3155+Fall+08+Monday+Oct+6

Class notes for Monday, October 06, 2008
 * Pol Sci 3155 Business & Public Policy, Fall 2008 (Dr. Howard)**

Globalization & Trade introduced || || Lehne 5, 14 || Cont’d, Lehne 14 || Trade seminar Friday || ||
 * This class** ||
 * Next class** ||
 * Topic** ||
 * Topic** ||
 * Topic** ||
 * Reading** ||
 * Reading** ||
 * Comments** ||
 * Comments** ||

Questions, problems? News items?

Driven by movements of goods, services, labor, capital, ideas Especially important: Intrafirm trade Financial flows… spreading risk, searching profit, arbitraging factors of production Communications (technology)
 * __Globalization (see handout: indicators of globalization)__**
 * Key aspects**

Location-specific production advantages based on factor costs Extra-national production efficiencies (volume) Market access Skills and Technology access… Global distribution policies ‘leveraging’ cost and cross-product advantage
 * MNCs** seek to build competitive advantage by:
 * Financial institutions** seek higher returns on investment, and/or to balance their portfolios by investing overseas, for example by buying equity and bonds in foreign companies
 * __Globalization and politics__**
 * Nation-states and much of politics defined by territoriality, but globalization can be defined as a “transformation of social geography marked by the growth of supra-territorial spaces” (JAScholte—see his ‘Core Theses on Globalization in __Globalization, A Critical Introduction__, 2000, St. Martin’s)
 * There are new globalized ‘spaces’ and contests take place in these ‘spaces’….business and policy makers must take note


 * Government and globalization: is gov’t disappearing?**
 * How is this measured?
 * Revenues
 * Note: US at about 30%; Sweden at 57%GDP
 * And note that the Scandinavian economies are very open…
 * What about relative power of business and government
 * Companies don’t have sovereign powers of taxation, etc
 * There are some limits of gov’t arising out of globalization…but is this a good thing?
 * Guards against tyranny: people can leave and there’s an information flow
 * Most closed states are tyrannous
 * Problem of the will of the people
 * Anti-globalists fear that states won’t be able to sustain productivity improving investments in a globalized era…
 * But …argues the Economist…why would market oppose them if they enhance productivity?
 * Time horizons?
 * Short term mobility?
 * Free riding and collective action problems?
 * Opposition of globalization and democracy?
 * No…since globalization increases demand for social spending

Is it inevitable? What are effects on state—on local sovereignty and autonomy of decision-making?
 * Key questions from political science standpoint**


 * 2 camps on globalization:**

1. It’s a major challenge…. Gov’ts have less autonomy Therefore systems are converging 2. States remain diverse Gov’ts still regulate/promote globalization Diversity will persist

Framework Regulatory Promotional Social services
 * Students should think about globalization and the various ‘functions’ of the capitalist state:**
 * __Governance and globalization__**
 * Globalization and world politics** ** à increased need for global governance of one kind or another…**
 * World or global governance does not imply world government, nor need it imply top-down, hierarchical authority (tho’ it sometimes does); Rather it provides coordination and regulation
 * Note the connection to power and society: It implies global society not just anarchy, and it suggests need to formalize power of some kind
 * Increasing interconnectedness of societies so events in one place have more impact on those far away …reduced importance of spatial geography…it’s multi-faceted
 * Politics: state capacities limited?
 * Economics: production, distribution, work, consumption
 * Society: population, experience
 * Culture and thought including everyday thought
 * ecology

__Need for global governance__ __Elements of global governance: Karns and Mingst distinguish following:__ //1. International rules or law//
 * Concrete challenges
 * globalization and its effects
 * end of Cold War and terror
 * emergent Trans-national civil society and need to preserve power
 * contested nature of sovereignty
 * Abstract functions
 * Coordination between powerful consenting international actors (esp states) which benefit from the arrangement, usually because it provides…
 * Public goods
 * Non-rivalrous
 * Non-excludable
 * Regulation, stability and discipline
 * Preservation of hegemony
 * Regulation, change and discipline
 * 3000+ multilateral agreements (contrast bilateral agreements)
 * International law lies in treaties and conventions, customary practice, writings of legal scholars, judicial decisions, general principles of law

//2. Norms or ‘soft law’//
 * Some human rights
 * Some labor rights
 * Framework conventions on climate change and biodiversity

//3. Structures, formal and informal//
 * IGOs, global, regional, etc (NAFTA, United Postal Union, etc)
 * 238 in 2003/4
 * IGO functions:
 * Informational
 * Forum for exchange of views
 * Normative
 * Rule-creating
 * Rule-supervising
 * Operational
 * International courts eg: [|International Court of Justice] (principal judicial organ of the UN)
 * INGOs providing humanitarian relief etc
 * Over six thousand plus within nation groups
 * Ad hoc arrangements such as
 * Group of 8 industrialized nations
 * Global conferences eg: on women, race etc
 * Private governance

//4. International regimes// __Actors in IO__
 * Linked principles, norms, rules, d-making structures for a given issue area (trade, nonproliferation, food aid, telecomms)
 * States (which alone have territorial sovereignty)
 * IGOs (eg: European Commission)
 * NGOs
 * Experts
 * Global policy networks
 * Multinational corporations
 * Others