GLOBALIZATION AND ITS ECONOMIC, SOCIAL AND CULTURAL IMPLICATION ON INDIAN SOCIETY

The globalization debate has been raging ever since it formally began in the mid-20^th century with the opening of institutions like World Bank and IMF. In technical sense, India opened up to Globalization much later in 1991 when it was felt important to liberalize market norms and allow privatization to encourage growth of its long stagnant economy. Historically however, India has long preached ideals of Vasudhev Kutumbhkam and Sarve Bhavantu Sukhina, carving out the Indian model of globalization. Last year, India marked the silver jubilee of this venture explained by concepts like global village (Marshall McLuhan) for borderless world (Kenichi Ohame) and compression in terms of time and space (Anthony Giddens).

When thinking the impact of globalization, it becomes important to mark at the outset that it has affected different countries differently. The impact of globalization has divided scholars across the world into its defenders and critics. While Marxists criticize it as expansion of capitalism on global scale, Islamic and Asian societies interpret globalization as an attempt to spread Western values. Noam Chomsky attributes the loss of many American lives to capitalist wars fought to force other countries to open their markets for bourgeoise in capitalist countries. Scholars like Emmanuel Wallerstein blame globalization for the poverty in Africa or wars in Balkans as a ramification of capitalists’ quest for market and acumen of capital. Globalization however, must not be confused with capitalism. According to Jagdish Bhagwati, globalization has brought unprecedented level of growth in poor countries. The percentage of people living in developing countries on 1$/day has halved in the past 20 years, life expectancy has almost doubled in developing world, child mortality has declined in every developing region and literacy levels have risen. India has largely benefitted from the impact of globalization.

In 25 years of economic reforms when India opened up to globalization, growth accelerated to almost 7% on an average, compared to 3-3.5% growth in the first 35 years after independence. Second, there has been a remarkable reduction in poverty, especially in the last 15 years though it is still too high for comfort. Third, entrepreneurship has resurged with many new entrants in corporate sector. Fourth, the current account has been opened fully while the capital account in India’s trade is substantially open to FDI and portfolio flows in a calibrated manner. Fifth, globalization has brought with it new technology with quality products that have made jobs more productive. Thanks to globalization, medical tourism has become a growing sector in India estimated to be worth more than US$ 3 billion. This garnered attention recently when an Egyptian woman shed more than a 100kg after undergoing a geriatric surgery in India. Most of all, there is a tangible self-confident in India’s foreign policy as evident from India’s stance in the ongoing standoff vis-a-vis Doklam against China.

However, even from an economic stand there are many challenges which have remained unaddressed. Globalization has led to increasing casual employment and weakening labour movements. We have failed to adopt a strategic policy in agriculture for an enhanced and sustained growth. Education and especially health have received inadequate attention despite intermingling with the globalized world. Globalization is also attributed for a surge in practices such as commercial surrogacy and human trafficking. Our real challenges are issues such as competence in governance and slowdown in private industrial investment. Therefore, in the face of globalization, the need of the hour is to have less centralized, more competent and independent regulators, and swifter resolution of disputes by the judiciary. What we also need is greater administrative decentralization and adequate empowerment of city administrators.

Economic changes naturally lead to social changes in a society. The advent of globalization has led to a more integrated world, and many emerging smaller communities that are in turn connected to many others. With Information and Communication Technology, one has access to a vast resource pool. People have begun to develop a global psychology. A primitive Irular community in India being hired by American wildlife professionals to study reptile behavior is a classic example of how globalization has impacted the social fabric of our society. It also benefitted horticulture and cash crop producing farmers, demands of whose products have surged globally.

On the flip side however, globalization has led to distress in the lives of small farmers and tribal people who are often displaced to provide land for MNCs. Besides, WTO free trade norms are also such that they benefit the famers of wealthy nations. What’s also important to register is that while globalization can bring such a magnanimous shift in the social life of people, it’s restricted to only the ‘haves’. The ‘have nots’ remain unaffected since they are bracketed out of the resource pool due to lack of access and agency. Rapid expansion of globalization and capitalism therefrom, has also given rise to consumerism which has now begun to target vulnerable segments such as teenagers.

Consumerist culture has also led to objectification of women in advertisements and commodified their bodies. Globalization has had an implication on women in the economy too. While MNCs have given a plethora of equal work opportunities to educated women, an ILO reports points that labour force participation rate among women in India has been dropping to one of the lowest in South Asia. While more women in India are enrolling in secondary education, it’s not a secret that due to lack of road infrastructure and basic facilities such as toilets, women are forced to drop out and hence lag behind when competing outside domestic spheres. In wealthier householders, women have even lower employment rates. To find the missing women, we must give them full access to labour markets for full utilization of human resources. This will also address the skewed work-family equation for women in India and create a family structure where women are not the sole child-raisers.

The most obvious impact of globalization has been felt in the cultural landscape. Global restaurants and international cuisines are served on the menus of Indian restaurants today. We are exposed to international music and dramas in literature, foreign festivals and languages. More and more students are getting involved in researches on foreign languages and histories and societies of foreign countries. Similarly, Indian cinema shot in foreign locations with foreign talent is expanding its reach across the globe as it completed its centenary. We wear Western clothes, travel in German cars, use Japanese technology, Korean smart phones, and have Indianized many such products.

Many scholars have also criticized blind adoption of western values with terms as ‘aping the West’. English has begun dominating the Indian languages not only for official purposes but also in every day parlance. Many Indian art forms  such as Kalchattis, stone pots from Tamil Nadu and performing arts such as Burrakatha are no longer in vogue. Thus a more balanced approach to globalization would make it a more affable process. This will happen when yoga becomes a common exercise the world over, Indian basmati becomes the preferred variety, Chess is played in international games such as Olympics and so on and forth.

Globalization, hence, has impacted every aspect of Indian society, its culture and economy. As elucidated above, India has been largely benefitted from globalization, though it can be even further benefitted when it becomes a net exporter of cultural and technological goods and services. Today it is felt that India is more dependent on the world than the world is on India. This reality needs to change to favour Indian needs. We must create a kind of globalization that not only makes the rich richer but equips the poor to enrich their lives. That then will be the true merit of globalization.