>Just to mention a few of the secondary, tertiary, quaternary etc
>effects of the G process.
>But its here and we like it, every time we go for 2p off a can of soup
>or whatever, I'm sure even many from crit geog feel good when
>seeing discounts like this....until the discount comes from the
>product YOU are manking, off your wages or terms and conditions
>of employment. And just becuase the product of many on crit geog
>will be education, not cans of soup, doesn't mean you won't be
>affected - look at MNC's pressures downwards on govt tax rates,
>and cutbacks in govt spending on pensions, benefits, public
>services, yes and higher edn too. Still at least we're netter off than
>the many minority groups being bulldozed by less devpt states as
>these states are desperate too for the crumbs from the MNC's
>operations abroad.
>So we can probably go on forever about Marx, left ideology,
>oppression of minorities across the world, poverty and regressive
>taxation in the UK, but lets have a look at the cause of this - at
>least the cause of a great deal of it, Globalisation, ....not just its
>symptoms as we have been doing. Or maybe thats too hopeless
>as, like Frankenstein, we, the global consumers, have created
>something we can't stop, don't know how to deal with, and are not
>even sure we want to rein it in. Not whilst we can get 2p off our
>cans of soup, anyway.
>Hillary Shaw, P/G Geography, University of Leeds
>
>
Graham Gardner
Institute of Geography & Earth Sciences
University of Wales
Aberystwyth
Ceredigion
SY23 3DB
Wales
UK
Tel: 0044 (0)1970 622606
Fax: 0044 (0)1970 622659
E-mail: [log in to unmask]
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