JUN 27 Globalization and the Environment

 "one thing impacting the earth's oceans are overfishing which has resulted in the extinction of numerous aquatic species and significant depletion of the earth's stock of tuna, salmon, swordfish, etc".

          According to wwf.panda.org  "Swordfish and other billfish are hunted for food and for sport. The methods used to catch these fish such as harpoons and some conventional fishing lines  also puts additional pressure on other vulnerable and endangered species such as marine turtles and tuna."
              I was not aware of illegal driftnets fisheries who catch fishes such as marlin, salmon, tuna and swordfish in indiscriminate ways, some of the fishes caught are pregnant and some are babies. one reason fisheries get away with these practice is because insufficient regulations for the fisheries to comply with  fishing rules.
           To protect these endangered species WWF is lobbying for fisheries to have rules and regulations pertaining to the size of fish they are allowed to catch, and the areas where they can fish. WWF is bringing close attention on the issue and is putting measures in place to monitor and protect endangered species of the ocean.

Globalization and Development

"The United Nations has its  Human Development Index (HDI) which uses three categories to define development: health, education, and income". After looking at the human development index Congo got my attention. Congo has a very low human development index. Congo (Democratic Republic of the)’s 2012 HDI of 0.304 is below the average of 0.466 for countries in the low human development group and below the average of 0.475 for countries in Sub-Saharan Africa 
The HDI is an average measure of basic human development achievements in a country. Like all averages, the HDI masks inequality in the distribution of human development across the population at the country level. in my opinion Congo is so low in human development index because the country poverty. the country has lots of wealth producing minerals such as copper and gold. I believe the citizens tend to drop out of school to work in the mines to feed families and fend for themselves, also the side effects of the  high levels chemicals such as  mercury etc in the water  in areas close to the mines are causing growth stunts, retardation, and infant mortality. also the unsafe practices at the mines causes accidental death to workers and also because lack of  or inadequate or accessible and affordable healthcare may be another issue. finally I believe because large developed countries do business with Congo and may outsmart them in business leaves the economy stunted and citizens stay in poverty and country at large dependent on foreign help

Growth, Inequality, and Poverty

Neoliberalism have increased poverty and inequality. neoliberalism is antipathetic to public sector and believe that private sector should play a major role in the economy. because of this there is separation between the private and public sector. this separation causes wealthy to become wealthier and the poor to be poorer. this type of inequalities created by neoliberalism can lead to terrorism, more deaths and hunger.

Globalization of Production

"Foxconn is actually a Taiwanese company with facilities in China. So, in this case, an American company contracts a Taiwanese manufacturer, with a factory in China that hires Chinese laborers, to assemble products that will be sold in American stores. That is a simple model of how global production works"
I never heard of the company Foxconn before and I became interested in how hard these laborers work and the pressure involve in manufacturing these high quality  apple electronics and gadgets. I became curious and wanted to find out how workers are treated and what work conditions they face at Foxconn. from my research I have learned that workers are not treated fairly or with dignity. 13 workers have attempted or committed suicide within 5 months in 2010.that number is shocking to me and within only 5 months. since the company is originally a Taiwanese company with locations in china the migrant workers are treated unfairly, get paid little and their labor and citizen rights are violated,. some of the workers are abused and work long hours and are pressures and mistreated. after reading this I feel a type of way to purchase an IPhone. these people are used as cheap labor and suffer so much to the point of committing suicide and then the Apple products are so expensive. 

Globalization's Impact on States

No individual country is immune from global threat of nuclear attack, unfair trading method or terrorist occurrence. Which is why globalization is very important through interdependency with other nations to preserved a healthy relationship with all our allies throughout the world to guard against nuclear proliferation and terrorism from despotic nation such as North Korea, Iran, Syria and Russia just to mention a few and to maintained a degree of fairness in trade such as the North Atlantic free trade agreement initiated under president Obama administration that ensured fair trading practice with participation nation.

President Donald Trump recent announcement to end NAFTA and to enter a unilateral trade war with china for his own political interest is going to have a ripple effect in international trade. Which only served to Isolate America in the global international trade arena while most of our allies are entering trade deals with china.   

The Logic of Economic Globalization.

Globalization in essence was design to connect the world through a “combination of deregulated foreign trade, reductions in trade tariffs and the removal of export fees. Globalization seeks to utilize foreign markets effectively for trade as well as provide new development opportunities for production employment in foreign countries” (Hammond, 2017).

In all its outward appearance globalization seems by many to                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                be the  elixir of the world economy for the twenty first century, but in reality not all nations are benefitting   equally  from globalization. For example, globalization tend to be more beneficial to developing nations such as the G-12 nations because the   world banks and other lending institutions such as the international monitory fund extend  ample resource to these nations which help to improve their economy, while on the other hand tend to have a negative impact on third world countries because these same lending institution such as the world banks and  IMF refused to lend funds to these third world nations for fearing that they do not repay their loan with interest on a timely basis.

For third world nations the benefit of globalization come in the form of the interconnectedness of countries due to modern technologies which allowed for citizens from these poorer countries to migrate to other developing nations in minutes to seek better employment and to reap the benefit of globalization.

Reference:

Hammond, K. (2017, September 26). Globalization's Effects on Third-World Countries. Retrieved June 26, 2018, from https://bizfluent.com/info-8543200-globalizations-effects-thirdworld-countries.html

JUN 18 The Political Economy of Global Financial Crises

This lecture will focus more on the nature of financial crises. Since the 1970s, these kinds of crises have become more common, and are much more global in their scope. The largest, so far, has been the crisis of 2008. The increasing frequency of these crises is, of course, related to the globalization of finance.
I choose to write about this quote because It is true that the 2008 financial crisis was so far, the largest and is mainly related to financial globalization. Globalization is beneficial among countries because it creates jobs and allow countries to import and export goods and services to boost or increase their economy and so on. on the other hand globalization can be the opposite. for example the 2008 financial crisis due to globalization affected many countries it did not just affect America but instead it affected countries on a global level. This type of financial crisis can be repeated again if President Trump really start a trade war with china. Again this war will be a very large crises related to globalization of finance. China, America and other large countries will face economic and financial crises as a result it will be related to globalization. I say this because over 10 American companies including caterpillar and apple have very close relations with china and they are technically American companies, They will face huge loses if trump put the trade war in effect.