On globalization

In the comments to JC’s recent post on globalization, Eliot gets riled up:

My sense is that globalization will lead to annihilation of cultures, natural destruction, and to large corporations becoming de facto governments.

Now, first off, this critique seems a bit strange coming from the user of a camera made in Malaysia, but, given my present circumstances as a traveller, I have a bone to pick with this contention. Now, as I’ve recently, if tangentially, noted, globalization can indeed have a negative impact on culture, but it’s impact can also be exceedingly positive. As an example, I’ll merely point out that, by way of some pictures I’ve taken, readers of this blog have been exposed to a bit of Bulgarian culture that they otherwise might never have had any awareness of. Given that I’m an American who flew to Bulgaria on a German airline, took the pictures with a camera made in Malaysia and powered by Japanes batteries manufactured in China, edited them on an American-designed computer made in Taiwan whose operating system is largely based on the work of the international open source community and presented them in an open-source photo gallery whose authors appear to include an Indian and a Frenchman, I’d say this cultural experience was heavily assisted by various aspects of that international bogeyman we call “globalization”. This, of course, serves as but a single example.

All of this is not to say that globalization has a unilaterally positive effect on culture; rather I merely want to point out that the various markets, products and services that fall under the globalization rubric have made it possible for people other than the extraordinarily wealthy to experience other cultures, either directly, as I am doing right now, or indirectly, through photographs, music and video. In other words, globalization greatly expands our cultural choices. What we do with those choices is not the fault of globalization, which is not, after all, a volitional actor. Rather, if we make choices that lead to “annihilation of culture” then I would argue that the fault lies with us for making those choices, rather than with globalization, which ultimately is just a facilitator for our choices.

(I’m proud to note that with this post I’ve just sent JC his first-ever Trackback ping. Welcome to the club, JC!)

EDIT Fixed a wrongful attribution