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Globalization and Liberalization: A View from the Developing Countries The term globalization is extremely controversial. Debates currently raging about globalization include whether it even exists, whether it is more important now than at some earlier date, whether it is displacing the nation state, and whether it is more important than regionalism or localism. Globalization is a multifaceted, multidisciplinary topic in its broadest reaches. It includes not only economic topics, but also political, social, cultural, and ideological ones. For example, political scientist, James Rosenau, defines it as "a label that is presently in vogue to account for peoples, activities, norms, ideas, goods, services, and currencies that are decreasingly confined to a particular geographic space and its local and established practices". Deciding to focus on the economic aspects of globalization still leaves many doors open since economic globalization has both microeconomic and macroeconomic aspects. The former refer to the technological revolution and the impact at the firm level, while the latter are related to the integration of markets for goods and services. Developing countries themselves had to take some important steps before the full impact of globalization could be felt. Specifically, they had to open their own economies, to lower the barriers to trade and capital flows that had been an important component of the import-substitution industrialization model that almost all followed for some period. Without these policy shifts, globalization would be much less relevant than it is today, especially in the developing world. Liberalization, then, is the other side of globalization. New thinking on development: Globalization Current exploration of both the theory and practice of development can no longer be undertaken without some consideration of the concept and processes of globalization. However, while globalization might be one of the most ubiquitous concepts used in the world today it is also highly contested. However, definitions share a focus on globalization as encompassing the interconnectedness of the world both in terms of physical distance as well as the flows of goods, people, money, information and ideas. These interlinkages have been brought about by technological developments such as the internet, as well as improved communications more broadly and greater ease of transport. This has arguably led to a shrinking world.

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More specifically, globalization is usually thought to comprise three main strands. First is economic globalization, which stresses the increasing integration of economic activities where distance is much less important and where transnational corporations, for example, now sub-contract production processes to different places throughout the world. The second is cultural globalization, associated with the growing convergence of consumption patterns and lifestyles across the world rooted in the dominance of the West, especially North America, in such global culture, referred to sometimes as McDonaldisation or Coca Cola-isation. Finally, political globalization refers to the erosion of rights, functions and activities of nation states as other bodies such as the IFIs take on a more important role. In relation to development processes, especially from the disciplinary perspective of geography, there have been suggestions that both a focus on places and place-specificity will decrease and that certain types of divisions across the world could potentially diminish. Globalization operates at a range of scales and that the global is not eroding or erasing the local. Instead, globalization processes can be identified at the local level. In addition, globalization is very uneven in its effects across the world, with some places being much more open to globalization processes than others. For example, people living in a tribal village in rural Mali tend to have very different exposure and experiences of globalization compared with those living in a middle or upper-income neighbourhood in a cosmopolitan metropolis such as Buenos Aires, Argentina. Thus, globalization is not a singular or undifferentiated process but rather intersects with the specific historical, social, cultural and economic contexts and circumstances of different places, sometimes referred to as globalization. The upshot of these observations is to emphasize that globalization is a complex, contradictory and uneven process. Indeed, some skeptics would argue that the process itself is not new, but is rather a continuation of trading patterns and interchanges, which have been occurring for centuries. Nonetheless, most agree that the scale of contemporary interconnectedness is unprecedented. In terms of development processes, the main debates revolve around whether Globalization will bring greater equality as the benefits trickle down to the poorer countries and the poor within them, or whether these processes actually intensify divisions and inequalities throughout the world and within countries. The former, more positive, view reflects some early modernization theory rooted in the notion that the spread of Western capital, culture,
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technology and information will be inherently beneficial. This viewpoint is one propagated by the IFIs together with many other development institutions. The UKs Department for International Development (DFID), for instance, published a White Paper in 2000 called Eliminating World Poverty: Making Globalization Work for the Poor.6 This document makes clear that globalization can bring many benefits to poor nations as long as it is managed properly. While it acknowledges the counterargument, it remains upbeat about the prospects of globalizations consequences in the Global South. The negative viewpoint links globalization with the inexorable and exploitative spread of capitalism around the world. With the critiques rooted in many of the challenges to the neoliberal policies of the IFIs in terms of SAPs and PRSPs, globalization is assumed to be a destructive force, only interested in spreading the wisdom of the market across the globe with little consideration for the disadvantaged and poor. Just as SAPs and PRSPs are often claimed to benefit the elites of impoverished countries so broader globalization is claimed to do the same thereby exacerbating inequality. As Joseph Stiglitz, the former Chief Economist of the World Bank notes .Globalization has been hijacked by the special interests in the North, often at the expense of the poor in developing countries. These views are encompassed in the various dimensions of the anti-globalization movement or what is more accurately called the counterglobalization or global justice movement. While much of the focus of this negative perspective is on economic aspects of globalization and on the IFIs and countries of the G8 in particular, the culturally homogenizing forces of global (US) retail chains such as McDonalds, Wal-Mart and Starbucks have been targeted as detrimental to countries of the Global South. Interestingly, and perhaps not surprisingly, a common pattern for corporate entities such as these has been to ally themselves with good causes in the development arena reflecting a shift towards what is now referred to as corporate social responsibility. For example, despite arguably playing a major role in adding to problems of childhood obesity and Attention-Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) worldwide, McDonalds teams up with UNICEF to support International Childrens Day, and supports a variety of other UNICEF causes. Without a hint of irony, some initiatives such as accessing McDonaldssponsored internet concerts or free postcards geared to increasing awareness

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of childrens issues which children themselves can personalize with their own message, include a trip to a local McDonalds to buy a Big Mac.