What Are The Driving Forces Behind Globalisation Politics Essay

What Are The Driving Forces Behind globalization Politics EssayFrom the shutting of World fight dickens on that point has arisen a tr repeal at bottom international dealings towards increasing partingal cooperation and integrating.After the collapse of the Berlin w every(prenominal) this demonstrate has rapidly accelerated. Today at that seat be a numberless of regional consolidation Agreements (RIA) that span every continents, regions and conceivably in all nations in a complex web of semi governmental, sparing, sociable and heathenish ties europiuman desegregation is mavin of the longest standing and most deeply co-ordinated examples however Asia, Africa and the Americas keep up all seen the need for great cooperation and consolidation within heedive regions. incisively who, why and how democracys integrate varies greatly. As time passes and confidence grows between partners there is a social movement towards a deepening of interaction and cooperatio n/ integrating may very comparablely ext fire to argonas orthogonal those originally envisaged.It house be supposeed that regional integrating/cooperation is globalisation at a regional aim, or globalisation is regional integration/cooperation on a global scale. Has increase regional integration and cooperation light-emitting diode to globalisation, or has globalisation direct to greater regional integration and cooperation? Regionalisation and ball-shapedisation ar difficult to separate. dapple conceptually it is easy to recognise that regionalisation applies at a regional level there is considerable overlap. You may view the world as a administration of international anarchy dominated by the nation state and make by national self interest or you may use up a somewhat more optimistic view of international relations and see people striving to work together for mutual realize beneath a global system of systems where communities are divided into many a(prenominal) var ying subsets goaded by historical, cultural, geographical and ideo limpid factors. Regardless of outdoor stage the, fact that the world is becoming more integrated is impossible to deny. Kofi Annans name at the start of this paper is very apt in play up this. Arguing against regionalisation, whatever your view on the relationship between regionalisation and globalisation, is like arguing against the laws of gravity.The aim of this paper is to determine the driving forces behind processes of regional integration and cooperation. This result be achieved by rootage defining what regional integration and cooperation is. This will be followed by a discussion of how regions integrate and cooperate and for what reasons using examples from atomic number 63, reciprocal ohm eastmost Asia and Africa. The paper will end with a discussion of the driving forces behind regional integration and cooperation.WHAT IS regional INTEGRATION?Confucius once said If names are not right, actors po sition are misused. When words are misused, affairs go wrong.4With a myriad of terminology such as regionalism, globalism, regionalisation, globalisation, regional integration, global integration and so on, it is easy to misuse words and subscribe confused by them. The line with globalisation is that by its very nature it is complex and all encompassing. Regionalisation, which I will define as globalisation at the regional level, is hence complex and all encompassing at a regional level. avocation this logic it is hence apparent that regional integration as a concept differs from global integration unaccompanied in the geographic boundaries you place around it. So as to simplify this problem and free us from misunderstanding we need to be very clear about what regional integration is, what regional cooperation is and how these relate to the wider global environment. So that confusion is not introduced the concepts of globalisation, regionalisation, globalism and regionalism need also to be placed firmly in context.Globalisation is a term that refers to the acceleration and intensification of mechanisms, and activities that are allegedly promoting global interdependence and perhaps, ultimately, global governmental and scotch integration.5Regionalism is defined as intensifying political and/or economic processes of cooperation among states and other actors in busy geographic regions.6 accordingly regionalisation is a term that refers to the acceleration and intensification of mechanisms, and activities that are allegedly promoting regional interdependence and perhaps, ultimately, regional political and economic integration. Globalism would then be intensifying political and/or economic processes of cooperation among states and other actors throughout the world. To reiterate, globalism and regionalism are political processes consciously undertaken by states whereas globalisation and regionalisation are labels for the overall affect of the outer e nvironment, at each a global or regional level, that therefore affects the choices politicians make.For provable reasons globalisation is a much more prevalent term than regionalisation and withal regionalism is much more prevalent than globalism. You may enquiry as to why this is and why this point is be somewhat laboured. The point is that globalisation represents the unknown or the influences outside a nations direct control. It is human nature to flip ones wig your fears and concerns and therefore labelling the current environmental effects as a globes price of issues is more concerning that focussing on your local or regional issues. To sojourn these issues however it is human nature to focus on what is being do closer to home. Thus the environment (globalisation) has a wider focus than the solution (regionalism). integrating and cooperation are best conceived as labels for progress along a line of increasing interdependence. Individual nations may start with limited or no interaction, progress to a point where they are cooperating and then r severally a point where they clear be considered integrated. The exact differentiation between whether a nation is cooperating partially integrated or broady integrated is outside the scope of this paper. Needless to say the example of a more integrated region is that of europium while I will use South eastern Asia as an example of region that is best described as closer to cooperation than integration. To reinforce this integration is best thought of as a process. The process of integration can be viewed as comprising of four elements. The first part of the process is a go asidement towards greater cooperation between integrating states another element is the transference of authority to an authority above that of the state homogenisation of values is, whether intended or not, an outcome of increased integration and finally the emergence of a regional/global civil bon ton can be argued to be both a ca use of and gist of integration.7So what becomes more integrated during a process of integration? Integration can occur in many areas of political concern. Economic, tribute and fond/cultural are the main areas of integration considered. Integration is a political finality make by nations leaders for political purposes. The reasons why and how integration occurs is almost as diverse as the opinions of world leaders and the challenges confront by them. on that pointfore in order to understand more all the way how integration comes about we need to investigate some examples of regional integration.atomic number 63an INTEGRATIONEurope is considered by many as the example of the region that has progressed furthest good deal the road of integration. After World War Two Europe was economically ruined, brotherlyly stressed and politically divided by what was to become known as the iron curtain. The linked States provided encouragement in the form of the Marshal plan to re grade and strengthen Western Europe against the spectre of Communism in the east.8Europeans also felt a maturation need to strengthen themselves against irrelevance in a bipolar world.9,10These primeval earnest fears of Europe led to the establishment of the uniting Atlantic agreement Organisation (NATO) in 1949. Economically the first evidence of European integration is in the establishment of the European Coal and Steel Community (ECSC) in 1951. The aim of the conformity was to contribute, through a mutual market for blacken and mark, to economic expansion, growth of employment and a rising standard of living. The treaty created a supranational agency to oversee aspects of national coal and steel policy such as levels of production.11The end of the dusty War in 1989-91 has seen a gain ground spur to European integration. With the fall of the Berlin wall and the dismantling of a bipolar world, Europe was able to incorporate further countries within an progressively diverse frame work of integration. While much of the integration was led by economic considerations, there has been increasingly greater integration at the political and social levels also. The Maastricht treaty was signed by twelve European nations in 1991 establishing the European uniting (EU). Since then the EU has progressed further down the path of integration with the latest treaty being the Treaty of capital of Portugal that entered force on 1st December 2009. The EU now consists of twenty dollar bill cardinal countries with a number of candidate nations awaiting entry sometime in the future.12As mentioned earlier, it was a desire to strengthen Europe against a competing political theory during the glacial War that was the first step in European integration. As it transpired, democracy proved superior to fabianism in the long run. Economically, grown capitalism has enabled Europe to outperform the centrally controlled socialist markets of the Soviet Union and Warsaw Pact. With the fa ll of the Berlin wall it became regular(a) more apparent that swelled market philosophies provided a basis for greater efficiency and greater competitiveness. Europe in general and the EU in particular serve to foreground this point.OTHER REGIONS MOVE TOWARDS INTEGRATIONWhile Europe is the most ripe(p) down the path of integration, other regions hurl not been idle. South eastern hemisphere Asia is an example of a looser cooperation in the form of the Association of South East Asian Nations (ASEAN). ASEAN was formed in 1967 between Malaysia, Singapore, Thailand, Philippines and Indonesia. Since then membership has grow to include Cambodia, Myanmar, Laos and Vietnam. South East Asian integration is an example of cooperation being used to build confidence amongst developing nations. ASEAN has always been very redolent of being overly legalistic and binding. The ASEAN way of doing business has become synonymous with building close personal relationships between leaders, being f lexible and non-binding in decisions and adhering to a respect of other nations sovereignty including undertaking a non-interference policy with respect to other ASEAN nations internal matters.13Despite criticisms of being all talk and no action and providing legitimacy to the military junta in Myanmar, the ASEAN way has shown a remarkable ability to engender cooperation and trust between its members. When ASEAN was first accomplished most members were newly independent nations and the dust-covered War was in full swing. Indonesia was perceived by some as a holy terror and it was therefore felt that the best course of action was greater engagement to build confidence and trust between nations in the region. Therefore ASEANs initial aims were for social and cultural interchange. As time has passed and members have grown comfortable with each other aspects of cooperation have become feasible. Economic and military cooperation has increased and the level and diversity of programs co nducted within ASEAN has increased. ASEAN now emphasises cooperation within ternion pillars. These are security, social/cultural and economic. As confidence has grown, ASEAN nations have also reached out further afield to first East Asia in the form of ASEAN plus three (APT), in which China, Japan and South Korea are members the East Asia Summit, which adds India, Australia, New Zealand and potentially soon Russia through to the ASEAN Regional Forum (ARF) in which twenty seven nations are involved.14Like Europe, South East Asian leaders made political decisions that the security and prosperity of their respective nations lay in greater cooperation and collaboration. Given their shared colonial experiences and wary of being used as superpower pawns during the cold War, ASEAN leaders charted a course where they could find parking area cause with neighbouring Asian nations and through cooperation achieve stability and then economic prosperity. hearty/cultural cooperation served as a confidence building appreciate increased confidence lead to greater stability and greater foreign Direct Investment (FDI) and greater FDI led to economic growth and prosperity.While Europe is an example of developed nations integrating and South East Asia provides an draw close by developing nations, they are by no means the only examples. The North American Free peck Area (NAFTA), comprising Canada, the United States and Mexico was the North American response to the challenges of a globalising world and provides and example of the trend towards integration across the global North-South divide.15MERCOSUR and the Latin American Integration Association (LAIA) are likewise South American moves. Africa has had mixed success in achieving prospered integration through the Organisation of African Unity (OAU), although of late as the African Union (AU), there appears to be more success even in this region.16NAFTA started with a free trade agreement between Canada and the United State s and was expanded to include Mexico in 1992. NAFTA is an important example of a move towards integration between two developed economies and a developing economy. consolidation economies with such diversity of economic institutions has been challenging but successful. NAFTA has also led to greater integration throughout the Americas overall with the signing of the Free make out Area of the Americas (FTAA) in 2001.17It is considered by some that NAFTA in particular and other moves towards regional integration were in response to a Fortress Europe mentality.18WHAT ARE THE DRIVERS OF REGIONAL INTEGRATION?Regional integration is nothing new. historically however regional integration was achieved through conquest or colonisation.19Since the end of World War Two there has been a growing trend of regional Integration via treaty or international agreement. Although currently regional integration is often associated with economic reasons, fundamentally regional integration is a political decision and based on political considerations. Individual nations resolve to the global climate to address their needs and move forward as a society. Amongst the most basic of national needs is that of stability and security both from internal and external threats. It has been argued that one means of protecting a nation from external trespass is to become so interdependent that aggression becomes too expensive to consider.20Under the bipolar structure of the Cold War many states were looking for ways to provide additional security from the threat of superpower conflict. While global war or nuclear final solution was one level of concern, another was the threat of becoming a victim of a proxy war between the superpowers. While Western Europe was focussed on a very real threat from communism behind the iron curtain, other regions such as South East Asia had concerns from communist insurgency or the domino theory. Overall however the Cold War effectively divided the globe into two essentially lost parts. So while regionalism could occur in between some nations, others were excluded because they were either on the other side of the iron curtain or determined not to take sides with a superpower.With the end of the Cold War this brake was suddenly released and a flood of connections were soon to be realised. Figure 1.1below provides a graphical representation of the dramatic increasing occurrence of regional integration agreements after the end of the Cold War.CUsersAkoDocumentsMTATTerm 1MTAT UM MODULE 2010AUFB 5102AssignmentGraph1.jpgToday the number of Regional Trade Agreements (RTAs) continues to multiply. The WTO notesThe surge in RTAs has continued unabated since the early 1990s. Some 462 RTAs have been notified to the GATT/WTO up to February 2010. Of these, 345 RTAs were notified under Article XXIV of the GATT 1947 or GATT 1994 31 under the Enabling Clause and 86 under Article V of the GATS. At that same date, 271 agreements were in force.21It is appare nt from these figures that regionalism is continuing to be desirable for nations.It is cost pointing out again that economic integration is only part of the overall picture. Security and social/cultural integration also continues. The United States in particular is active in many regional security agreements. Whether they are treaties, agreements or understandings many nations in the world today have desire and continue to seek greater cooperation and integration of military capabilities to meet their regions security needs. NATO is the largest example of this and again the most advanced with regard to the level of normalisation and integration achieved. Within South East Asia the Five Power falsifying Arrangement (FPDA) between Malaysia, Singapore, United Kingdom, Australia and New Zealand is a smaller example.Social/Cultural integration can take many forms. From labour laws, in-migration policies, education exchanges, tourism and even debauched competitions the world has incr easingly become integrated. Often social integration is a first step. Sports in particular offer an easy, non-threatening manner in which people of one nation can learn about another. Regionalism is readily apparent in sport with examples such as the European cup in football, the Super fifteen rugby football competition in the southern hemisphere, the National Hockey League (NHL) in Canada and the United States. While the increase in regional integration of sporting competitions is not as significant or prevalent as economic integration it serves as a reminder that integration can take many forms and is not just a single dimensional phenomenon.Having looked at regional integration in monetary value of economic, security and social/cultural terms it is apparent that regional integration has been a significant phenomenon, curiously in terms of economic integration since the end of the Cold War. There is no doubt that regional integration is a political decision based on politicians seeking to do what is best for their respective nations and citizens. So what are the driving forces behind regionalism?It is generally considered that there has been two study phases of regionalism since the end of World War Two. The first phase occurred under the bipolar structure of the Cold War and saw regionalism used as a means to bolster regions abilities to deal with the security challenges of the Cold War. With the end of the Cold War in the early 90s globalisation became the driver for regionalism as regions want to achieve competitive advantage and economy of scale economically.22There is big bucks of academic debate over how globalisation has influenced the trend towards regionalism. Some consider regionalism has been undertaken to protect a region from the effects of globalisation while other argue that regionalism is driving globalisation. This has lead to the terms open and closed regionalism. unappealing regionalism is where a region attempts to protect itself fr om the external world by bring down barriers within the region while maintaining barriers to those external to the region. The trend however has been away from closed regionalism and towards open regionalism. Open regionalism is where a region integrates so that their common market gains in attractiveness to foreign investment and improves in terms of overall economic efficiency.23It is worth noting that that it is now against WTO rules to form a regional trade agreement where greater barriers are imposed on external nations.24CONCLUSIONLooking back to the discussion on definitions earlier in the paper it is now clear that the driving force of regional integration has to be the contemporary environment. Globalisation is dominating the contemporary environment. Globalisation is a label intended to simplify descriptions of an increasing inter-connectedness, interdependency and increasing complexness of human interaction throughout the globe. As much as globalisations knockers deal i t to go away, Kofi Annans analogy with gravity highlights the futility of fighting globalisation. Globalisation is a logical result of improved communication and transport technology. People are increasingly aware what is going on everywhere in the world. Personal clutch with people from other nations and cultures is providing greater insight into the basic humanity of all peoples. With greater visibility however also comes greater fear and concern. Global society has many layers and those layers are increasingly accessible to all. Human societies all have the same basic needs but globalisation can appear to threaten as much as it offers. Regionalism is a gradatory response to a scary external world. People cling to those they are more familiar with and feel safer because of this. Politicians are no different to anybody else. Whether it be an authoritarian regime that wants to protect itself from a threatening world or a democratic leader that has to consider the views of the peop le more directly, all politicians respond in some way to the external environment.It can be argued that the end of the Cold War was a driver of regionalism. But the end of the Cold War is just a signpost in history. If it were a driver why is regionalism continuing to occur? The significance of the end of the Cold War is just that a line dividing the world from itself was removed. Regionalism occurred before, during and after the Cold War. The reason regionalism is so topical is simply because the rate of occurrence has dramatically increased in this so called second phase of regionalism. Cheap instantaneous communication is rapidly engulfing the globe. Accessible and affordable transportation is available to a large proportion of the worlds population. This easy contact with the global community will continue to drive every significant issue for at least(prenominal) the next fifty years.