Abstract
The Global Turn can be read as a manifesto of global studies; why it is important, and why one should study it, and why universities and academic establishments must embrace it. The authors provide forceful arguments on behalf of global studies, a transdisciplinary academic program that overcomes the limitations of traditional discipline based academic subjects. The authors are, in large part, convincing in their arguments.
For the authors: ‘To be truly global, global scholarship must break free from modernist and Eurocentric concepts and assumptions. This includes moving beyond the prevalent geopolitical state frameworks that are inadequate for examining today’s postnational global processes’ (p. 10). Instead, the authors propose ‘a global transdisciplinary framework that is more than a simple amalgamation or combination of mainstream disciplinary perspectives’ (p. 10). This is reminiscent of what Immanuel Wallerstein several years ago called the ‘unidisciplinary’ approach, different from a ‘multidisciplinary’ perspective.
The field of global studies is fertile. Multidisciplinarity, flexibility, a holistic world view and a critical decentering of the nation-state and centrality of the local are some of the main characteristics of this approach. The authors provide a genealogy of the academic programs of global studies introduced in various academic institutions in the United States, Asia, and Europe. Many university administrators and those who care for the fate of social sciences in a complex, globalized world will find this book useful.
Sub-disciplinary fields such as global history, global literature, global sociology, and global legal studies provide, according to the authors, a cafeteria-like smorgasbord of course offerings in various universities. This is different from distinct interdisciplinary global studies curricula being developed around the world (p. 25). The authors hold that the global studies program – incorporating humanities and social sciences – has the potential to recast the liberal arts curriculum (p. 26). ‘Global studies’ thus ‘emerged as a new field of inquiry that broadened the focus beyond economic forms of globalization’ (p. 21).
The first programs in global studies were launched in the late 1990s. Within two decades it is now in numerous countries including Australia, China, Denmark, Germany, Indonesia, Japan, South Korea, Russia, the UK, and the US. Indiana University launched the School of Global and International Studies in 2012, and the global studies program took off at the University of California Santa Barbara in 2014. The book chronicles the life and times of global studies.
The authors correctly point out: ‘for research to be global does not mean that its object of study is necessarily big in a spatial sense or that it must intrinsically have a worldwide reach’ (p. 12). What is significant of the global approach is that it allows one to examine the impact of global forces and flows on the ordinary, on the slum dwellers of a large city, or refugees, or other marginal communities. The recent popularity of the global–local (or, glocal) approach also adds to the conceptual strength of the global perspective. The authors rightly claim: ‘Being able to see the global through the local and the local through the global is an important way of understanding our globalizing world’ (p. 12).
Here, the authors miss out referencing the proponent of the glocalization approach, Roland Robertson (1990), whose contributions along with that of the Pittsburgh School (Robertson, 1995; Robertson and Chirico, 1985; Robertson and Lechner, 1985) remain seminal in both globalization and glocalization research. The authors also fail to engage with the contributions of not only Roland Robertson, who provides the most important cultural interpretation of (hence, the cultural turn) globalization contra economists and the economic-history oriented world systems analysis of Immanuel Wallerstein since the early 1980s, but also the seminal contributions of John W Meyer (2000, 2007) and the Stanford School. Meyer’s contribution through the conceptual innovation of isomorphism provides important empirical support for the globalization perspective as evident in the research on state and non-governmental organizations among others. Also missing, conspicuously, in the discussion are the works of Ulrich Beck (2000) or Göran Therborn (2000), among others. Such absences render the discussions of the theories of globalization incomplete.
The inadequacies of the theoretical discussions are somewhat compensated by a useful review of the historical contexts that provided the backdrop to the rise of globalization theories. Globalization discourses became more widespread in the 1980s and 1990s. For the authors, the post-World War I and II conversations on peace, stability, and democracy provided the foil for their work. The New York World Fair in 1964 was billed as a ‘universal and international’ exposition (p. 13). Disney’s ‘it is a small word’ was featured in this expo as well.’ A ‘shrinking globe’ in an expanding universe. Unisphere was a symbol of freedom and global democracy. Postwar events led to a new global perspective of humankind’s interconnectedness.
It makes good sense when the authors argue that the global studies approach offers new and innovative ways of thinking that have the potential to generate solutions to the kinds of global-scale problems that our rapidly globalizing world faces.
Saskia Sassen, Naomi Klien, and others have pointed out the limitations of our conceptual categories to deal with the global problems we confront. Global studies point out various dysfunctions of the global systems. Many of the key problems, for example ‘mass migration, conflict, climate change, and resource depletion,’ confronting humanity today are global in nature, therefore analyzing larger systems is essential for understanding and acting on these problems (p. 33). A global studies approach offers unique insights and new, powerful analytical capacities. By situating the local–global continuum in deep historical contexts, ‘global studies help us understand our historically interconnected identities (p. 32).
One of the limitations is the ‘nation-state’s taken for granted status as the container of political, economic, and cultural activities’ (p. 31). Yet, nation-states are not obsolete by any means. Nation-states as wielders of economic and political power under the cover of sovereignty remain internationally legitimate organizations.
However, some problems emerge when authors allude to a non-western way of thinking, which falls into the trap of reverse Orientalism or Occidentalism, a mirror opposite of Orientalism. The call for epistemological pluralism is at once attractive and dangerous. The attack on binarism is useful, yet by invoking non-western the authors unwittingly return to binarism. The authors recognize that ‘[A]s the world becomes more globalized, the lines between East and West, First World and Third World, and global north and global south are increasingly blurred’ (p. 51). Avoidance of binary logic and overcoming a fascination with solid categories in favor of hybridity and fluidity are some of the contributions of the new program of global studies.
A stronger case can be made with regard to critiquing linearity, yet the diffusion model is hard to critique or retire. Some nations, regions, civilizations become dominant and they tend to dominate the rest of the world. Directionality of diffusion becomes visible even in the transmission of knowledge.
The danger of epistemological pluralism is relativism and parochialism. While pluralism of ideas is embedded in the very essence of the liberal tradition of knowledge, one cannot automatically assume such tolerance of diversity in alternative knowledge systems. Besides, knowledge systems in certain contexts become appendages of political power. The debates over human rights illustrate such conflicting intellectual positions supposedly emanating from multiple cultural and epistemological systems. This is not to say that alternative knowledge systems should remain marginalized, but such alternative voices, ideas, and modes of developing knowledge must be respected, rather than patronized. The idea that a global synthesis supports development of new analytical concepts through ‘global intersectional solidarity’ (p. 32) is undoubtedly good but such solidarity is hard to achieve in a divided and unequal world.
Yet there are nuggets of wisdom, for example, how to live in harmony with nature, how to live a life of seclusion without isolation, how to avoid crass materialism and consumerism, which can be gleaned from other cultures. In a pluralist world, diversity is the strength, and such a world need not be limited to a binary world. The authors refer to Kwame Anthony Appiah’s idea of shared global ethic: ‘learn about people in other places, take an interest in their civilizations, their arguments, their errors, their achievements, not because that will bring us to agreement, but because it will help us get used to one another’ (Appiah quoted on p. 39).
The authors, in the second half of the book, provide a detailed list of topics that can be covered using the transdisciplinary global perspective. Eight themes are identified which is a mish mash of theoretical and empirical or substantive issues from race, to gender inequality, which are amalgamated with postcolonialism, social constructionism, etc. (p. 64). The evaluation of alternative ideas needs to be made by using the same universal criteria of science. An implicit recognition of such universal criteria becomes evident in the authors’ detailed outline of research methods. The research programs charted are laudatory, yet such prescriptions are often limiting and tend to foreclose an open discussion based on plurality of voices.
Some researchers of global studies may find the long discussion of research programs and methodological issues of global studies useful. At the same time, this unorthodox programmatic section, to some extent, deflects the theoretical focus of the contribution.