The Importance Of Globalization In The 21st Century

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In the 21st century, globalisation is a term that keeps being frequently used, thus the need to comprehend and grasp its true significance in our society has become vital. The concept of Globalisation and the connotations it carries have become very complex. In its most simplistic form, the term globalisation can be defined as ‘the cross national flows of goods, investment, production and technology’ (Petras, 1999). Generally, it can be said that the complexity of globalisation reflects the growing intricacy of contemporary society. The term globalization describes the process of the deepening, broadening and speeding up of the world in all aspects of modern life. Globalisation captures elements of a contemporary world that is being sculpted …show more content…

Theodore Levitt (Levitt, 1983) was one of the first academics to write about globalisation in 1983 and he highlighted the important role of technology in the globalisation of markets and thus, ‘converging commonality’ in countries around the planet. In Levitt’s ‘Globalisation of markets’, he suggested that cultural differences due to globalisation were becoming more homogenised, perhaps predicting the condition of contemporary society today. However society has changed since then and the meaning of globalisation with it, and the widespread view of globalisation being homogenous or even to some extent being described as ‘Americanisation; has somewhat diminished. Dr Moises Naim (Naim, 2009) explains how even America have greatly benefited from globalisation, highlighting that globalisation is bigger than one of the world’s biggest super power. Furthermore, Naim explains how relationships between countries has moved from simply co-operating to integrating with one another, sharing ideas, knowledge and culture. In the same way, Scholte (Scholte, 2008) sustains this notion, calling globalisation the ‘spread of trans-planetary and the reduction in barriers to trans-world social contacts. Highlighting that this is the new characteristic of contemporary society; world-wide

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