This is my first bit of writing on globalization. I could not help but to write on globalization’s hand in guiding poverty up and down. I might have been too specific and detailed for this assignment, but I have yet to see a grade on it. Enjoy the read:
The positive effects of globalization on poverty are noticed from multiple perspectives. “If world inequality is narrowing, perhaps more significant is the fact that absolute poverty is rapidly declining. By comparison with 1980, 200 million fewer people live in absolute poverty” (Held McGrew 126). Impoverished countries, however, are barely clinging to life and feeling affects of the gain or loss of wealth from larger countries. Recent study shows the link between the recent global financial crisis with child mortality in the third world. The article by Jed Friedman and Norber Schady, which was posted on the World Bank website, stated “there will be 30,000 – 50,000 excess infant deaths in sub-Saharan Africa” (http://go.worldbank.org/RNMUWTQN50) related to the latest international monetary setback. According to the UN’s update on their ambitious poverty goals, “More than halfway to the 2015 deadline to achieve the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), major advances in the fight against poverty and hunger have begun to slow or even reverse as a result of the global economic and food crises, a progress report by the United Nations has found” (http://www.un.org/millenniumgoals/).
Globalization does help those countries in the short term by providing more immediate aid with a sort of global welfare system. One of the trends I have noticed in researching globalization is the tendency of developed nations to be generous and work to the aid of those less fortunate. The US contributions more than doubled between 1996 and 2006 to nonprofits (Amy Blackwood, Kennard T. Wing and Thomas H. Pollak, The Nonprofit Sector in Brief Facts and Figures from the Nonprofit Almanac 2008: Public Charities, Giving, and Volunteering. The Urban Institute). Even larger organizations coordinate different efforts and initiatives to aid the poor and needy as recently noticed by the response to Haiti. The Associated Press estimates nearly $1billion has been pledged to the shaken country (http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/H/HAITI_EARTHQUAKE_AID_GLANCE?SITE=RIPAW&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT).
I have been mulling over many other ideas that might be too much to share in one post. I will say I concur with Bhagwait in his thought of making investment options more accessible to the poor in order to assist them in attaining wealth in the long term (Bhagwait 59). Stiglitz also made good points about purchasing from local businesses over international companies (Stiglitz 68) especially in the case of America where “firms with fewer than 500 employees accounted for 64 percent (or 14.5 million) of the 22.5 million net new jobs (gains minus losses) between 1993 and the third quarter of 2008” (www.sba.gov/advo/stats/sbfaq.pdf).
Attempting to stop globalization is like an ant trying to stop a landslide, but we must stay informed and continue to dig deep for data and trends in order to attempt to bring order to the chaos.
This paper was written for a global justice movement class. Feel free to ask me about any of the references. Some of them were not posted due to brevity.
Let me know what you think.
Josh Grace
