The cause of globalization

International Economy, The, Fall, 2004 by Alfred H. Kingon

TO THE EDITOR:

I read with amazement the symposium: "Is continued globalization of the world economy inevitable?"

Not one of the thirteen distinguished respondents (including some friends of mine) articulated the prime cause of "globalization" and therefore were unable to come to the "inevitable" conclusion.

If by "globalization of the economy," we mean the free flow of goods and services, free movement of labor, free flow of capital, free movement of enterprise, and the free flow of information, then we must look at the root cause of the changes, not specific policies, here and there, that indeed ebb and flow and are subject to change.

Some forty years ago, Alvin Toffler in his books Future Shock and The Third Wave predicted the radical revolutionary transformation of the world from the industrial age to the information age. I do not think it an accident that it began in earnest in the 1980s and exploded dynamically in the 1990s. "Globalization" was and is a phenomenon, a manifestation, if you will, of that more basic secular transformation.

So to answer your question one must ask is the transition into the age of information over? Is the technological revolution over? Clearly far from it. I suspect we are still at the very beginning of the new age. Most keen scientific observers see the innovative technology growth rate expanding at least into this century's midpoint and then continuing well beyond.

Thus, increasing globalization of the world's economy is absolutely inevitable, albeit in fits and starts, depending on geopolitical, economic, and other concerns.

But even to suggest otherwise, such as comparisons with pre-World War I, etc., with these transient matters puts those who expound these concerns very much in the camp of the feudal lords, monarchs, farmers, and the religious and political leaders of some five hundred years ago when the agrarian age gave way to the industrial age. Then they resisted hopelessly.

That radical transformation had overwhelmingly profound economic, social, political, and religious repercussions that lasted for centuries. So will this transformation--even more so!

ALFRED H. KINGON

Poughkeepsie, New York