I THINK it is high time that this article will be focusing on the concept of “globalization” after the announcement of the Commission on Higher Education that “The Contemporary World” course in college will no longer be included in the higher education curriculum as one of General Education subjects. But how is globalization related to the “soon-to-be-defunct” college course? During my early years of teaching in college, I used to handle “The Contemporary World” course with first year students as the audience and most of its course contents are leaning towards the globalization.
As I recall its definition, globalization is the seamless interconnectedness and interaction that occurs among nations of the world when they exchange goods and services, information, technology, culture, etc. The benefits that we are reaping from globalization is undeniably immense. In fact, our world without globalization in unimaginable—that is, if countries won’t be opening their doors to other countries.
Perhaps we will get stuck in an old civilization just like what’s currently transpiring in North Korea when its Prime Minister decided to live in isolation from the rest of world. And no matter how North Korea wanted to show that it can live on its own, it cannot deny the fact that it is lagging behind almost all countries in terms of all aspects more especially economic.
Another theory which goes well with the pros of globalization is the theory of absolute advantage by Adam Smith. It states that a country has an absolute advantage over another if it can produce a good more efficiently—that is, using fewer resources or at a lower cost than the other country.
It clearly explains the reason behind importation and exportation in the international business stage. Without globalization, we will never enjoy the benefit of buying and using products manufactured from other countries more especially those which we are not capable of producing (cars, high-end tech devices, etc.).
But while globalization has been offering significant economic rewards (i.e., our income from BPO companies is attributable to globalization, so as the remittances of our OFWs), it has also presented complex challenges that our country must continue to navigate. Firstly, the country has become very vulnerable to external and global shocks. If there are economic recessions, geopolitical tensions and supply chain disruptions in the global scale, the Philippine economy can also be affected.
For instance, we have been very reliant to import of necessity products like oil and rice in which their shortage would be detrimental to our economy. Moreover, manufacturing firms which have become dependent on imported raw materials would be facing volatility if there will be global raw material shortages.
Another major challenge brought about by globalization that the Philippine government must overcome is the threat to local industries and MSMEs. One of the responsibilities of the state is to protect the local businesses from cannibalization of global brands due to widespread international trade that’s happening now. For instance, in terms of food, the Philippines have already been Westernized since most Filipinos (especially the younger generation) prefer foods that originated from the US (hamburgers and fried chicken). We have been seeing the growth of fast-food giants like McDonalds and KFC, but thanks to Jollibee which has been making raves internationally in the fast food industry.
Meanwhile, in other industries like fashion and technology, Filipino brands, I think, are slowly dying due to “colonial mentality” that we have. We often think that global brands are of higher quality than the local ones, thus the colloquial phrase “lokal naman iyan” which denotes that local products are always associated with poor quality. We have seen numerous local businesses which already stopped their operations due to continuous entry of international brands which the locals think are trendier, of better quality and of better value for money.
Yes, globalization offers multitude of benefits to any country. But with its potent force to erode a country’s cultural identity, the responsibility lies in the hands of the government to strike a balance between cultural preservation and economic growth.|
