Global Social Problems: Quiz 1

Globality

A social condition, characterized by economics, politics, cultural environments, interconnections; makes existing borders and boundaries irrelevant

Global Imaginary

People’s growing consciousness of global connectivity; destabilizes conventional nation-stage image

Globalization

A social process; expansion and intensification of social relations and consciousness across world-time and world-space; interconnectivity

• Dynamic

4 Characteristics of Globalization

• Creating new social networks

• Expanding social relations

• Intensification & Acceleration

• Objective and Subjective (Frames of reference)

Great Depression 1930s

U.S had crisis of demand

John Maynard Keynes (Protectionist Policies (1918-1939))

Supply and demand inadequate; government intervention can support and strengthen the economy

Move Government Roles in Economy

• Regulation

• Monetary and fiscal policy to reduce inflation and create jobs

• Taxation and redistribution

• Social Security Net

WWII

When the government spent more military, the economy boomed, in line with Keynesian economics

Significance of Bretton Woods and “Golden age of capitalism”

• International Monetary Fund (IMF)

• International Bank for Reconstruction (Now called World Bank)

• General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT → WTO)

The Success of Keynesianism & The “Golden Age” of Captialism

• 1940s-1960s

• Interventionist state

• Economic growth

• Wage growth

• Social Safety Net

Rise of the American Middle Class

The Success of Keynesianism & The “Golden Age” of Captialism is also known for?

The Rise of the American Middle Class

Shift to Neoliberalism: Stagnation

Stagnant demand, high unemployment, high inflation

Shift to Neoliberalism

• Stagnation

• 1970s (Abandon the gold-based monetary system_

  • Trade deficit: paying for imports with gold reserve

• Oil crisis because OPEC is formed

• Public Debt

• Decrease power of economic elite

Neoliberalism (Adam Smith, David Ricardo)

The free market can take care of all our needs

• Self-regulating mechanism; Supply and demand, rather than central planners

• The rationality of the free market; constraints interfere with natural efficiency of markets, “fittest” rise to the top

Neoliberalism: Less Government Role in Economy

• Privatization (Pro-business)

• Deregulation

• Low taxes/austerity

• Free trade, get rid of tariffs on imports and other barriers to trade

Conflation of market freedom ad other types of freedom (press, expression, democracy)

Conflict Theory

Society involves sets of competing interest groups; social order based on conflict, coercion, and power

Marx: Economic Determinist

• Those who benefit “Bourgeoisie” are motivated to maintain it

• “False consciousness” Ideology as a mechanism for social control of the Proletariat

• “Class Consciousness awareness born out of collective struggle

Hegemony Definition

Power or dominance one group holds over another

Hegemony (Gramsci)

Economics to ideas; force to consent (“Common sense”); political society to civil society

Begin with ideologies we share

Not fixed; Counter-hegemonic

Ideology

System of meaning that helps define and explain the world; helps you make value judgments about the world, locate identities and interests

Normalization

Neoliberal ideologies

Normalization

Boundaries; presence and absence

Power of Transnational Corporations (TNC)

Complex web of transnational economic interconnections that is created through flow of goods, services and capitial

• Jobs, Workers, Money → moves across borders

General Agreements on Trades and Tariffs (GATT)

• 1950s

• 1994 becomes → World Trade Organization (WTO)

• 135 Country members but allow corporations to “consult”

• WTO puts burden on governments to justify their trade policies