Globalization is a procedure that has infiltrated all areas of our life, hence it is very essential to analyse whether globalization has impacted modern society positively or negatively. As every point of the issue has two sides, let's discuss the advantages of globalization first, in reference to the debates that took place.
As per the debates, there were three prominent areas of globalization that were focused on, these include, Foreign investment and employment, innovation and technology, and products and services. Foreign investments and increased employment were some of the advantaged laid out during the debate, students also emphasized that due to foreign investment, employment opportunities are generated. Globalization invites associated economies to allocate their resources to one another to ensure their financial wellbeing and gain new benefits. Through foreign investments, millions are being lifted out of poverty due to employment opportunities, for example: as manufacturing industries are invested in by foreign businesses, thousands of labour opportunities are generated as a result, Interpreters and Translator jobs grow to assist with communication between foreign business owners. Another advantage of globalization was the stimulation of innovation and technology. Due to globalization, trade between countries with a mutual understanding has resulted in the exposure of new technology and innovation, technology spreads to underdeveloped countries to improve their living conditions, this includes, medical technology, electronic technology, environmental technology. Trade of medical technology was one of the key benefits, discussed during the debate, as underdeveloped countries instead of executing unsafe medical procedures through limited technology are now able to perform an operation with little or no risk due to the exposure of enhanced medical technology. Lastly, another prime advantage discussed was increased diversity in products and services. As foreign markets are brought into light through globalization, this has resulted in an increasingly tight competition between businesses promoting or selling similar or the same products and services. Businesses are constantly engaged in the development of new products, or simply working on improving pre-existing ones in order to persuade customers to select their products. If there wasn’t any competition, businesses would simply stop the innovation of new ideas and improved products, instead sell the pre-existing ones, a very common example of this is the competition between Apple and Samsung.
Now let’s examine the negative aspects of globalization, as per the debates, there were three negative areas of globalization that were focused on, these include, exploitation of workers, environmental damage, and cultural risk. One of the key concerning factors of globalization is the exploitation of worker rights. Through globalization, a large number of businesses have offshored labour into countries taking advantage of lower wages and in the process of violating worker rights. The average garment worker is known to be paid $0.097 per hour, which does not even equal one per cent of the wages offered in western countries. Despite the ridiculously low wages, workers are known to work 14-16 hours a day in severe conditions with the risk of health issues. These low wages mostly reside in authoritarian regimes, they are known to benefit immensely through globalization as it gives them the upper hand once exporting these products produced at such a low cost. Another concerning factor of globalization is the immense harm caused to the environment during the process. There are three major ways the environment is endangered: Exploitation of natural resources, harm to animal life, and pollution. Companies are known to adopt cheap methods in order to minimize their production cost, such as the use of cheaper natural resources, which during emission create the risk of global warming due to pollution which as a result harms animal life. Another disadvantage of globalization is a cultural risk. Globalization has resulted in the exposure and spread of cultures throughout the world, which endangers the existing cultures of a nation. For example, English is the second most spoken language in the world in which globalization has a very dominant role, as businesses in order to conduct business with large economies such as the U.S have to communicate in English, which devalues their native language. Western culture is known to have spread the fastest, western cultural aspects such as movies, songs, clothes are known to be adopted by a vast majority of countries around the world, which harms their own cultural aspects.
Considering all the points laid out in the debate on globalization, I believe the advantages overweigh the disadvantages and in my point of view, I believe globalization benefits the world a lot more than it harms it. Employment is one of the key issues every country suffers and through globalization, unemployment can be immensely reduced. Foreign investment is one of the benefits of globalization, which not only generates millions of jobs, but also strengthens foreign relations between countries. I also believe if it wasn’t for globalization, innovation and technology would not be stimulated, this would mean a less competitive market and no innovation for new ideas and improvement. One of the reasons I am lean in favour of globalization is because I believe the above disadvantages of globalization can be tackled. Environmental damage is caused as a result of globalization, but globalization has actually resulted in causing awareness of these environmental problems. Globalization through multilateral exchanges by means of the World Trade Organization has made the environmental concerns as part of their mandate, as well as many other organizations such as the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP), and World Nature Organization (WNO) etc.