Globalization in Theory and Practice in a Post-Globalization Era.

• Author: Magbadelo, John Olushola
• Position: Political Theory Without Borders; Trade, Development and Globalization; Globalization in Practice - Book review

Political Theory without Borders

Edited by Robert E. Goodin and James S. Fishkin

Chicester, UK: John Wiley & Sons, Inc, 2016, 327 pages, $99.95, ISBN: 9781119110088

Trade, Development and Globalization

By Robert S. Javed Maswood

New York: Routledge, 2014, 185 pages, $148, ISBN: 9780415826990

Globalization in Practice

Edited by Nigel Thrift, Adam Tickell, Steve Woolgar, and William H. Rupp Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2014, 285 pages, [pounds sterling]29.99, ISBN: 9780199212637

Over the years, the term 'globalization' has acquired notoriety in all forms of intellectual exchanges in the social sciences and other disciplines. But, its common usage and definitions have ubiquitous references in matters bordering on trade or economic relations among countries of the world. The books under review here offer intellectual renditions on the concept and manifestations of globalization. The books indeed represent the different areas in which globalization has continued to impact humanity across national borders. In its various usages, globalization is depicted as both a cause and effect of the developmental challenges that have engulfed the world since the end of the second world war--thereby becoming a paradox of some sort in the sense that globalization as a concept possesses the built-in theoretical capacity of being either a dependent or an independent variable, depending on the analytical objective of any given analyst at any given time. Thus, globalization presents a big problem for political theorizing in the sense that as a concept, it can be utilized as an explanatory variable for other phenomena while other phenomena can be utilized to explain globalization.

The problematique of theorizing on issues of global significance engages the attention of Robert E. Goodin and James S. Fishkin in their book, Political Theory without Borders. Political theory, as they assert in their book, has focused its analytical beam for too long on internalities--on relations among a people, and on relations between them and those ruling over them, noting that the prescriptions of political theory were traditionally designed for the internal governance of principalities, taken one at a time. The challenging events and incidents in the contemporary world including climate change, pollution by industrial effluents, especially carbon emissions and the threats they pose to humankind have continued to refocus concerns for global action to deter or reverse such untoward developments. This book attempts to present a broad theory encompassing dimensions of the diverse issues of common concerns to humanity across national borders; the authors agreed in their belief that a clearer perspective and deeper understanding of the concept of globalization can emerge from this project.

The book begins with an introductory chapter by Robert E. Goodin and James S. Fishkin and consists of three parts of thirteen chapters. The first part entitled "Global Spillovers" contains three chapters by George E Kennan, Simon Caney and Mathias Risse respectively. The chapter by Kennan discusses the imperative of preventing a world wasteland from the standpoint of a multi-stakeholders approach comprising national, regional and international efforts, with emphasis on the latter and exploring standards for conserving the environment in the face of the ravaging impact of ever-increasing productive exploitation of natural resources in substantial parts of the world (pp. 8-17). Simon Caney's chapter on "Two Kinds of Climate Justice" examines the ethical challenges of climate change from two different prisms, namely 'burden-sharing justice and harm avoidance justice'. While laying a premium on the perspective of harm avoidance justice, Caney observes the need for making necessary sacrifices to avert dangerous climate change by the application of relevant principles such as the power/ responsibility principle and the polluter pays principle (pp. 18-45). Risse's chapter on "The Human Right to Water and Common Ownership of the Earth" broaches issues of managing water in the context of the theory of global justice, stressing the importance of having a global water compact for regulating the distribution of water (pp. 46-73).

The second part of the book entitled "Global Flows" consists of five chapters on varying issues of global significance including tax competition, human rights, and migration and citizenship, among others. The chapter by Peter Dietsch and Thomas Rixen examines the question of global background justice against the backdrop of the prevalent tax competition among sovereign States. They observe that aside from putting pressure on national fiscal regimes, tax competition has the tendency to exacerbate inequalities of income and wealth both within countries and across borders. They emphasize the need for close examination of the rules of international taxation to ensure...