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Essay about Extent of Globalisation

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To what extent have the processes of globalization resulted in a more even distribution of economic activity across the globe?

Globalization is currently a very hot topic and many people have an awful lot to say about the matter, creating different theories and points of view. A definition of globalization could be, ‘The straightforward exchange between core and peripheral areas based upon a broad division of labour, is being transformed into a highly complex, kaleidoscopic structure involving the fragmentation of many production processes and their geographical relocation on a global scale in ways which slice through national boundaries.’ (Dicken ’98). When talking about globalization it is difficult to go straight down one trail of…show more content…
In the past economic activity has been resource driven, whereas as now, due to advances in technology in particular, modern day economic activity is based upon ‘ideas and information rather than material or physical goods.’ (J.Khan notes ’07). This would indicate that knowledge is key and changes in technology mean that a more skilled workforce is needed. Different locations have been better suited to utilise technology over the ages, e.g. the industrial revolution saw the rise of the U.K and Western Europe, and then the introduction of Fordism (mass production) saw the rise of the Far East. On the whole these different periods of development have made a massive difference to the areas affected, it is however still very difficult to definitively state whether or not the distribution of economic activity is more evenly spread or not. It could be suggested that the distribution of economic activity is definitely not even, however over the last few decades it could be put forward that the level of unevenness may have become less great. The argument of globalization causing world economic activity to become more even is hard to fight for when there are statistics like, ‘in the year 2000 the top 1% of the worlds population earned more than the bottom 60%,’ also in world GDP terms, ‘the high income countries account for $37.5tr or 77% but only 15% of the world’s population, the low income countries account for $1.6tr or 3.3% but 37% of the world’s population’,
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