Globalization, World Economy, and Multiculturalism

  Globalization as many people perceive is quite a multidimensional progress, and process of analyzing multiculturalism in relation to globalization is more so. Thomas L. Friedman argued that there are two aspects regarding the globalization. One is the Lexus, and the other is the olive tree. The Lexus symbolizes the integrated or common drive for [...]

Global Governance of Poverty and Millennium Development Goals

There are actually many ways to deal with the obvious disparity of wealth distribution around the world. However, many of them do not qualify as the “neoliberal way” per se, considering that some of those ‘choices’ can accompany violence or other kind of ugliness derived from human nature. Therefore, we are left with a handful [...]

The Future of Asian Regionalism

Regionalism is a movement which is widely believed to be the counterpart of globalization. In fact, it is a product of globalization itself and the most important aspect of it. According to Robert Gilpin, the movement toward economic regionalism or regional trade agreements accelerated in the mid-1980s. The European Union was the sole survivor of [...]

1997 Financial Crisis in Southeast Asia

The Asian Financial Crisis, which Koreans generally refer as “the IMF crisis”, was a period of financial crisis that gripped much of Asia beginning in July 1997, and raised fears of a worldwide economic meltdown due to financial contagion. The crisis started in Thailand with the financial collapse of the Thai baht caused by the [...]

World Trade Organization and Free Trade

  The World Trade Organization represents the political economy of free trade, and even though the free trade has significant influence and meaning of its own, some might argue that it is actually a misleading charade to hide the real agenda behind it. The World Trade Organization (WTO) is an international organization designed by its [...]

Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS), and Collective Intelligence

There have been many efforts to protect intellectual property rights (including TRIPS) and to some extent they are necessary, but one should not ignore the problems those protection measures impose on world economics, and the high potentials of collective intelligence. The Agreement on Trade Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS) is an international agreement [...]

The Role of International Organizations

An international organization is defined as an organization with an international membership, scope, presence. However when we discuss about them, they are often Intergovernmental Organizations (IGOs). There are of course, International Nongovernmental Organizations (INGOs) too. These include non-profit organizations such as Amnesty International and Doctors without Borders, and multinational corporations like McDonald’s Corporation. Because the [...]

About American Hegemony & Financial Crisis in the US

In the past many decades, one country from the continent of America has been in global hegemonic position for almost a century long. The United States, going through the periods of World War II, Cold War with U.S.S.R., has clearly become a dominant power in political, economic, ideological, military, and cultural aspects of the world. [...]

Summaries and a critical review on “Commanding Heights”

[Commanding Heights : The Battle for The World Economy] is a documentary film based on a book by the same name written by Daniel Yergin and Joseph Stanislaw. [The Battle of Ideas], the first episode of this 3 parted documentary walks through aspects of 20th century world economy (to the era of Ronald Reagan and [...]