THE FIELD OF GLOBAL ETHICS AS BOTH ETHICS OF GLOBALIZATION AND ETHICS UNDER GLOBALIZATION
THE FIELD OF GLOBAL ETHICSAS BOTH ETHICS OF GLOBALIZATION AND
ETHICS UNDER GLOBALIZATION
GLOBALIZATION?
Globalization is a process of interaction and integration among the people, companies, and governments of different nations, a process driven by international trade and investment and aided by information technology.
This process has effects on the environment, on culture, on political systems, on economic development and prosperity, and on human physical well-being in societies around the world
WHAT IS
HISTORICAL
ORIGINS Colonial times are often referred by historians as proto-globalization
British East India Company is sometimes regarded as the first multinational corporation
After World War II, the creation of institutions such as the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank helped to the development of economic globalization
Technology in our days has driven cultural globalization
a generalized environmental crisis the one-sidedness (biased and limited) of ‘economic globalization’ war human rights the spreading of migration world hunger and poverty fair trade the growth of media dictated mass consumption coupled with earth-devastating
waste-patterns
human population
MAJOR GLOBAL
ISSUES
a generalized environmental crisis the one-sidedness (biased and limited) of ‘economic globalization’ war human rights the spreading of migration world hunger and poverty fair trade the growth of media dictated mass consumption coupled with earth-devastating
waste-patterns
human population
MAJOR GLOBAL
ISSUES
THE ONE-SIDEDNESS OF ‘ECONOMIC GLOBALIZATION’
GLOBALIZATION AND ECONOMIC
INJUSTICE Globalization is a natural consequence of capitalism.
Wealth and income gaps are growing inside countries and between countries
The richest 20% of the world as a whole enjoyed a 12% increase in their incomes from 1988 to 1993 while the poorest half saw no growth at all and the poorest 5% suffered a 25% fall.
The main problem rests more with developing countries resisting market mechanisms and retaining protectionist policies.
But, it is also true that today’s management of globalization compounds economic polarities.
GLOBALIZATION AND ECONOMIC
INJUSTICE In practice there is not one market of international trade, but many.
Some of this markets are liberalized to become truly global markets.
But there are other markets that tell different stories.
There are markets that haven’t been opened up, and are often subject to tougher restrictions than before.
Liberalizing some markets while retaining or raising barriers in other markets drives today’s polarization.
THE PROBLEM ISN’T WITH GLOBALIZATION PER SE, BUT WITH SELECTIVE GLOBALIZATION.
WORLD HUNGER AND POVERTY
Almost half the world — over 3 billion people — live on less than $2.50 a day.
The GDP of the 41 Heavily Indebted Poor Countries (567 million people) is less than the wealth of the world’s 7 richest people combined.
Less than one per cent of what the world spent every year on weapons was needed to put every child into school by the year 2000 and yet it didn’t happen.
1 billion children live in poverty (1 in 2 children in the world). 640 million live without adequate shelter, 400 million have no access to safe water, 270 million have no access to health services. 10.6 million died in 2003 before they reached the age of 5 (or roughly 29,000 children per day).
SOME FACTS ABOUT
POVERTY
CAUSES OF POVERTY
Structural Adjustment This has required poor countries to reduce spending on things like health, education and development, while debt repayment and other economic policies have been made the priority. In effect, the IMF and World Bank have demanded that poor nations lower the standard of living of their people.
Corruption Leaders from rich countries tell poor countries that aid and loans will only be given when they show they are stamping out corruption. But, the rich countries are often active in the largest forms of corruption in those poor countries, and many economic policies they prescribe have exacerbated the problem.
Food Dumping (Aid) Free, subsidized, or cheap food, below market prices undercuts local farmers, who cannot compete and are driven out of jobs and into poverty, further slanting the market share of the larger producers. In the past few decades, more powerful nations have used this as a foreign policy tool for dominance rather than for real aid.
THE LOCAL
MULTIPLIER EFFECT
Buying local products at locally owned businesses keeps money circulating closer to where you spend it.
For every $1 spent at a local business…
For every $1 spent at a corporate chain…
45 cents are reinvested locally
Only 15 cents are reinvested locally
This creates a ripple effect as those businesses and their employees in turn spend your money locally.
Corporate chains send most of your money out of your town.
THE LOCAL
MULTIPLIER EFFECT
The local effect of that spending
If everyone in a community spends a greater percentage locally, the multiplier effect turns that into big bucks for the local economy. For example, increasing local spending from 50 to 80 percent more than doubles the local effect—from $200 to $500.
Increasing percentages of $100 spent locally
THE LOCAL
MULTIPLIER EFFECT
A study by the Leopold Center found that 16 common crops that grow in Iowa travel an average of 1,494 miles to reach chain groceries there.
By buying local goods, you maximize your money’s impact and minimize fuel use and CO2 production. Produce from the supermarket travels up to 92 times farther than produce grown locally.
Bought from local growers, they travel only 56 miles.
HUMAN POPULATION
WAR
War is a behavior pattern of organized violent conflict, typified by extreme aggression, societal disruption, and high mortality.
ARMED CONFLICTS
Major wars, 1000+ deaths per year Other conflicts
MAP OF COUNTRIES WITH ONGOING
when man is seen more as a producer or consumer of goods than as a subject who produces and consumes in order to live, then economic freedom loses its necessary relationship to the human person and ends up by alienating and oppressing him.
John Paul II
WILL GLOBALIZATION EVER TRULY SERVE THE GOOD OF ALL?
WILL IT BE ETHICAL?