a national tongue in many former colonies, helped to elevate the language to a
globallingua francaeven before it emerged as the primary language of the “infor-
mation superhighway.” But additionally, there is no question that new forms of
communications technology have exponentially increased the level of contact
between people from around the world. Social networking sites like Facebook
and MySpace, easily accessible media sites like YouTube, the now-ubiquitous cell
phone with its option of text messaging, and the ability to connect to individuals
and businesses across the globe virtually free of charge via email have all contrib-
uted to the emergence of a “global culture” by dramatically increasing the degree
of communication between individuals living in diverse, geographically dispersed
regions. Western popular culture, such as movies and music, also has become dis-
seminated globally, both through traditional means like theaters, as well as via the
World Wide Web. The American filmAvataropened on more than 14,000 screens
in over 80 countries in 2009, and with distribution on DVD and the Internet it may
have been viewed by almost half-a-billion people worldwide since its release.
While globalization has resulted in increased contact between people and
brought investment capital and economic development to many places, there are
negative consequences as well. Some advocates ofWorld Systems Theoryand
its derivatives view globalization as a continuation of the drive by the developed
world to dominate international relations and control the production and distribu-
tion of wealth. In addition, many see the spread of Western cultural attributes, both
in terms of physical culture and social values and mores, as “cultural imperialism.”
Globalization to these commentators represents an effort to impose their own,
Westernized world view on other peoples, undermining and eventually destroying
those cultural systems and resulting in a homogenized, uniform “global culture”
that is in reality nothing more than an extension of Western, and predominantly
American, culture. Proponents of this view point to the loss of languages, tradi-
tional music and literature because of the adoption of modern, “global” cultural
perspectives that has occurred among many peoples in the past century.
Furthermore, many argue that there are clearly negative economic effects
associated with globalization, both for developed and developing countries. For
example, global mobility of labor, especially of highly skilled people, is frequently
to the detriment of developing countries, who are the victims of a “brain drain” to
the developed world. Doctors, engineers, and other highly skilled personnel, many
of whom were trained at the expense of their home country, are able to migrate to
the developed world, thereby undermining the potential for development and
improved living standards in their countries of origin. In the developed countries,
opponents of globalization claim that the wages and bargaining power of workers
are weakened and jobs are actually lost, due to the relocation of capital and
production facilities to developing countries, where wages are lower.154 Globalization