Philosophy of Globalization

Concha Roldán, Daniel Brauer, Johannes Rohbeck

• Publisher: De Gruyter
• Year: 2018
• ISBN:
  9783110491685
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Philosophy
• Subtopic: Political Philosophy

Not so long ago, it seemed the intellectual positions on globalization were clear, with advocates and opponents making their respective cases in decidedly contrasting terms. Recently, however, the fronts have shifted dramatically.

The aim of this publication is to contribute philosophical depth to the debates on globalization conducted within various academic fields – principally by working out its normative dimensions. The interdisciplinary nature of this book's contributors also serves to scientifically ground the ethical-philosophical discourse on global responsibility. Though by no means exhaustive, the expansive scope of the works herein encompasses such other topics as the altering consciousness of space and time, and the phenomenon of globalization as a discourse, as an ideology and as a symbolic form.

1Global Economy and Politics

Griselda Gutiérrez Castañeda

The Political Subject in Globalization:
the Discussion Agency

Griselda Gutiérrez Castañeda, Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México (UNAM)

Abstract: From the defining trends of a globalized world, I expose an analysis of the systemic effects they produce in different spheres of social life, such as the guidelines that structure, in a systemic sense, the insertion of social agents, as well as the way they influence their traditional forms of intervention and participation in the course of social processes and decision-making. The trends of increasing complexity and indeterminacy inherent to globalization produce changes in the economic dynamics of the world market and effects that disrupt the institutional, legal-political frameworks of states. So, when analyzing such transformations, I take on the radicalization of the questions about the possibilities of inclusion or exclusion of the social agents, and the density of the fragmentary effects on the formation of collective identities (and, therewith, of the debate on the opportunities or restrictions of political intervention, organization and mobilization—in other words, the range of probability of their constitution as political subjects). These social and structural transformations update the basis of the theoretical, philosophical and sociological debate on the quality of the agency of social subjects, for which I consider the task of asking whether the dynamics of globalization block the possibilities of intervention of some relevance or, on the contrary, there is scope for resistance and even ways of influencing constructively.

An approach to globalization

Sociological research set out to characterize the organizational structures of modern-contemporary social systems tends to privilege the logic of a growing differentiation that –beyond the segmentary historical forms, or through forms of stratification—has the modality of functional differentiation, in which each subsystem (economic, political, juridical, cultural, scientific, etc.) operates according to specific languages, techniques and values, which are not commensurable, and allows for their autonomous specialty (Luhmann / De Giorggi 1993, pp. 279–339). In line with subsystems differentiation, processes of interdependence occur through functional couplings that integrate the social system, which reveal a flexible and diffuse dynamic, which in turn leads to the break in the concert of the specific weight of each functional domain with causal, hierarchic or centered standards, giving rise instead to a polycentric tendency.

Following this logic, the increasing processes of complexity and indeterminacy in post-industrial societies are explained, and their effects may be noticed at the level of understanding, disposition, adaptation, organization and practical control by social agents. Danilo Zolo′s interpretation in this respect (with which I agree) notes that the plurality of spaces and practices in their differentiation and semantic specialization, while diversifying and increasing the flexibility of social behavior, introduces an increase in the number of intervening variables that deplete the established intellectual resources operability and makes understanding more precarious. Likewise, increasing interdependencies, and the contingent and diffuse nature of interaction between these spaces, obstructs forms of social intervention when predictions are unlikely, since the known intelligibility and control schemes (e. g. causal, linear schemes, etc., or criteria such as centralization, domination/subordination)—effective until very recently as hierarchical structures and defined attributions—lose validity; there is an unfolding of the referents of certainty. Indeed, it is possible to predict why they are considered regularities, tendencies according to causal schemes; or of a similar nature, if this possibility is diluted, then, in a reflexive sense, we speak of indeterminacy.

In light of the so-called ‘spheres of social action’ (Weber) that were regulated by basic criteria and norms or accepted and routine techniques, according to which defined roles and possible schemes of action were stipulated, in the now characterized ‘functional domains’, these are replaced by contingent and flexible criteria. With the displacement of shared and institutionalized beliefs, or of positive or negative motivation schemes to encourage or discourage behaviors, their place is occupied by polyvalent value scales that generate difficulties of accommodation and location within these spaces. In turn, the ranges of social mobility are enhanced as a result of the differentiation of experiences that, by blocking routines or opening new options, can generate insecurity, along with destabilizing effects.

The repercussion of these tendencies is that diverse experiences tend to be shaped by the dynamics of functional domains rather than being an expression of the purposes of social agents, for whom the roles they must play are increasingly unstable, and for whom the diversity of functional needs and expectations to be met, the possible options of profusion of services, the lack or abundance of information to be processed, and the urgency to respond are all greater, which generates uncertain choices regarding opportunities or risks, as opposed to “a kind of ′selective overload′” (Zolo 1994, pp. 19–21).

In order to abound in some of these systemic effects on the perception and practices of the social agents, I will approach those macro trends that account for the functioning of the social system in a globalized world, which are relevant for our analysis. Based on the internationalization of exchanges between countries and regions that has been characteristic of market societies, what today prevails in the intensification and complexity of cross-border and transnational interconnections, is a displacement of the space referent, starting from a reconfiguration of the temporal referent (Held 1996, pp. 380 –381), which takes on centrality by the impulse of what is justifiably called ‘revolution in communication’. Techno-scientific developments in communication—which reach the level of IT, robotics and ‘mass media’—boost the production and processing of information, the speed and expansion of its distribution and the plasticity in its forms and in the different levels of use, in such a way that when applied to the execution of projects and commercial, scientific and technological exchanges, they practically erase frontiers and permeate all levels of activity: economic, political, technological, military, legal, cultural and environmental areas.

Among the systemic tendencies that globalization entails (such as complexity, indeterminacy, interdependence, mobility), I am interested in highlighting the flexibility of connections and the widespread effect of deregulation. The extensive use of new technologies that impels (by intensifying the financial transactions according to trade flows, the investment and the migration) a great dynamism and complexity to the markets, requires—while it feeds back— conditions of flexibility. As a defining criterion of the current capitalist regime, it displaces traditional forms of production and privileges tertiarization, and with this, the organization of enterprises is decentralized and merchandized. This, in the face of greater competition and uncertainty, diversifies organizational and transactional modalities, so that this criterion has an impact on the regulations established for the sake of greater openness and release of restrictions.

Such transformations have a substantial impact on the labor market (as precarious salary conditions prevail), as well as on stability in work, and the conditions under which it develops; tertiarization powers sectors such as services and maquilas, increases forms of outsourcing and a tendency to “deslaborizar las relaciones de trabajo” (Yáñez 2004, pp. 85 and 103)—which translates to say that it dilutes or blurs the labor nature of work relations, as informality increases both in the relationship and in the labor spaces.

Flexibility, beyond the extension of the range of investment and profit opportunities, and when coming into tension with the established legal routines, standards and procedures, exerts pressure for a relaxation or open fracture of the same, which in turn leads to the establishment of highly permissive legal reforms (of investment, commercialization and labor) or the imposition of practices of open illegality. Certainly, common regulatory and procedural forms operate with temporalities that short-circuit the potential and speed of new technologies—but the latter, together with the current modalities of organization and competition as resources of neoliberal economic policies, produce an effect that (oxymoronically) ‘institutionalizes’ deregulation, prioritizing the logic of the market and reducing the policies of intervention and regulation on behalf of the State.

The combination of global trends and neoliberal adjustment policies, by prioritizing the extraction of benefits for global corporations, accentuates inequality in the development of entire countries and regions, as well as high costs in human development, reflected in the increase of unemployment rates, the rising costs of services and an exponential growth of migratory flows.

Mechanisms of inclusion and exclusion in a globalized world

The confluence of the aforementioned factors and their consequences explains why practical and theoretical debates about the effect on the conditions of social agents’ insertion in these scenarios revolve around the notions of ‘expulsion’ and ‘social exclusion’ (Sassen 2015; Saraví 2009). In my opinion, the interpretations given to each of them are not in contradiction. With regards to ‘expulsion’, the problem is analyzed from the logic underlying the organization of functional domains, which is why a homeostatic dynamics that operates in terms of preserving the social system’s own equilibria tends to prevail, which filters and expels the disrupting factors (Zolo 1994). It is a dynamic that would allow us to understand that in the practices of advanced capitalism’s accumulation, its axis is the procurement of stability, investment and extraction of benefits—even when the expulsion by way of ‘collateral effects’ implies intensification of unemployment rates, of extreme poverty and the naturalization of the absence of any link with educational training and the labor market of broad social sectors; as well as the displacement of populations derived from the predation of their lands by the extractive industry, and a trend of mass migration (particularly that which results in statelessness) and openly illegal practices, such as people trafficking.

Likewise, the theory of ‘social exclusion’ seeks to interpret the diversity of these extreme cases of deprivation and marginality of some groups, along with the broad social sectors whose situation is one of ‘unfavorable integration’, as a result of the accumulation of disadvantages, since they seek forms of integration in the labor market despite the deficiencies and obstacles. Its theoretical performance is of interest because, apart from recording extreme cases of exclusion, it tries to understand the new forms of social configuration based on contemporary forms of inequality, differentiation and polarization (Saraví 2009, p. 24), and allows us to problematize the new forms of integration and social agents.

I consider that these interpretations are key to appreciating the effects of the transformations referred to above. In that sense, it is important to point out that among the criteria that gave support to the integration of the modern western political-social ordinances was inclusion, in terms of freedoms and protection, and codified in the formal character of juridical-political membership. Nevertheless, inclusion was always materialized in terms of opportunities that may be of different types, but, relevantly, in economic opportunities. And it is precisely this that is now diluted or made precarious by prevailing conditions of labor instability, forms of outsourcing, low wages, and as a whole, lack of protection and job insecurity of people as workers. This implies that as a result of the uncertain and reduced opportunities and poor quality, agents fragmentarily face, derived from disappointment and restructuring of expectations, their attempts to insert and adapt to new scenarios. This is intensified by recording those sectors that operate from the informality or open illegality to those who access social fringes in a marginal condition, including the masses of undocumented migrants in a significant proportion.

The subsumption of the political subsystem to the logic of the economy is, among other reasons, what underlies many of the transformations of its attributions and competences; it explains the weak presence, and even the absence of the State in the mediation and interlocution tasks able to set limits to the abuses of the business sector, as well as in its nature as a demand referent.

Historically, the compliance of government tasks by nation-states required the construction of a system of attributions and competences according to legal, authority and control capacity regulations. This implied, in a functional sense, operating in a centralized and binding manner within defined territorial frameworks, the faculty for the distribution of resources, along with the creation and regulation of conditions and opportunities for economic, political and social exchanges aimed at political integration and, of course, conflict management— as well as the sovereign attribution with respect to deciding between peace and war, and determining who should be members of that community and who should not. The link between the State and members of the political order according to the status of citizenship was to determine the levels of responsibility to provide welfare, protection and scope of rights, and the type and enforceability of obligations, their compliance outlining criteria of membership, creating an institutional framework capable of functionally generating stability and continuity, and in a relevant way a civil connection that socially and symbolically would have guided forms of socialization, belonging and the integration of individuals according to roles.

Today, growing interdependencies tend to dilute territorial boundaries and centralized operation, given the proliferation of power and decision-making centers—such as hegemonic states or regions, transnational institutions, and legal and illegal profitable corporations—according to the influence of functional connections that exert global market sectors such as financial, technological and service sectors. This, as a whole, produces an inflation of the states’ capacity for resolution and a tendency to outsource their authority and decision-making—in other words, their loss of sovereignty.

As Jacobson points out in his analysis of how the State is taking on new forms by losing primary qualities of its institutional tasks: “… the state remains critical as the mediating mechanism, the node, of a variety of international institutions and global processes” (Jacobson 1997, p. x, my italics). This ‘node’ is one in which corporate interests and transnational political agreements are crossed, and whose mediation takes place under conditions of flexibility and deregulation, which impairs its institutional functioning in and on its borders, such as the loss of control of its borders in relation to migratory flows.

When the State submits to the pressures of agents and global dynamics and gives rise to the systematic disengagement towards its governed ones (since, far from dosing the effects of these tendencies, it contributes to the intensification and cancellation of opportunities), an overload that people face under c...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title Page
• Copyright
• Preface
• Contents
• 1 Global Economy and Politics
• 2 Ethical Duty: Global Justice
• 3 On History of Globalization
• 4 Globalization in the History of Philosophy
• 5 Theory of Globalization and Philosophy of History
• Index of Persons