Living with Globalization. Book: published by Berg Publishers (2006). ISBN: 978 1 84520 193 7
In April 2006, I had a book entitled Living with Globalization published that builds on ideas about the influence of globalization raised in ‘Rebuilding Communities in an Age of Individualism’. Globalization studies are still in their infancy, and this work takes stock of existing approaches and outlines some possible ways forward.
As part of a critical examination of globalization, Living with Globalization seeks to move beyond general and abstract accounts of this subject focusing instead upon how globalizing processes are interpreted and experienced within specific contexts. And in demonstrating and substantiating this position a series of case-studies are undertaken. This includes, for example, examining how globalization has informed governmental policy in the UK and specifically the New Labour third-way agenda; how it is influencing debates within the Islamic world; how it is impacting upon America’s position and role in the world; how the Chinese party-state has for reasons of political expediency utilized economic globalization, but resisted its cultural and political dimensions; and how it has contributed to the development of the European Union. The latter further develops themes I identified in my 2004 article (submission 4). The book advocates pursuing a differentiating, multidimensional, contextualist and interdisciplinary approach to globalization, part of which entails considering how the discourse of globalization can have tangible effects. Some (mainly UK-based) academics are now starting to advocate this approach to globalization (egs, Colin Hay and David Marsh), but at present there is simply no other work that deals with this subject in quite this way.
The book, published by Berg Publishers, has generated interest both inside and outside of the UK, and can be found in university libraries in a number of countries. The book can also be accessed via the Internet having been posted on books.google.com by the publishers.
