Cultural Consequences of Globalization

"Nevertheless, I want to stress that hegemonic attributes of globalization should not be perceived in an alarmist manner. Globalization is a reality that cannot be avoided. It is a consequence of human action and interaction. But as a result of globalization, it is likely, and in fact inevitable that certain cultural forms would have a universal appeal and presence."

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by Sasanka Perera

(February 03, Colombo, Sri Lanka Guardian) Other than economics, politics and power, culture is also a central concept linked to any serious discussion on globalization. Culture can be defined as something that transforms difference into essence. As Jonathan Friedman argues in his book ‘Cultural Identity and Global Process’ (1994), this process starts from the "awareness of specificity, that is, of difference, of different ways of doing similar things. Where difference can be attributed to demarcated populations we have culture or cultures". On the other hand, as R. Robertson has pointed out in his book ‘Globalization: Social Theory and Global Culture’ (1992), "globalization refers both to the compression of the world and to the intensification of the consciousness of the world as a whole." His reference here is both to an increase in global interdependence and the awareness of that dependence. Robertson further argues that this compression has been going on for much more than the last century, perhaps over the last millenium or more, even though not in the same form. It is in this context that Friedman has observed that "the great empires of the past were powerful globalized organizations and just as often powerful globalizing cultures".

If globalization refers to a compression of the world, where people get to know more and more about other people, regions and countries, then as a result, does it also mean that cultural identities and markers tend to become less clear over time? In other words, does globalization also mean the eraser of cultural differences or the submerging of such differences within the identity of one or few hegemonic cultural systems? At this point, we also need to re-examine the notions of global interdependence that emerge in many definitions of globalization. The issue here is not really whether there is interdependence between countries, populations or regions today, but the nature of that interdependence. For instance, is that interdependence based on and function according to ideals of equality? Alternatively, do ideas, goods and services flow between different regions in the same intensity and on an equal basis? As a result of globalization, has humanity become one big happy family where cultural and ethno-religious differences no longer matter and where equality dictates all relationships between peoples? Commonsense on the basis of what is happening around us would inform us that this is not really the case.

There clearly is a certain compression of the world today due to technological advances such as radio, television, internet and so on which produce and distribute information. This allows us to be more familiar and knowledgeable about the world and it cultural formations than we were 30 years ago. Historically however, this is a process that has been going on for a very long period of time. Many European intellectual enterprises in the colonial and postcolonial periods can also be understood in the context of globalization, whereby there was a certain compression of the world. For example, it is because of this compression that native children in colonial peripheries, including Ceylon learnt European history and not their own, and read books like Robinson Crusoe, the story of a white man who single-handedly brought civilization and thereby order into a situation of chaos, very much like the actual process of colonization. But that same kind of cultural influence either in terms of literature or anything else did not flow from the peripheries to the center in the same intensity and volume.

As in the past, at present also the reality behind this idealized compression of the world is that, we know more about certain cultural formations than about others. For example, CNN, BBC and other international media companies made sure that the entire world knew about the horror and the anger of the United States in the post September 11th 2001 period in great detail. We still get daily and live updates of its consequences. Comparatively however, those media organizations or our own offer us almost nothing about the collective fates and pain of thousands of people missing or killed over the last twenty years of violent conflict. The pain and anger of the rest of the so-called developing world has a similar marginal presence in the global media. Similarly, American icons of popular culture such as Coca-Cola, Pizza Hut and McDonalds have become part of a universal cultural phenomenon, precisely because of global compression attributes of globalization. In other words, these cultural icons have become familiar and common in many parts of the world. On the other hand, Jinadasa’s Talaguli, a local cultural icon, is still mostly visible in Warakapola on the Colombo - Kandy road, and a marginal presence at Liberty Plaza in Colombo.

Looking at these contradictions from a critique of globalization, what are the fundamental differences between McDonalds and Jinadasa’s Talaguli? Jinadasa’s Talaguli is strictly localized in the same way that the pain of the people who have been scarred by Sri Lanka’s political violence is also strictly localized to those individuals themselves and their kin. On the other hand, McDonalds is highly globalized in the same way that the story of the American people who perished in the craziness of Osama Bin Laden was also highly globalized to cover a huge global audience far beyond their kin and friends.

These very different realities can be explained on the basis of lack of equality and the operation of power relationships. Globalization, in cultural or in any other field, is a highly hierarchical and hegemonic process replete with contradictions that manifest in global power politics. American cultural icons as well as news that are important to that country become ‘global’ because of the economic and political might of the United States, because of the position that country occupies in the extended world of politics and industry. In this scheme of things, countries such as Sri Lanka or cultural formations or trends from such countries, are placed in the periphery.

Culturally speaking, to us, Levi’s jeans are a symbol of status and high fashion as it is in many other parts of the world. Comparatively however, despite all its local poshness, Barbara Sansoni Fabrics are merely objects of no significance lost in the periphery of the global system. Of course, in another time and in another reality, if Mrs. Sansoni’s and Mr. Jinadasa’s businesses were located in nation states whose socio-political clout was significant (such as that of the US), then the world perhaps would have considered Barefoot sarongs and Jinadasa’s Talgulis preferable to Levi’s jeans and BigMac Hamburgers.

What I want to stress here is that globalization is generally a one way process that is informed by ideals of inequality and hegemony. That is, what becomes globalized, whether cultural icons, political institutions, systems of knowledge etc tends to flow from those highly industrialized countries or regions of the world to the rest of the planet. Even in the industrialized world itself, this same one way process is evident. So it is more visible to see American cultural icons from McDonalds to Disneyland in Paris than an infusion of popular contemporary French cultural icons to any city in the US. As such, the direction of globalization depends on power structures based on relative positions countries or regions occupy in the global world of industry, politics and finance.

Nevertheless, I want to stress that hegemonic attributes of globalization should not be perceived in an alarmist manner. Globalization is a reality that cannot be avoided. It is a consequence of human action and interaction. But as a result of globalization, it is likely, and in fact inevitable that certain cultural forms would have a universal appeal and presence. At the same time, often it may be difficult to ascertain what is strictly global and what is strictly local. Writers such as Friedman has pointed out that certain perceivably localizing phenomena such as ethnicity, nationalism, and indigenous movements may in fact be global products, and that localizing strategies may be inherently global (1994). For instance, nationalist movements may emerge in a given society precisely because of a perceived fear of cultural domination by an alien cultural formation, which results from globalization. It is in this context that one can understand the anti-English language legislation in France spearheaded by the French language lobby due to its fear that English may alter the way French is spoken. That fear has come about as a result of globalization, and the resultant expansion of English as the language of global commerce and communication.

In any event, cultural globalization is an inevitable and natural process, even though it has some clear features based on hegemony and inequality. What is needed is not to attempt to stop globalization, which is impossible, but to find means that would democratize that process.