from Part II - Change Agents, in Theory and Practice
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 15 January 2023
Globalization seemed like an irresistible, unstoppable force. Political plasticity seemed to be pushed to higher levels, as globalization accelerated and impacted all humankind. The development of larger units such as the European Union signaled, for many, the end of the nation state – a borderless world. Economic and technological forces seemed to be forcing globalization, and all humankind, down a one-way road. On closer examination, however, we realize that globalization has been taking place in a fractured manner: Just as economic and technological forces have been pushing us toward the global, basic identity needs have been pulling us back toward the local. Thus, just as Europe is integrating, there is Brexit and Basque and Scottish independence. Just as the North American Free Trade Agreement comes into place, there is Quebec nationalism and the effort by Quebec nationalists to break away from the rest of Canada. The deglobalization movement has been accelerated by the rise of authoritarian strongmen and their extremist nationalist supporters. As this chapter shows, it seems that basic identity needs and allegiances to local groups and nations have influenced developments, so that political plasticity remains limited in this domain.
To save this book to your Kindle, first ensure [email protected] is added to your Approved Personal Document E-mail List under your Personal Document Settings on the Manage Your Content and Devices page of your Amazon account. Then enter the ‘name’ part of your Kindle email address below. Find out more about saving to your Kindle.
Note you can select to save to either the @free.kindle.com or @kindle.com variations. ‘@free.kindle.com’ emails are free but can only be saved to your device when it is connected to wi-fi. ‘@kindle.com’ emails can be delivered even when you are not connected to wi-fi, but note that service fees apply.
Find out more about the Kindle Personal Document Service.
To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Dropbox.
To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.