Q. Critically discuss the positive and negative effects of globalization in India. How can science and technology reduce negative effects ? Explain. (56-59 BPSC/2016)

Q. Critically discuss the positive and negative effects of globalization in India. How can science and technology reduce negative effects ? Explain. (56-59 BPSC/2016)
Globalisation is the process of interaction and integration among people, companies, and governments worldwide. It leads to increasing exchange of people, views, products, ideas and other aspects of culture. The national boundaries tends to get blurred with increasing trend of such exchanges and the world tend to become a “global village”.
Causes:

• Technology: has increased the speed of communication manifolds. The phenomenon of social media in the recent world has made distance insignificant.
• LPG Reforms: The 1991 reforms in India have led to greater economic liberalisation which has in turn increased India’s interaction with the rest of the world.
  • International Monetary Fund (IMF) and World Bank helped them in this endeavour
• Faster Transportation: Improved transport, making global travel easier. For example, there has been a rapid growth in air-travel, enabling greater movement of people and goods across the globe.
• Rise of WTO: led to reduction in tariffs and non-tariff barriers across the world.
• Improved mobility of capital: a general reduction in capital barriers, making it easier for capital to flow between different economies.
• Rise of MNCs: Geographies have led to a diffusion of best practices. MNCs source resources from around the globe and sell their products in global markets leading to greater local interaction.

Positive Impacts:

• Economic Impact:
  • Better growth: increased revenue for the government which in turn could spend more o social services.
  • Greater Number of Jobs: The advent of foreign companies and growth in economy has led to job creation.
    • However, these jobs are concentrated more in the services sector and this has led to rapid growth of service sector creating problems for individuals with low level of education.
    • The last decade came to be known for its jobless growth as job creation was not proportionate to the level of economic growth.
  • More choice to consumers:
  • Higher Disposable Incomes:
    • People in cities working in high paying jobs have greater income to spend on lifestyle goods.
    • There has been an increase in the demand of products like meat, egg, pulses, organic food as a result. It has also led to protein inflation.
    • Protein food inflation contributes a large part to the food inflation in India. It is evident from the rising prices of pulses and animal proteins
  • The Green Revolution-> increased production of grains and India became self sufficient.
  • Rise of IT industry.
• Socio-Cultural impacts:
  • Divorce rates are rising day by day. Men and women are gaining equal right to education, to earn, and to speak. ‘Hi’, ‘Hello’ is used to greet people in spite of Namaskar and Namaste.
  • Access to education: On one hand globalisation has aided in the explosion of information on the web that has helped in greater awareness among people.
  • Changes in Education system more aligned with the demand of the industry.
  • Growth of cities: estimated that by 2050 more than 50% of India’s population will live in cities
  • Indian cuisine: Pizzas, burgers, Chinese foods and other Western foods have become quite popular.
  • Clothing: Increasing varieties-> Traditional Indian clothes like saris, suits, dhoti, kurta etc. jeans, t-shirts, mini skirts have become common.
  • Indian Performing Arts:
    • The Indian Classical music has gained worldwide recognition and recently, western music is too becoming very popular in our country.
    • More Indian dance shows are held globally.
  • International recognition of Yoga.
  • Modernisation: Inculcation of modern Ideas -> loosening caste and group identities.
• Political impact;
  • Global best practice to ensure accountability: e.g. Lokpal
    • The first Lokpal in the world was posted in Sweden in 1809.
  • Steps to increase accountability. e.g. RTI act, Social auditing, citizen charter etc.
  • UN conventions influence our policy direction.
  • More awareness among people about political activities.
  • Increaseing voter turnout, Equal participation of women in election.
• Psychological Impacts;
  • Development of Bicultural Identity
    • The development of a hybrid identity, which means that part of one’s identity is rooted in the local culture while another part stems from an awareness of one’s relation to the global world.
    • A sense of belonging to a worldwide culture.
• Combined collaborate effort towards environment issues. e.g. Paris peace treaties, Montreal Protocol etc.

Negative impact:

• Economic:
  • Jobless growth
  • Increasing inequality: Wealth of India’s richest 1% more than 4-times of total for 70% poorest
  • Shrinking Agricultural Sector:
    • Agriculture now contributes only about 15% to GDP. The international norms imposed by WTO and other multilateral organizations have reduced government support to agriculture.
    • This has increased the vulnerability of Indian farmers. Farmers are also increasingly dependent on seeds and fertilizers sold by the MNCs.
  • Increasing rural-urban divide. 
• Social:
  • The advent of private education, coaching classes and paid study material has created a gap between the haves and have-nots.
  • Increasing Health-Care costs: increasing susceptibility to diseases. Whether it is the bird-flu virus or Ebola or recent corona.
  • Trafficking of drug, human, arms etc due to increasing movements across border.
  • Nuclear Families: The increasing migration coupled with financial independence has led to the breaking of joint families into nuclear ones. The western influence of individualism has led to an aspirational generation of youth.
  • Westernization: uncritical acceptance of everything coming from west.
  • Old Age Vulnerability: Rising sources of information undermined the position of elderly people. Earlier they used to exercise their authority because they were considered as pool of information and experience. But now there are diverse sources of information (e.g. internet, books etc).
  • Pervasive Media: There is greater access to news, music, movies, videos from around the world. Foreign media houses have increased their presence in India.
  • McDonaldization: McDonaldization refers to the increasing presence of the fast food business model in common social institutions.
    • e.g. salad bars, fill your own cup, self-serve gasoline, ATM’s, Voice Mail, microwave dinners and supermarkets (versus the old-time groceries where you gave your order to the grocer).
  • Walmartization:
    • It can be seen with the rise of big businesses which have nearly killed the small traditional businesses in our society.
    • e.g. When a large chain store moves into a region and devastates local businesses driving displaced workers into low paying chain store jobs.
  • Growth of Self-Selected Culture: means people choose to form groups with like-minded persons who wish to have an identity that is untainted by the global culture and its values.
  • Consumerism:
    • Western fashions are coming to India: the traditional Indian dress is increasingly being displaced by western dresses especially in urban areas.Media- movies and serials- set a stage for patterns of behavior, dress codes and jargon. There is a changing need to consume more and more of everything.
• Political:
  • Global pressure on government can infringe on India’s sovereignty.
  • Criminalization of politics due to increasing cost for election.
  • Black money stored in other countries.
  • Foreign corporate may increase influence on the policy making e.g. lobbyin, foreign funding to parties.
  • Foreign entity like Cambridge Analytica impacting the election.
• Environment degradation and pollution:
  • Genetically modified species can be brought in that can impact the indigenous species.
  • Increasing urban wastes etc.

Science and technology reduce negative effects:

• IT industry creating jobs => entrepreneurship.
• Collecting data using Internet and sensors => evidence based policy making.
• Single window system to increase the ease of doing business.
• Awareness creating using social media for various issues.
• Biotechnology use in health, environment etc.
• CCTV, Trakie app for women safety.
• De-radicalization, and value inculcation among youth though communication technologies.
• webinar, virtual meeting to discuss and communicate various problems.
• E-technologies to help farmers, Satellite images to approve relief amount to farmers under the Pradhan Mantri Fasal Bima Yojana.
• Smart cities envisages to use ICT and IOT for efficient service delivery.
• Alternative technologies renewable energy.
• Technology can help bridging the rural urban divide. e.g. common service center, internet access, road connectivity, electricity etc can increase the standard of living. 

We cannot say that the impact of globalization has been totally positive or totally negative. It has been both. Each impact mentioned above can be seen as both positive as well as negative. Through the increasing use of science and technologies we can minimize the negative impact and further boost the positive impacts.