Globalization. Process and consequences. What is globalization and how does it manifest itself?

Siberian Federal University.

Institute of Psychology, Pedagogy and Sociology.

Abstract.

"Globalization in the modern world"

Completed by: Student PP10-04B

Perevozchikova

Alexandra

Teacher:

Globalization, understood as the coverage of economic, political, social and cultural relationships of the entire human community, is the predominant orientation of the current stage of world development. However, the contradictions and negative consequences of globalization associated with its unevenness and potential conflict raise the question of the prospects for involving new sovereign, primarily post-Soviet states and regional interstate associations, in this process.

The relevance of this topic is due to the expansion of globalization of the modern world and the growing importance in these conditions of the problem of preserving the national identity and cultural uniqueness of each civilized country. Culture has long been the privilege of those who, due to their knowledge, education, property and social status, could have access to works of thought, literature and art. However, along with the material and intellectual progress that has transformed the appearance of European countries over the past two hundred years, culture, like other aspects of European life, has undergone irreversible democratic mutations, as a result of which wide sections of different societies have been able to join it. At the same time, a certain layer of cultural ties and exchanges arose, thanks to which all peoples learned to share some common spiritual values. Moreover, a common culture became the basis of a political organization.

Globalization, as the most important social process and trend in world development, is actively studied in modern science. Almost all the world's leading political scientists (Fukuyama, Huntington, Toffler, Wallerstein, Necklessa, Barber, Rothfeld, Rosenau) expressed their vision of this phenomenon, proposing various concepts of changes in the world order caused by globalization. But since the subject of scientific interest is the participation of states in globalization processes, when analyzing the development of the problem, they focused on the publications of scientists.

B. Tursunkulova’s monograph is devoted to the study of the phenomenon of globalization, its most important manifestations and consequences, which examines the theoretical and methodological approaches of Western scientists to the study of globalization processes, the degree of influence of globalization on states in the transition period and development prospects.

In terms of socio-economic integration, the most famous are the studies of academician T. Koychuev, which examine the foundations of integration processes in the world economy, analyze the development of the economy in the space of globalization and its adaptation to world economic processes. Relevant recommendations are given for developing a well-thought-out policy for joining the world economic community, taking into account the specifics of its development.

The monographs of other researchers are devoted to the same problem.

Thus, an analysis of the scientific development of the research topic shows that this problem is beginning to arise in world science.

"Globalization- the process of worldwide economic, political and cultural integration and unification. The main consequence of this is the global division of labor, migration (and, as a rule, concentration) throughout the planet of capital, human and production resources, standardization of legislation, economic and technological processes, as well as the rapprochement and fusion of cultures of different countries. This is an objective process that is systemic in nature, that is, it covers all spheres of society. As a result of globalization, the world is becoming more connected and more dependent on all its subjects. There is both an increase in the number of state problems common to the group, and an expansion in the number and types of integrating entities.”

Views on the origins of globalization are controversial. Historians view this process as one of the stages in the development of capitalism. Economists trace back to the transnationalization of financial markets. Political scientists emphasize the spread of democratic institutions. Culturologists associate the manifestation of globalization with the Westernization of culture, including American economic expansion. There are information technology approaches to explaining globalization processes. There are differences between political and economic globalization. Regionalization acts as a subject of globalization, giving a powerful cumulative effect in the formation of world poles of economic and technological development.

At the same time, the origin of the word “globalization” itself indicates that the leading role in this process is played by the rapid growth of international trade that occurs at certain historical stages. The word “globalization” (meaning “intensive international trade”) was first used by Karl Marx, who in one of his letters to Engels in the late 1850s. wrote: “Now the world market really exists. With the entry of California and Japan into the world market, globalization has been accomplished.” The same leading role of international trade in the processes of globalization is also indicated by the fact that the previous globalization, which began in the era of Marx, ended in the 1930s, after all developed countries switched to a policy of strict protectionism, which caused a sharp curtailment of international trade .

"Globalization of the economy- one of the patterns of world development. The interdependence of the economies of different countries has increased immeasurably compared to integration. Associated with the formation of an economic space, where the sectoral structure, exchange of information and technology, and the geography of the location of productive forces are determined taking into account global conditions, and economic ups and downs acquire planetary proportions.”

The growing globalization of the economy is expressed in a sharp increase in the scale and pace of capital movement, faster growth of international trade compared to GDP growth, and the emergence of world financial markets operating around the clock in real time. The information systems created in recent decades have immeasurably increased the ability of financial capital to move quickly, which contains, at least potentially, the ability to destroy stable economic systems.

Economic globalization is a complex and contradictory process. On the one hand, it facilitates economic interaction between states, creates conditions for countries to access the advanced achievements of mankind, ensures resource savings, and stimulates global progress. On the other hand, globalization has negative consequences: the consolidation of a peripheral economic model, the loss of their resources by countries not included in the “golden billion”, the ruin of small businesses, the spread of globalized competition to weak countries, a decline in living standards, etc. Make the fruits of globalization available to the maximum number of countries - one of the tasks facing the world community.

Emerging economic challenges are often discussed by influential politicians and economists together (World Economic Forum).

Population problem access to information technology currently has important social significance and is designated as a problem of “digital inequality”. Like social inequality, “digital inequality” can significantly destabilize the normal functioning of the social process and public administration. Recently, the concept of global society has become increasingly popular in the world scientific community, from the point of view of which all people on our planet are citizens of a single global society, which consists of many local societies of individual countries of the world. This concept greatly simplifies the consideration of globalization processes, which in this case turn into ordinary social transformations within a global society.

The ideas of a global society were expressed by the ancient Greek thinker Diogenes; he used the concept of cosmopolitan, that is, a citizen of the world or a citizen of a cosmopolitan society (society of the world). In Orthodoxy, such concepts as “human race”, “humanity”, “Christian world”, etc. were used. In the worldview of the inhabitants of China, Central Asia, the Mongol Empire of Genghis Khan, the idea of ​​the Celestial Empire - the whole Earth (under Heaven) and the human society existing in its vastness.

In politics globalization lies in the weakening of nation states and contributes to the change and reduction of their sovereignty. On the one hand, this is due to the fact that modern states are delegating more and more powers to influential international organizations such as the United Nations, the World Trade Organization, the European Union, NATO, the IMF and the World Bank. On the other hand, by reducing government intervention in the economy and lowering taxes, the political influence of enterprises (especially large transnational corporations) increases. Due to easier migration of people and free movement of capital abroad, the power of states in relation to their citizens is also reduced.

Globalization in the modern world. At the beginning of the 21st century, more formidable questions arose over humanity than ever before in its many-thousand-year history: where are we going? what awaits us ahead? will we survive? The situation in all spheres of human life has long become critical. The sword of Damocles, the threat of self-destruction as a result of a nuclear war, hangs over the planet; the world is threatened by increasingly worsening environmental problems of truly planetary significance. Humanity is torn by property polarization between the countries of the “golden billion” and the “non-privileged” countries, between the rich and powerful West and the weak and poor East and South. Violence is everywhere and is glorified by Western popular culture. Crime, drug addiction, and AIDS seem invincible. All humanity is threatened by lack of spirituality, demoralization, cynicism, conformism and the cult of consumerism. Aggressiveness at the state level is becoming the dominant trend in global development. As a result, despair, pessimism and apocalyptic sentiments are growing among the vast majority of people on the planet. Futurologists paint various options for the future of humanity and, as a rule, they are all presented in gloomy tones - a world war, slow death from resource depletion, spiritual savagery, the disintegration of the world into a series of permanently warring civilizations.

The future of humanity is shrouded in mystery. It is unknown and unpredictable, which is why it is so scary to look into it. It frightens, but also attracts. Some supernatural force forces every person to think about it, and scientists to try to make predictions and describe possible alternatives for its development. It is not given to us to prophetically foresee all future events, but we can explore historical reality and make a socio-historical diagnosis. And from this diagnosis we can draw conclusions about present and future events. The focus of all forecasting projects and predictions has been the problem of globalization, which has been vigorously discussed in the last decade in world science.. What does it bring to humanity – what are the challenges and threats? To answer the question that interests us most - what is the place and role of Russia in the globalizing world? – it is necessary, first of all, to understand what modern globalization is, to understand its essence and logic of development. Only after this can Russia’s attitude to globalization be determined and the questions answered: what should Russia do, where should it go, in what direction and with whom.

Definition of globalization. The essence of globalization, in our opinion, in the briefest definition, is that it is an objective, natural process of integration of humanity into a single whole. The concept of globalization captures the current stage of integration of the world, which is becoming increasingly connected, interdependent and increasingly universal. Humanity in the 21st century has entered a new era of its development - the era of global peace.

Globalization is manifested in the fact that social processes in one part of the world increasingly determine what happens in all other parts of the world and, in turn, are determined by the latter. Space is being compressed, time is being compressed, geographic and interstate borders are becoming more and more transparent and easily surmountable. Flows of people, capital, goods, services and information circulate across the planet with increasing intensity. The earth becomes very “small”, and, therefore, fragile. The speed and dynamics of historical changes are increasing unusually. An individual, during his short life, becomes a witness and participant in changes that are historical in nature, which in the past lasted for centuries. Temporary milestones of globalization. Globalization as a process of unification and universalization of social structures has its roots far in the past. Already in ancient times and the Middle Ages, there were large social communities that united vast territories and peoples: the Persian Empire, the Empire of Alexander the Great, the Roman Empire, and the Empire of Genghis Khan. But these communities were most often unstable political unions of heterogeneous territories, turned out to be fragile and lasted relatively short. In the 16th-19th centuries, a process of sharp acceleration of integration began, that is, interaction and mutual influence of different regions of the world. This acceleration was associated with the Great Geographical Discoveries, the invention and spread of printing, the emergence of capitalist society and the industrial revolution in Western Europe. This process at the end of the 20th century due to the use of new means of communication, especially global information technologies, the end of the Cold War and the destruction of the USSR, liberal reforms in Russia and the former countries of the socialist camp, reached such a level that for the first time in history integration, interaction and mutual influence of various parts of humanity has covered the entire planet in its network, uniting all regions of the world without exception. It is from this moment that we can talk about globalization in the strict sense of the word. All of humanity as a whole turned out to be integrated, although each of its parts was integrated to varying degrees. The integration of humanity continues and intensifies to an ever greater extent. Manifestations and trends in the development of globalization. Globalization in its modern manifestation appears as a multi-level and multilateral system of various integration manifestations. The main ones, in our opinion, are: global communication, global economy, global politics, global culture, global science, global language, global way of life.

Global communication. New means of communication, in interaction with improved old ones (jet aviation, television, radio, Internet, mobile phone) connect people on different continents. Geographical obstacles and interstate borders are receding. Space and time are compressing, people and nations are getting closer. Global Economy. A global economy is emerging. An increasing number of goods are produced by the combined efforts of many countries. But the emerging global economy is dominated by 40 thousand transnational corporations (TNCs), which are overwhelmingly owned by capital from the United States, Western Europe and Japan. They often push into the background or even subjugate the economies of medium-sized and small countries. Of the 100 largest economic entities on the planet, 51 are TNCs and only 49 are countries. We are talking about such TNCs as Coca Cola, Ford Motor, Philip Morris, Mitsubishi, General Motors, Toyota. The annual turnover of General Motors exceeds the gross domestic product (GDP) of Thailand and Norway, the turnover of Ford exceeds the GDP of Poland, Greece, and Malaysia.

Global Politics. Global politics is emerging and its most influential and powerful subject has become the community of developed Western states, led by the United States. Western powers, relying on their economic and military power, either directly form their most influential international organizations (NATO, G7), or crush them under themselves (World Agreement on Tariffs and Trade, World Bank, International Monetary Fund, International Bank for Reconstruction and development). Nation states are retreating before the global power of the community of Western powers. The United States and its allies, in the name of the greedy interests of their TNCs, in the name of selfish political interests, are increasingly brazenly and unceremoniously violating the norms of international law and committing crimes against sovereign states and their peoples. This was convincingly demonstrated by the wars against Yugoslavia and Iraq. In these situations, the negative consequences of the cessation of the existence of the USSR as a second superpower, which was a counterweight to the United States, a powerful deterrent to curb its aggressive policy, giving the opportunity to freely develop other peoples of non-Western countries, were fatally revealed.

Global culture. A global culture is emerging that unites the whole world. The whole world consumes Hollywood film products (in different countries of the world it makes up from 60 to 100% of the national film market), reads books about Harry Potter, listens mainly to English-language pop and rock music, etc. It is easy to see that these products are mainly produced in the USA, Great Britain and other Western countries. Global Science. Global science is being formed, facilitated by international academic exchanges and the development of global academic infrastructure (international forums, journals, publishing houses). Sociology, among other sciences, both as a system of theoretical knowledge and as a social institution, is becoming global. Global language. A global language has emerged - English, in which communication between different countries and peoples takes place. It connects people of different nationalities and skin colors, but at the same time, its increased spread threatens in a number of sectors of public life (politics, business, science) the positions of even very developed languages ​​- Russian, Chinese, German, French, Spanish and other languages. The scope of the latter is narrowed even in their national territories. National languages ​​are becoming clogged with English cosmopolitan slang and syntactic tracings; national languages ​​are degrading to the level of a mixture with the English language.

Global lifestyle. There is a steady trend towards global unification of lifestyles: on different ends of the earth, people consume the same food, wear the same clothes, listen to the same music, watch the same films, receive information from the same people. mass media. Such global unification destroys national identity and local identity in all spheres of life. These are the manifestations of globalization V first approach to them . But it is not enough to limit ourselves to them. The fundamental drawback of a significant part of the entire world sociological, political science and economic literature on the problems of globalization, in our opinion, is that it is often limited to only describing these manifestations of globalization, but does not penetrate into the essence of the globalization process and does not fully analyze how positive , as well as the negative social and humanitarian consequences of this process. In our opinion, with a more careful and in-depth analysis, globalization appears as an extremely contradictory and complex process in which two trends confront and fight with each other - the trend towards total globalization of the world and the counter-tendency towards disintegration, resistance to the globalization process.

On the one hand, globalization is a process of unification and integration of humanity, accompanied by an increase in the quality of life and the level of well-being of mankind, the acceleration of economic and political development of countries, and the intensification of the exchange of technological, scientific and cultural achievements between different countries and peoples. On the other hand, globalization is a deepening on an unprecedented scale of the gap between the rich West and the poor non-Western world, an increase with extraordinary speed in the gap between the development of Western countries and the backwardness of all non-Western countries, the strict dictatorship of the West over the rest of the world, the unification of the national and cultural identity of the peoples of the planet , their spiritual identity, the destruction of national sovereign statehood, standardization and spiritual devastation of the human personality. All this causes a wave of opposition to the process of globalization, gives rise to a disintegration trend, which has recently been gaining strength and acquiring a truly global character. It is important to understand that this disintegrating anti-global tendency appeared and exists as a spontaneous reaction to the form of global processes that is cultivated by the United States and Western countries.

The developed Western powers, led by the United States, relying on their economic and political power, usurped and monopolized the process of globalization, drove it into the “Procrustean bed” of Westernization and Americanization, and saddled it to extract maximum benefits for themselves. The West has actually privatized globalization and subordinated it to its interests. He uses it for his own narrowly selfish purposes - as a means of enslaving all non-Western peoples by transnational corporations and Western governments, to establish his dominance throughout the world. The United States in the new world order is assigned the role of the main world organizer and hegemon. This is the essence of the so-called liberal globalization in its modern pro-American, pro-Western form. Thus, liberal globalization is an ambitious political project of the United States, unprecedented in history, for the strategy of establishing its hegemony over the whole world for the long term; it is an application for the creation of a global American empire. Liberal globalization is a drama of human history that the world has never seen before. Let us cite only some facts generally recognized by liberal globalists that testify to the negative, shadow sides of globalization. The government of Great Britain, a country that, along with the United States, is one of the leaders of liberal globalization, in its official publication “Eradicate World Poverty: Making Globalization Work for the Poor. The White Paper on International Development states many of the glaring problems that globalization has brought about: a fifth of humanity - more than 1.2 billion people - live on the brink of survival, without adequate food, clean water, health care and access to education . They live in conditions of absolute poverty, i.e. exist on less than $1 a day. An authoritative publication of British scientists dedicated to the problems of globalization claims that a third of the world's children are malnourished, half of the world's population is deprived of access to the most necessary medicines, and 130 million children do not have the opportunity to attend school. In third world countries, under globalization on liberal grounds, adults are thrown out of production, while children work. Child labor is rampant in the world: 246 million children in the world are forced to earn a living for themselves and their loved ones, of which 73 million are under the age of 10 years. Under these conditions, many countries of the world are in deep stagnation or even degrading in socio-economic terms. In 70 countries, the average per capita income in 1996 was lower than in 1980, and in 43 countries it was lower than in 1970 (!). Globalization means increasing wealth and consumption inequality. In 1760, per capita income in India was only 10-30% less than per capita income in Great Britain, and in 1800, per capita income in China was equal to or even higher than that in Great Britain. Now, at the beginning of the 21st century, per capita income in in all Western countries are 5-10 times higher than per capita income almost everyone developing countries. The positive results of globalization accrue mainly to the economic and political elites of Western countries, that is, transnational corporations and Western governments, as well as the ruling classes of developing and post-socialist countries acting as their junior partners. Non-Western countries are faced primarily with the negative consequences of globalization, namely, lagging behind developed countries, disruption of the national economic balance due to the stimulation of certain sectors of production, mainly raw materials, semi-finished products and agricultural products, “brain drain”, irreversible destruction of the natural environment, hyperconsumption of non-renewable resources, the destruction of traditional sectors of the economy, and, therefore, the traditional way of life, unemployment, marginalization and demoralization of significant masses of the population, the loss of national identity under the rink of liberal-globalist depersonalization, the forced imposition of liberal-capitalist values ​​on other countries - militant individualism instead of communal (conciliar) collectivism , aggressive self-interest and greed instead of the ideology of the common good, unspiritual secularization instead of religious faith.

One of the negative manifestations of globalization in its modern form is the formation of a network of global drug mafia. The production of narcotic raw materials occurs in the poorest and most disadvantaged countries - Colombia, Burma, Tajikistan, Afghanistan. Peasants whose traditional way of life has been destroyed and who find themselves under pressure from the forces of capitalist globalization find themselves forced to grow narcotic raw materials. Drugs and the drug mafia are a great evil, but it is impossible to fight it without taking into account its real causes, which are rooted in liberal globalization. Globalization in its liberal form is unfolding under the banner of a consumer society consisting of selfish individuals isolated from each other, engaged in constant competition with each other. Humanity is turning into a homogeneous mass of consumers with the same tastes: there is a unification of consumption: drinks, hamburgers, American and English pop music, films and television programs. This is globalization at the stomach level. We are talking about global consumption. The US wants to turn the entire planet into territory for McDonald's and Coca-Cola. Liberal-capitalist globalization seeks to unify the world, to build it according to one – American (Western) standard. A uniform culture dominated by Western values ​​and tastes is being imposed on humanity. The Global West, led by the United States, strives to restructure the entire world on liberal democratic principles, that is, in a way that benefits primarily Western countries. They are not concerned about whether other nations need these liberal values. All this causes legitimate and understandable indignation and dissatisfaction of huge masses of people in different countries of the world, for the ethnocultural and civilizational diversity of the world is the wealth of humanity and serves as a source of its spiritual development.

Anti-globalism, terrorism, socially organized resistance to globalization. The prospects for the continuation of globalization in its existing, liberal form are alarming - according to many scientists, globalization on liberal principles is throwing a significant part of the population of many countries of the world to the margins of civilization. The majority of the population of many non-Western countries, as globalization continues in its modern, liberal form, faces an extremely dramatic fate - marginalization and unemployment. Hundreds of millions, billions of people will be doomed to vegetation, the destruction of the traditional way of life, poverty, degradation, demoralization, and various forms of social barbarism. As a reaction to the dangers and threats that globalization brings with it, a protest movement is increasingly unfolding all over the world, which sometimes takes on the most bizarre forms.

If we follow the historical logic of the development of liberal globalization, then this is a road to nowhere, or, more precisely, a road to self-destruction. This is a dead-end path for human development, which will inevitably lead the world to a global catastrophe - an intercivilizational conflict and, ultimately, to nuclear war. The project of liberal globalization conceived by the United States is not only harmful, but also extremely dangerous for the whole world. That is why he is doomed to failure, to defeat. Humanity as a whole will not accept this project, will not submit with resignation and submission to the power of the United States, no matter how terrifying it may be. As history shows, there has always been another force to counteract strength.

I would also like to note that the creation of a single global society or global empire is impossible in principle, since such a global world system, even if it were possible to imagine it in reality, would be absolutely unstable and would immediately disintegrate. There are no internal integrating forces that would be able to ensure its existence for a long time and keep it in a stable state.

The future is uncertain. It is impossible to comprehend it in all details. It's difficult to predict. There are plenty of reasons for both optimism and pessimism. Nothing can be excluded from the range of possibilities. But, despite this, we will try to outline at least the contours of the further course of development of world events.

What needs to be done to avoid a tragic outcome for humanity? What are the possible future development scenarios? We believe that several scenarios are possible. First. The United States and Western countries will change the strategy of globalization and will not consider globalization as their exclusive privilege, as their property. The United States will voluntarily renounce hegemonic aspirations and the use of force in solving all problems. Second. Non-Western countries will form alliances and stop the US and its Western allies in their hegemonic claims and desire to use globalization only in their interests. Third. The West will fizzle out and collapse from within, as the strategy of liberal globalization will deplete the economic and spiritual potential of Western countries, deprive them of social energy and lead to collapse. Fourth. The West and the East, under the pressure of circumstances, relying on international law and using international organizations such as the UN, will develop plans for managing and monitoring globalization processes at the negotiating table. Fifth. If none of the above scenarios is realized, then humanity will be destroyed as a result of a global conflict, a world war. It is important to keep in mind that these scenarios are not mutually exclusive; it is possible for them to occur simultaneously.

Can humanity, in principle, survive in the face of such a challenge? Maybe if it chooses the second of these scenarios. In order to avoid a tragic outcome for humanity, it is necessary to immediately stop liberal globalization, it must be curbed and put an end to it. Considering the state of political euphoria and “dizziness” from success in which the political elite and the entire population of America now find themselves, the degree of exorbitant pride that has seized them, one can be sure that now only with the help of force can the United States be forced to doubt its own exceptionalism and infallibility. Only under this condition can we hope to sit down at the negotiating table, use the collective efforts of all members of the world community and develop strategic plans for managing and controlling the processes of globalization in the interests of each individual country and all of humanity as a whole. If we talk about the contours of the future world order, then based on the historical logic of the modern development of the world, it can be argued that it will be multipolar - each country will retain its national self-sufficiency, culture, language and statehood. The future world order will be based on the balance of forces and interests of all countries included in the world community. None of the states will have any advantages over others. Everyone will be equal. Only under these conditions can we be sure that peace will finally reign in the world. If we soberly assess the political situation in the modern world, then we must admit that only collective forceful opposition from the states of the East can stop liberal globalization. Faced with the threats of liberal globalism, Russia's national interests largely coincide with the national interests of China, India, and the countries of the Muslim world.

Of all the eastern countries, only Russia and China can now really stop the United States in its claims to world domination and interrupt the “victorious” march of liberal globalization. Each of these countries has not only powerful political, economic and military potential, but, most importantly, enormous spiritual potential, rooted in the thousand-year past. They have such potential energy and such human forces that the United States does not and cannot have. The United States is running out of steam, starting to get nervous, they are disintegrating in the literal sense of the word, they are starting to attack all those who oppose them, which leads to unforgivable and fatal mistakes by America, such as, for example, aggression against Iraq. These mistakes will have far-reaching negative consequences for the United States.

Only the creation of regional civilizational military-political blocs of Eastern countries can play the role of an effective deterrent force that will force the United States to sit down at the negotiating table and help achieve some positive results. It is necessary to create a balance of power between the West and the East, which will lead to a reduction in tension and the establishment of greater stability in the world. At the moment this is the only real alternative. All other scenarios are possible in principle, but right now they are unlikely.

The dominance of the West and the United States within global humanity is short-lived. Any empire is doomed to defeat, as evidenced by the history of all empires - from the Roman Empire to Hitler's empire. The world domination of the West, led by the United States, global liberal imperialism is approaching its historical finale. The United States and the West are on the verge of exhausting their economic and military potential in futile attempts to assert their global dominance and make it eternal. The United States must prepare for the fact that in the very near foreseeable future it will become one of many states in this huge multipolar world and will not have any special exclusive advantages or privileges over other states. They must prepare to recognize the collapse of the Great Liberal Utopia, the project of liberal globalization, and come to terms with their defeat. No one has ever succeeded in subjugating the entire world, and neither will the United States. This is basically impossible. History convincingly proves that often attempts to expand their territory through wars of conquest were successful, but no one was able to retain what they acquired in this way for a long time. It's time for the United States to abandon its insane pride, the euphoria of infallibility and impunity. At any time, everyone, without exception, has to pay for everything someday. What goes around comes around. If you sow the wind of evil, you will reap a storm of uncontrollable anger and a punishing sword.

The United States must prepare for its defeat now, so that disappointment does not become such a mental drama, an existential tragedy for all of America, from which it may never recover.

It is necessary, by minimizing the negative consequences of globalization, to make it work for all states, for Total humanity. To do this, first of all, it is necessary to curb the global expansion of the West, led by the United States. Globalization, understood as a natural process of integration, is a universal heritage and it should serve all peoples of the world, and not just the so-called “golden billion”, not transnational corporations and Western governments. The international sociological community must make its significant contribution to the study of new strategies and forms of globalization processes, the prospects for a more just and humane global world. In our opinion, this is becoming one of the most pressing tasks of world sociology. It must, abandoning petty topics and scholasticism, explore the possibility and necessity of another, illiberal globalization (alter-globalization), globalization in the interests of all humanity

87. Legal technology: theory and practice

In recent years, attention to the problems of legal technology has noticeably increased in the domestic legal literature. Dissertation and monographic research, articles, scientific and practical seminars and conferences, and round tables are devoted to these problems *(1).

Legal technology is increasingly being introduced as an independent topic in textbooks and teaching aids on the theory of state and law, and branch legal disciplines. Dozens of universities offer special courses on legal technology under different names: “legal technology,” “rule-making technology,” “legislative technology,” etc. There is a renewed interest in hermeneutics. At the intersection of jurisprudence and linguistics, a new branch of scientific knowledge is developing - legal linguistics. The activities of “legal clinics” are increasingly developing, within which much attention is paid to the art of drafting, interpreting and applying legal documents. Recently, the country has been actively making efforts to create an effective system for organizing monitoring of legislation and law enforcement practice, constant analysis of the quality of regulatory legal acts and their application. Legal technology has an important role to play in this work.

Scientific and practical interest in legal technology is not accidental and is caused by a number of objective and subjective factors.

Firstly, a radical update of the entire legislative system, the need to increase its efficiency, ensure internal consistency of the legal system within the framework of a federal state, and create a rule of law state.

Secondly, by expanding the boundaries of regulatory influence on social relations with the help of the law as an act of supreme legal force, the need for a new approach to the quality of the “finishing” of legislative material, its structuring, and the development of mechanisms for real influence on social processes. In the Address of the President of Russia to the Federal Assembly of the Russian Federation on April 25, 2005, the task of further enhancing the role of law was set as a priority.

The high technical and legal level of legal documents is one of the most important indicators of the general and legal culture of society. “The level of its civilization largely depends on the extent to which legal technology is developed in a country,” it is rightly stated in the preface to E. Anners’ book “History of European Law.”

“The level of legal technology,” believes S.S. Alekseev, “is one of the indicators of the level of legal culture in the country” *(3). Underestimation of the structural and compositional structure, external design, requirements of logic, style of presentation leads to declarativeness, inconsistency, and ambiguity of legal acts, which creates favorable opportunities for various manipulations with them and, ultimately, to a decrease in the level of legality and order.

Thirdly, the convergence of legal systems in the context of the internationalization of law, the assertion of the priority of the norms and principles of international law over national law, the accession of our country to the Council of Europe, the recognition of the compulsory jurisdiction of the European Court and the need in connection with this to unify many branches and institutions of law, legal terminology , the use of legislative and law enforcement procedures and regimes. Efforts to improve the quality of legislation are widespread. Legalism *(4) - this is the name today for an emerging scientific and educational discipline that deals with a comprehensive study of the problems of legislative activity. This approach, according to L. Madera, a professor at the Swiss Academy of Public Administration, combines elements of science, art and craftsmanship and places the focus on both the content of legislation and its form *(5).

Fourthly, the massive dissemination of information legal systems, which requires strict classification and unification of legislation, and its clearer categorization. It is almost impossible to resolve all these issues without legal technology.

And finally, fifthly, the growing role of legislation in protecting the rights and freedoms of man and citizen. Current conditions require high legal literacy and knowledge of legal technology not only from civil servants, but also from ordinary citizens. Legal technology becomes an effective tool in realizing the rights and legitimate interests of citizens. It is important not only to know your rights, but also to be able to defend them and achieve their implementation in practice. The modern citizen is increasingly involved in the scope of law. He increasingly deals with numerous legal documents, judicial and administrative procedures.

It is worth paying attention to one more circumstance. A large number of government bodies and officials, public associations, lawyers, and specialists from various fields of knowledge are involved in the process of development of lawmaking. The country's parliament and representative bodies of the constituent entities of the Russian Federation, whose main form of activity is lawmaking, have become professional. And if previously the republics had some experience in this area, then the territories, regions, autonomous okrugs, autonomous regions, cities of federal significance encountered this for the first time with a virtual absence of law-making specialists. After all, the training of lawyers in the recent past was focused mainly on law enforcement.

Of course, legal technology is not an invention of today. It appeared at the time of the birth of law itself. Subsequently, its elements received clearer outlines and formed a certain code, a collection of rules, techniques, special means, with the help of which, first on stone pillars, parchment scrolls, and then in handwritten and printed books, legal regulations were created and embodied.

The formation of legal technology has its own history, its own stages of development in different countries. This is evidenced by well-known legal monuments of world history, such as the laws of Hammurabi, king of Babylon (1792 (?) 1750 BC), the laws of Manu (II century BC), the laws of the XII tables (V century . BC), Code of Justinian (VI century AD), Salic truth (V(?)VI century AD) "Carolina" (beginning of the 16th century), "Russian truth", Russian Code of Laws and many others.

The methodological foundations of legal technology were laid in the works of Plato and Aristotle, Cicero and other famous ancient jurists, and later - in the works of F. Bacon, I. Bentham, C. Montesquieu, R. von Iering and other prominent representatives of philosophical and legal science of Europe. Thus, C. Montesquieu and R. von Ihering formulated the most important principles for drawing up laws and rules of legal technology, which have not lost their relevance today *(6).

The history of the development of state and law in Russia also indicates that legal technology had quite deep roots here and its own development characteristics. This, in particular, is the normative construction of sentences, the presence of article headings, special legal terms in “Russkaya Pravda”; preambles, division of texts into articles in the first codified acts of Russia - Sudebniks of 1497 and 1550. In the Council Code of Alexei Mikhailovich (1649), a well-structured text appears, chapters with headings, and clearer legal terms *(7).

Much work on the technical and legal design of legislation was carried out under Peter I, Catherine II and Alexander II. At this time, major legislative acts were created using the rules of legal technology. High demands were placed on the writing of legal texts. As an example, let us cite the requirement of Peter the Great: “All projects must be in good working order, so as not to ruin the treasury and not cause damage to the Fatherland. Whoever messes up projects in any way, I will deprive him of his rank and order them to be beaten with a whip - for the edification of descendants” *(8).

In the Order of the Commission for drafting a new Code, Catherine II instructs: “Every law must be written in words intelligible to everyone...” “Laws are made for all people, all people must act according to them - therefore, it is necessary that all people and could understand" *(9).

The outstanding activity of M.M. is well known. Speransky to bring Russian legislation into a coherent system. In 1830, the Complete Collection of Laws of the Russian Empire was published in 45 volumes, and a short time later the first Code of Laws of the Russian Empire was prepared. Providing it with alphabetical chronological and comparative indexes became a noticeable novelty of legal technology for its time *(10).

From the second half of the 19th century, a source of current legislation began to be regularly published - the Collection of Legislation and Government Orders.

All these large-scale works on the creation of a modern legal system in Russia, its streamlining and technical and legal improvement did not arise out of nowhere. The theoretical foundation for this activity was the works of M.M. Speransky, K.A. Nevolin, N. Rozhdestvensky, E.V. Vaskovsky, G.F. Shershenevich, F.V. Taranovsky, M.A. Unkovsky, N.I. Korkunov and many other outstanding Russian lawyers and statesmen.

In Soviet times, the traditions of studying the problems of legal technology, development and use of its creative potential continued.

A notable stage in the development of technical and legal rules for the design of legislation was the development of Soviet constitutions, the creation in the 60s. fundamentals of legislation, new codes, preparation and publication of a systematic collection of legislation of the USSR and corresponding collections of legislation of the union republics. A significant achievement in the development of legal technology was the development and publication, using removable sheets, of the Code of Laws of the USSR (11 volumes) and the Code of Laws of the RSFSR (8 volumes). These were major state events that were based on scientific developments of problems of legal and, above all, legislative technology of the All-Union Scientific Research Institute of Soviet Legislation, the Legal Commission under the Council of Ministers of the USSR, lawyers - scientists and practitioners. Unfortunately, much of what was proposed in the works of scientists has not been implemented in life.

A new stage in the development of legal technology in the country began in the late 80s and early 90s. And yet, despite certain positive results, the study of problems of legal technology suffers from fragmentation, and at present a full-fledged theory of legal technology has not yet been created in our country. Evidence of this is the lack of an established definition of legal technology, its constituent elements, role and place in the legal sphere, features of application in various branches of legislation, etc.

Currently, the most widespread point of view is that legal technology is considered as a set of rules, techniques, methods and means of development, design, systematization, interpretation and application of the most advanced normative legal acts and other legal documents in form and content and is reduced mainly to legislative technology.

At the same time, there are authors who consider legal technology as a technique with the help of which only texts of normative legal acts are created. Others go beyond such ideas and consider legal technology as a technique used in legal activity in general. There are also disputes over the composition of the elements of legal technology that make up its content. There are definitions of legal technology in a broad and narrow sense. In a broad sense, legal technology is the science of lawmaking, legislative policy and legislative technology (A. Nashits). In a narrow sense, these are technical means and techniques for constructing legal norms (V.K. Babaev).

Differences in approaches to understanding legal technology in common law countries and in continental law countries have been identified, but not yet explored. There is a debate about whether legal technology has only an applied nature or whether it is a more complex phenomenon that combines instrumental and fundamental approaches. Interesting thoughts on this matter were expressed by D.A. Kerimov, S.S. Alekseev, L.D. Voevodin, A.S. Pigolkin, A.F. Cherdantsev, G.I. Muromtsev, V.M. Baranov, V.N. Kartashov, L.A. Morozova, N.A. Vlasenko and others. So, B.V. Chigidin believes that in Russian literature, static and dynamic approaches to the content of the concept of legal technology have developed. The static approach is characterized by revealing the content of the concept of legal technology through a listing of its elements - methods, methods, techniques, means. The dynamic approach considers legal technology not only as a set of these elements, but also as an activity, that is, the performance of certain actions.

It seems that legal technology is mainly of an applied, instrumental nature. But this does not at all mean that she is “second-class,” subordinate, or dependent. This is “extremely significant knowledge,” noted D.A. Kerimov, “which has a relatively independent significance in the legal system” *(11).

Being a scientific-applied, instrumental branch of knowledge, it uses the achievements of not only jurisprudence, but also other sciences - logic, document management, linguistics, etc. and, of course, a large number of our own, practice-developed techniques and means by which the goals of legal regulation are achieved.

These rules, techniques and means ensure the most accurate compliance of legal acts with their essence and content. In the literature, the following types of legal techniques are most often distinguished:

1) legislative (rule-making, law-making technique);

2) law enforcement (law enforcement or technology of individual legal acts);

3) interpretative, or the technique of acts of official interpretation;

4) technology for systematization and recording of regulatory legal acts;

The following are sometimes also considered as independent types of legal techniques: techniques of judicial speech, notarial activities, investigative actions, etc. And although all areas of legal activity, which together form legal technology, are important, a special role belongs to lawmaking and, accordingly, to the legislative technology used in the development of legislative acts. It is this type of legal technique that has the greatest scientific and practical interest.

Despite the various nuances in the views of scientists, a certain idea has developed about the generally accepted rules, techniques and means of legal technology. At the same time, it should be noted that each type of legal technique in various branches of law (in addition to general ones) has its own special technical and legal techniques and means of expression.

The basic general rules of legal technique most often include:

1) the most complete, adequate expression of the will of the legislator;

2) rational organization and logical sequence of presentation of normative instructions placed in a normative legal act;

3) the absence of gaps and contradictions in regulatory legal acts and in the entire legislative system;

4) brevity and compactness of presentation of legal norms with sufficient depth and comprehensiveness of reflection of their content;

5) clarity, simplicity and accessibility of the language of regulatory legal acts, accuracy and certainty of the terminology used;

6) minimizing the number of regulatory legal acts on the same issue in the interests of better visibility of regulatory material and ease of use;

7) timely promulgation and entry into force of laws and other legal acts in accordance with the established procedure.

Of course, the list of general rules is not exhaustive and can be supplemented. As correctly noted in the literature, there are an infinite number of rules, techniques, methods and means of legal technology, and yet they can be combined into groups and subgroups (A.F. Cherdantsev).

The first group consists of rules, techniques, means, methods and methods used for the external design of normative and individual legal acts.

The second group consists of rules, techniques, methods of rational organization of structure, style, logical and linguistic construction of the content of legal regulations, ensuring the interconnection of legal norms, and presentation of their structural elements.

The third group includes rules, techniques and methods for developing and formalizing law enforcement and interpretative acts.

The fourth group includes rules, methods of systematization and accounting of normative legal acts. Each type of systematization (incorporation, consolidation and codification) has its own characteristics, its own specific techniques and rules. This applies equally to all types of organization of recording acts. In 1968, the Legal Commission under the Council of Ministers of the USSR issued special guidelines for systematizing and improving the legislation of the USSR, many of whose provisions have not lost their relevance today.

The fifth group consists of the rules, procedure and conditions of publication contained in the Constitution of the Russian Federation, the Federal Law "On the procedure for publication and entry into force of federal constitutional laws, federal laws, acts of the chambers of the Federal Assembly", the Decree of the President of the Russian Federation "On the procedure for publication and entry into force of acts the President of the Russian Federation, the Government of the Russian Federation and regulatory legal acts of federal executive authorities", as well as in regulatory legal acts of the constituent entities of the Russian Federation.

In the current vast legal body, it is important that each legal document has its own “face”, its own details, that is, such external designations that would reflect the subject of regulation, scope and other parameters that facilitate the rapid search and use of the necessary legal information. We are talking primarily about the form of the act - law, decree, resolution, etc.; its name - the law on veterans, the law on joint stock companies, etc.; territorial scale of action - federal law, law of a constituent entity of the Russian Federation, decision of a municipal body; place and time of acceptance, signing, registration number, as well as the officials who signed these documents. The use of these seemingly simple designations has its own originality and different spellings. For example, the place of adoption of the document can be designated as “Moscow city”, “Moscow city” or simply “Moscow”.

As for the group of rules, techniques and other elements of legal technology related to the structure, language, logic of presentation, then the first place comes to the requirements for a consistent presentation of normative material, its completeness, clarity, intelligibility, relationship with already existing legal regulations within the framework of the relevant institutions, industries and all legislation in general. The logical scheme for constructing normative legal acts and, above all, laws can be reduced to the three most significant parts: general, main and final. The structural elements of the text of the act are sections, chapters, articles, and paragraphs.

The general part includes provisions defining the subject of regulation, the meaning of the terms used, and the principles of legal regulation.

The main part reflects the competence of public authorities, the rights and obligations of legal entities, the procedure for carrying out activities within the framework of regulated relations, measures of responsibility and other issues.

The final part (final and (or) transitional provisions) establishes the procedure and timing for the entry into force of the act, upcoming changes in legislation and some other issues.

Nowadays, most of the laws adopted have a more or less coherent logical structure. However, there are still many legislative acts where, for example, such a formal entry about liability for violation of established regulations appears, as an entry “in accordance with current legislation.”

A separate and rather extensive topic within the framework of legal technology is the language of legislative acts *(12). The uniqueness of the normative legal style of the language is that it expresses the will of the legislator and forms official documents. Its characteristic features are impersonality, neutrality, accuracy, specificity, simplicity and conciseness. The language of the law and other legal documents is strict, standard, and official. Let us note that the language of the laws of Ancient Rome is still an example of brilliant brevity and aphorism, but at the same time of unsurpassed accuracy and depth of thought. Today, many countries have established regulatory requirements for the formulation of legal texts and the use of a certain vocabulary in legal constructions. A typical example in this regard is the “Handbook of Rule-Making Technology” of Germany *(13).

The basic requirements for the style and language of regulatory legal acts are expressed, in particular, in the need to use terms with a clear and strictly defined meaning in the text of the law, use words and expressions in their direct and immediate meaning, reject unjustified neologisms, unsettled terms, jargon, and overkill with foreign vocabulary. In a number of countries, for example, France, Great Britain, Canada, Spain, etc., great attention is paid to caring for national languages ​​not only in the spiritual and cultural sphere, but also in administrative and government activities, lawmaking, and legal practice.

Globalization, the expansion of international contacts, and the uniformity of many legal procedures inevitably lead to the development of a kind of legal “Esperanto” and the widespread use of international legal terminology and foreign vocabulary. The general rule in lawmaking here is that the use of foreign terms is permissible in cases where they are understandable and when there is no corresponding term in the Russian language.

An important element of legal technology is legal terminology - the verbal designation of state legal concepts. It has a unique classification and consists of certain subtypes: commonly used terminology, special legal terminology and special non-legal terminology.

In addition, legal technology includes special means or atypical normative structures and regulations *(14). These include: legal presumptions, legal fictions, legal axioms, legal constructions, legal symbols. Recently, this also includes the concepts of regulatory legal acts, which are increasingly used in the development of the most complex legislative acts. Atypical normative regulations, like norms of law, serve a regulatory purpose. Their use is determined by the needs of practice, the need to increase the efficiency of legal regulation. Atypical regulatory requirements, according to Professor V.M. Gorshenev, “give the law as an integrity compositional completeness and completeness” *(15).

Legal presumptions are assumptions about the presence or absence of certain facts that are confirmed or refuted in the process of proof. The classic option is the presumption of innocence (Part 1 of Article 49 of the Constitution of the Russian Federation). There are general legal, intersectoral and sectoral presumptions. General legal presumptions, many of which are also principles of law, include: the truth and appropriateness of legal norms; legal personality of persons and organizations entering into legal relations; integrity of citizens; knowledge of laws by subjects of law, etc. Intersectoral presumptions: presumption of paternity (Part 2 of Article 48 of the RF IC); presumption of equality of the share of property of each spouse when dividing it, etc. An example of an industry presumption is the presumption of a significant increase in the degree of social danger of an act when committed by a group of persons (Part 7 of Article 35 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation).

Legal fictions are provisions formulated in legislation about non-existent facts that are recognized as existing, and therefore having certain legal consequences. The use of fictions has a long history - they were used in the practice of Roman law. There is a well-known example when, in the event of the simultaneous death of parents and children as a result of a shipwreck or battle, the following rule was applied: if minor children died along with their parents, then the parents were assumed to survive; if parents and their adult children died, then the children were assumed to survive. This was very important when considering inheritance cases. With a certain degree of convention, the theory of a legal entity can also be classified as a legal fiction. The famous German lawyer Savigny considered a legal entity “a subject of law that does not actually exist in reality.” A classic example of a fiction in civil law is the beginning of the calculation of the period for recognizing a citizen as dead (Article 45 of the Civil Code of the Russian Federation) or missing (Article 42 of the Civil Code of the Russian Federation). Using this method of legal technique, the legislator disciplines participants in civil proceedings, achieves clear organization of legal proceedings, and timely resolution of cases in courts.

Legal axioms are provisions that do not require proof in the legal process. They, like irrefutable presumptions, are interrelated and very similar to the principles of law, although not identical with them. In domestic legal science, this term appeared relatively recently - around the 60s. last century. Although many axioms have been known since ancient times: no one can be a judge in his own case; no one can transfer to another more rights than he himself would have; no one is obliged to blame himself; every doubt is interpreted in favor of the accused; the law has no retroactive effect, etc.

Legal structures are ideal models, diagrams, templates for the structural construction of rights, duties, responsibilities and other elements used by the legislator to formulate legal norms. Legal structures are the result of centuries-old efforts of science and practice. They simplify the process of legal regulation, making it clearer, clearer, and more specific. For example, in the field of civil law - this is a contract, property rights; in criminal law - corpus delicti, insanity, etc.

Legal symbol is a conventional image created or sanctioned by the state, a distinctive sign, which is a visible or audible entity, which is given a political and legal meaning, used to convey legal information to the addressee (National Flag, National Anthem, National Emblem, traffic light signals when regulating traffic, road signs, logos, etc.). In addition, there are a number of rules, techniques and methods of legal technology that are used in constructing legal definitions, formulating rules of law (abstract, casuistic methods); their presentation in articles of legislative acts (direct, reference, blanket methods); when listing objects, conditions, circumstances in the texts of laws (exhaustive, approximate lists); when making changes and additions to laws, officially recognizing them as no longer in force; when using notes, clauses, writing quantitative indicators of measure, weight, volume, length, placing punctuation marks, using abbreviations, dividing and connecting conjunctions, and many other ways.

In a number of countries, the requirements of legal technology are enshrined in regulations, and their use is mandatory. Such rules are set out, for example, in the already mentioned “Handbook of Legislative Technique” of Germany, “Principles of Legislative Technique” of Poland, “Legislative Conventions of Uniform Law of Canada”, etc. The Russian Ministry of Justice especially emphasized the need to develop and apply general rules of legislative work in our country, including technical and legal ones, which must be established by the Government of the Russian Federation. Of great interest are the recommendations of the European Association for the Advancement of Legislation, the official thesaurus of the European Parliament, model legal acts of the Interparliamentary Assembly of the CIS countries *(16), scientific and practical seminars regularly held on the basis of the Russian parliament on the effectiveness of legislative procedures and the development of legal technology. All this contributes to the mutual exchange of experience and reasonable unification of approaches to the use of technical and legal procedures.

In our country, the requirements of legal technology have received regulatory approval in the Regulations of the State Duma, the Federation Council and the Government of the Russian Federation, and legal acts of federal executive authorities. It is difficult to overestimate the role that the recently prepared, at the initiative of the Legal Directorate of the State Duma Staff, by the Main State Legal Directorate of the President of the Russian Federation, the Legal Directorate of the Government Staff of the Russian Federation, the Legal Directorate of the Staff of the Federation Council and the Ministry of Justice of the Russian Federation, are called upon to play in the development of legal technology. bills. This document will certainly have a positive impact on overcoming errors associated with the content and form of bills, eliminating the inconsistency of details and headings of legislative acts, establishing a stereotypical structure, a unified style of presentation, and carefully working out the mechanism of action of laws.

At the regional level, some issues of legal technology are regulated in special laws (“laws on laws”) dedicated to lawmaking and the legislative process. Interesting in this regard are the laws “On Legal Acts of the Sverdlovsk Region”, “On Regulatory Legal Acts of the Kurgan Region”, the Law of the Irkutsk Region “On Laws and Other Regulatory Legal Acts”, the Law of the City of Moscow “On the Laws of the City of Moscow and Resolutions of the Moscow City Duma” . By order of the Moscow Mayor, the Methodological Rules for the preparation of draft laws were approved, which detail linguistic requirements, techniques for making changes and additions to the texts of laws and other techniques, methods and means of legal technology. Nevertheless, on a national scale, they are all unsystematized, fragmented and entirely dependent on the initiative of local leadership. Unfortunately, we have to admit that there is no well-thought-out, scientifically verified regulatory framework on legal technology in the country. It was assumed that the beginning of their solution would be laid in the federal law “On normative legal acts of the Russian Federation”, adopted by the State Duma in the first reading back in 1996. However, work on it was suspended for unknown reasons. Only recently, based on a report from the Ministry of Justice of the Russian Federation, the President of Russia ordered the preparation and introduction of such an act.

Today, in the context of the “imbalance” of Russian legislation, it becomes obvious that the quality and effectiveness of laws are in close, inextricable connection with the use and application of modern methodological rules and requirements of legal technology.

The historical process of the last century to bring states and peoples closer together is the globalization of human society. Cultural, political and economic boundaries are gradually being erased, and many phenomena observable with the naked eye are evidence of this: the same goods are distributed all over the world, and with the help of the media, the same event is discussed by many millions of people on earth. There are many examples of human society that can be cited.

Main roles

As soon as telecommunications and information technologies emerged and spread widely (and this happened extremely quickly), the process of globalization of human society became especially noticeable. For example, the World Wide Web, that is, the Internet, exists without recognizing any boundaries, and this “network of networks” is capable of uniting all of humanity. First of all, the globalization of human society has contributed to the expansion of a market economy on a global scale; financial capital circulates freely throughout the world and also does not recognize borders.

The main roles in this process taking place in the global economy of our time are, of course, played by TNCs (transnational corporations). They pave paths around the world quickly and briefly, the globalization of human society is carried out by them without any control, because not a single state can build a worthy barrier to a single transnational corporation. TNCs closely interact with each other, thus controlling and coordinating global economic activities. International economic organizations such as the IMF (International Monetary Fund) and the like determine the global economy today.

Base

However, if we characterize this process most succinctly and briefly, the globalization of human society has a very contradictory character. This can be observed especially effectively in the cultural sphere. National cultures today are in crisis, as the consumerism strategy is increasingly spreading throughout the world, and it is literally spurred on by the media. With their light hand, it is mass culture in mass society that becomes the basis on which human society grows; from points 1 to 8 of their enumeration, every person already knows by heart, and this will be discussed in much more detail below.

The ongoing process is to an unacceptably large extent leveling out the importance of regional and national identity, and this cannot but lead to resistance. Not everyone likes the globalist ideology and practice, and therefore the protest against it is expanding in the world at the same time, the world anti-globalist movement is gaining strength and getting stronger day by day.

What is humanity afraid of?

And the globalization of human society is indeed extremely great. So far, there are about eight of the largest and most dangerous. In any case, the social studies textbook (grade 10) shows exactly this about the globalization of human society. Although the problems are growing not only in scale, but also in number. Today we are talking about an environmental crisis to which humanity has been led precisely by overconsumption. This is the first point.

The second is the demographic crisis. Humanity is rapidly aging: life expectancy has increased significantly thanks to medicine, and babies appear in sufficient numbers only in third world countries. The prosperous population does not want to reproduce. The reason for this is the third point: humanity is really threatened by nuclear war, and the fears are not at all without real grounds.

Terrorism, AIDS and drug addiction

You can imagine how difficult it is for a teacher today to compile a lesson summary for a 10th grade lesson on the globalization of human society! The fourth point is very difficult. Indeed, along with the increasingly complex and increasing fight against terrorism, the terrorist community itself is growing by leaps and bounds, creating their own states that are waging an ongoing war with the whole world. And the whole world has not yet succeeded in defeating terrorism. How can a teacher explain that this seemingly positive process has become the product of such a phenomenon as terrorism? And the 10th grade must learn a lesson on the globalization of human society, because these young people are the future of our humanity.

The fifth point is no less scary. If just a generation ago the word “drug addict” did not exist in the vocabulary of an ordinary person, now it is precisely these children, studying the globalization of human society in social studies, who are in the greatest danger. Morals have become easier, tolerance is prevailing (again, thanks to globalization and the pernicious work of the media) in relation to the choice of not only a sexual partner, but also one’s own gender, and therefore the fight against the spread of AIDS and drug addiction has to be fought more and more stubbornly, and this fight is increasingly to no avail. Therefore, activities on the sixth point, which concerns health protection, are also slowed down. Here, not only AIDS knows no borders, but also African swine fever, bird flu from Hong Kong, and much, much more is plaguing humanity, flying tens of thousands of kilometers in a matter of days.

North South

The essence of the seventh point is slightly encrypted in the title “Problems of the North and South”. Although quite a bit of intelligence is needed to understand what we are talking about. The 10th grade is quite capable of understanding the globalization of human society as bridging the gap between the living standards of developed and developing countries. Basically, all the poor are in the south (with the exception of a very few, such as South Africa), and all the richest are in the north.

The former want help from the latter, but they receive something completely different (remember Libya, Syria, Iraq, Afghanistan). Because of the wars for mineral resources of developing countries, the flow of migration to prosperous countries (most of all to European ones) has sharply increased, bringing with them the same terrorism, AIDS and drug addiction. Moreover, both new and well-forgotten old diseases are spreading throughout the world - smallpox, cholera, plague. "North-South" is one of the most pressing global problems of humanity. We have already touched upon the eighth point slightly, and it is no less painful. These are suffering national cultures on the verge of complete destruction.

Periphery

Defining the globalization of human society as the rapprochement of the peoples of the world and states does not free leading sociologists from understanding the ongoing process. There are a wide variety of theories, and one of the most interesting is the theory of global dependence, where social development is considered as an international division of labor. Three elements have been identified in the modern world community.

This is the center that dominates the world economy and politics, which includes exploiting countries relative to other socio-economic systems. These are raw material appendages supplying the center, the endlessly exploited periphery. And there is a semi-periphery where both are present. The countries of the center, which export raw materials from the “third world,” do not leave young states any chance for development, since the economy of the exploited country is already disfigured by this unequal exchange. She will never rise from her knees and will never become successful.

Clash of Civilizations

And more about cultures. There is another theory of the development of the world community, also one of the most interesting. It examines seven or eight major civilizations present in the modern world. Almost all of them belong to different civilizations. India. Russia. Japan. China. Europe. USA. Only the last two can be combined in some way, but even then not completely. And an equally strong group is the Islamic states, which are incredibly populous.

This alignment in regional politics has purely ethnic characteristics, but in global politics these relations occur at the level of civilizations. That is why the largest, most dangerous conflicts do not arise on the basis of wealth or enrichment. Peoples conflict because they belong to different cultures. The confrontation is multi-level: neighboring states, which represent different civilizations, and leading coalitions, which also belong to different civilizations, are fighting. Now the question for sociologists is: is the process of globalization as positive as they teach children in the 10th grade in social studies lessons?

In Russia

Social changes in modern Russian society have been influenced by both external and internal factors. The balance of power in the international arena changed, since in the 90s the system of socialism ceased to exist, and with this the confrontation between different world systems ended, the military-strategic and geopolitical position of Russia became different. These are external factors. And everyone knows the internal ones - these are the tactical and strategic mistakes of the “young reformers”.

As a result, the country’s starting position turned out to be extremely unfavorable, plus the identity of our people, which is quite strongly resistant to general globalization. Nevertheless, the idea of ​​an international system in our country has gradually been replaced by the idea of ​​a global system, which means that certain processes of globalization are, unfortunately, taking place here too. What is happening in the country cannot be explained in any way by the traditional logic of independent national communities, since development is taking place according to a completely different pattern.

Globalization of the economy

Sociologists, focusing their research on advanced industrial communities, presented two processes of globalization, but their colleagues studying the “Third World” also found a third process. The first is the globalization of production capacity. The end of the twentieth century is characterized by the expansion of capitalism, its transformation into a global economy, where transnational corporations “rule the roost.”

Still would! Incomes are not many times higher than the economy of some small European country. TNCs conduct their global activities without any control, and internal operations and transactions with each other are integrated into global economic activities.

Globalization of culture

This is the second process. Localized cultures are currently losing their own diversity, and any bright national features are being replaced by the kitsch of consumerism. It has already been said here how it has spread throughout the world, replacing or more than significantly supplementing almost all national cultures. Very effectively, all the most advanced consumerism strategies, through marketing and other trade and advertising activities, spread right to the most “bearish” corners of the world.

All the most popular and large media outlets are also operated mainly by transnational corporations, which understand how effective PR is in the globalization of human society. The field of telecommunications is becoming extremely homogeneous due to technological changes, consumer culture “averages” the vision of the world, since it has almost completely mastered the ability to manipulate human desires.

Global system

The third process is sociological, in which the entire global system participates. Sociologists studying the Third World have noted that the international managerial bourgeoisie is showing signs of life, that is, a transnational capitalist class has emerged. Numerous studies have established that in third world countries there are “comprador” groups closely linked by interests with transnational corporations, and the rationale for cooperation with them promises benefits for one’s own country.

It is with their light hand that the dominance of consumer culture is established everywhere. The concept of a new transnational class of capitalists is not yet sufficiently defined and substantiated, since the sociology of globalism itself has not yet been sufficiently formed - the process is moving forward so quickly that science cannot keep up with it. In fact, both of them are newbies. Both globalization and the science that studies it. However, the first one is much more successful.

conclusions

It must be admitted that the process of globalization of human society has become irreversible, and the transformation of the world economy into a single space, into a single zone will not stop and will not be reversed. This can be seen through an analysis of the globalization process, which is presented in the theory and methodology of foreign and domestic literature.

The world is covered by a single economic, political, sociocultural, information space, where information, services, goods, capital, as well as poverty, vices, illnesses and lack of culture can move freely. What is happening is what the famous Japanese-American, political scientist and philosopher in 1989 called “the end of history.”

In the modern world, two trends are clearly visible: globalization and regionalization. Globalization is the process of transforming the world into a single global system, characterized by the following features: 1) the comprehensiveness and complexity of changes in all spheres of human activity, 2) a decrease in the importance of the national-state factor.

Another trend in the development of the modern world is regionalization as the integration of local communities and their desire for autarky.

Regionalization strengthening of boundaries between territorial-social complexes, 1) manifests itself in localism, 2) preservation of cultural differences between ethnic groups and other social groups, strengthening the sense of their exclusivity, 3) the emergence of self-sufficient economic and political entities.

Meanwhile, from a scientific point of view, the question of the meaning of globalization, its nature and significance is far from clear-cut.

Globalization is the process of increasing importance of the interconnection of social events and relationships throughout the world. It was in this vein that reference to globalization appeared in Webster's dictionary in 1961. In numerous publications in recent years, globalization is seen as a process during which most social activity acquires a global character, in which the geographical factor loses its importance or becomes insignificant in the establishment and maintenance of cross-border economic, political or sociocultural relations.

Globalization as the formation of world integrity reveals itself in the formation of a single economic, political and information space. The intensification of globalization processes is influenced primarily by countries developing on a post-industrial basis. Globalization is driven by :

The needs of developed countries to export new technologies and knowledge, and of developing countries - natural resources and industrial goods;

An incredible expansion of opportunities for the exchange of goods and information; the rapid growth of international trade volumes and gigantic flows of capital moving freely around the planet;

The development of worldwide communication networks and the interpenetration of sociocultural paradigms.

In general, definitions of the concept of “globalization” found in the academic literature use the term “interdependence” as a key word. Thus, globalization is interpreted as a process of increasing interdependence. Researchers identify three main directions of global change, thanks to which globalization takes on institutionally developed forms:

Economic,

Political-ideological,

Sociocultural (for some, technological instead).

Globalization is driven by changes in the world economics, within which the movement of goods, capital is carried out, and the exchange of ideas and people is realized. The speed, intensity and depth of penetration of these flows increases to the extent that national economies become interdependent. Elements of national economies (national producers, consumers, financial and other institutions) are directly integrated into the common world economic space. As a result, national producers are becoming increasingly connected with foreign consumers. Accordingly, in the domestic markets, in the struggle for national consumers, they are forced to compete on equal terms with foreign economic entities. Thus, if previously there was a quantitative increase in the interaction of individual national economies in the form of an increase in flows of goods, capital and investment, today there is a qualitative change in their interaction.

Globalization leads to the fact that national economies become part of a single world economic system, i.e. globalized economy.

Globalization in the economy is expressed in the following:

An abrupt increase in the scale and pace of capital movement;

Rapid growth of international trade compared to GDP growth of all countries;

Creation of networks of international production with the rapid deployment of capacities for the production of standardized and unified products;

The formation of global financial markets in which many transactions are carried out almost around the clock;

The financial sector is becoming a self-sufficient force that determines the possibilities for the development of industry, agriculture, infrastructure, and the service sector;

The emergence of new powerful entities in the global economy through mergers and acquisitions of transnational corporations.

Globalization carries with it many negative consequences, including an increase in the gap in living standards between the “golden billion” and the rest of the world. Moreover, the widening gap in the level of development between different segments of the population and regions is also characteristic of many countries, including the most developed. Because of this, the process of globalization encounters resistance not only in those countries that stand on the sidelines of this process, but also within the most developed countries, which are the “locomotives” of globalization.

Globalization clearly manifests itself in political field. The spread of liberal and democratic political values ​​and instruments has become global. Globalization has brought to the forefront of world political life such non-traditional participants (actors) as TNCs, international non-governmental organizations, various kinds of alternative movements (ecological, feminist), media, interstate organizations, etc.

Political globalization is manifested in the institutionalization of international political structures. For example, the European system was formed as an interstate system - a system of alternately conflicting and uniting states and empires. Earlier world systems, in which unification was achieved primarily through violent force, were subject to oscillations between multi-centered interstate systems and world empires in which one dominant state conquered all other states in the region. The modern world system has remained essentially multi-centered, the reason for which was the transition to a form of unification based on the production and sale of goods for profit, i.e., the transition to capitalism. States that claim to be hegemons have chosen to pursue a strategy of controlling trade and access to resources imported from the periphery, rather than conquering other states and extracting taxes from them.

Competition for power in an interstate system does not require much cultural consensus among countries. Accordingly, such a phenomenon as “global governance” arose. It means the development of specialized international organizations, such as the League of Nations, the UN, the Council of Europe, etc. The creation of these “primary world states” is a process of creating certain institutions, but, unlike earlier “world states”, they arise gradually, based on agreements between states, and not through conquest. This trend may in the future lead to the creation of a single world state.

Globalization of culture associated with two phenomena. The first represents the spread of Western individualistic values ​​among an increasingly large part of the world's population. These values ​​are promoted by social institutions that recognize individual human rights and attempts to protect human rights at the international level.

The second trend can be called the borrowing of Western “rules of the game” throughout the world. Bureaucratic organization and rationalism, materialistic views, values ​​of economic efficiency and political democracy have been spreading throughout the world since the European Enlightenment. At the same time, the special role of cultural consensus in the world should be recognized. Although the world system has always been and is multicultural, one cannot turn a blind eye to the growing influence of Western values: rationality, individualism, equality, efficiency - in other parts of the world.

Technological globalization associated with the development of information and communication technologies. The technological revolution predetermines a qualitative leap in the social development of the world community. The Internet today represents a gigantic and constantly growing network of networks. This is the foundation of the information highway, through which huge volumes of text, graphic, sound and video products are already pumped to any corporate or individual consumer. The intensification of connections, their diversity, and scale lay the foundations for a new type of organization - a network society, the understanding of which is of key importance for characterizing the global community and the process of globalization itself.

Regions, including the South of Russia, are beginning to act as active subjects of globalization processes. Supraregional associations are taking shape, covering a wide territorial area. Such associations are called “macroregions”. An example of the latter is an international economic organization of a regional type - the Black Sea Economic Cooperation (BSEC). The BSEC unites 11 countries of the Black Sea region: Albania, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Bulgaria, Georgia, Greece, Moldova, Romania, Turkey, Ukraine and Russia. The necessary conditions are being created for the formation of the effective functioning of a regional free trade zone. Yu.R. participates in the process of globalization also due to the so-called. “microregion”, that is, the existence of micro-level connections between neighboring regions of different countries. For example, out of 767 joint ventures registered in the Rostov region, 172 enterprises are with Ukrainian capital, 16 Russian-Belarusian enterprises, 10 Russian-Georgian ones.

Globalization also gives rise to large-scale negative consequences associated with the deepening economic crisis, stagnation, political instability and cultural alienation, and the lagging behind the West in terms of development of many countries. All this encourages political, ethnic, ideological and religious extremism, which also has a regional aspect. In this regard, the south of Russia is characterized by a heightened background of general tension. Two wars in Chechnya, the difficult situation in the Karachay-Cherkess Republic, Ingushetia, Dagestan, Adygea, North Ossetia-Alania, involvement in the Abkhazian and South Ossetian problems, etc. carry a certain danger for the explosive growth of terrorism and extremism, increased flows of refugees and social upheaval . In this sense, the North Caucasus is one of the most vulnerable regions for Russian national security.

Numerous studies view globalization as a threat to the sovereignty of the nation-state. State sovereignty, on the one hand, is being eroded under the pressure of the world market, and on the other hand, due to separatism, ethnic, religious conflicts, etc. In the North Caucasus, a situation has arisen in which the federal government, for a number of reasons, does not have full control over areas potentially subject to this control, primarily the territory of Chechnya. In fact, the south of Russia plays an extremely important role for the existence of the integrity of the Russian Federation.

Globalization of modern society

Completed by a history and social studies teacher

Municipal Educational Institution of Secondary School No. 2 of Magnitogorsk

Rizatdinova Rizida Ibragimovna

• Globalization- the process of changing the structure of the world economy, understood as a set of national economies connected with each other by a system of international division of labor, economic and political relations, through inclusion in the world market and the close interweaving of the economy based on transnationalization and regionalization. The process of globalization is a consequence of the evolution of state-formed market systems.
• This is a historical process that brings nations and peoples together, gradually erasing traditional boundaries and transforming humanity into a single political system.

• Since the beginning of the 21st century, the concept of global society has become increasingly popular in the world scientific community, from the point of view of which all people on Earth are citizens of a single global society, which consists of many local societies of individual countries of the world. This concept greatly simplifies the consideration of globalization processes, which in this case turn into ordinary social transformations within a global society.
• The ideas of a global society were expressed by the ancient Greek thinker Diogenes; he used the concept of cosmopolitan, that is, a citizen of the world or a citizen of a cosmopolis (society of the world). In the worldview of the inhabitants of China, Central Asia, and the Mongol Empire of Genghis Khan, an important place was occupied by the idea of ​​the Celestial Empire - the entire Earth (under Heaven) and the human society existing in its vastness.

• In the political sphere, this trend is expressed in the emergence of supranational units of various scales: political and military blocs, coalitions of ruling groups, continental or regional associations, world international organizations. One can also notice the contours of a world government, with a number of important functions performed by supranational organizations (for example, the European Parliament, Interpol).

• In the economic sphere, the importance of supranational coordination and integration, regional and world economic agreements is increasing. There is a global division of labor, the role of multinational and transnational corporations is increasing, the market is becoming a single economic mechanism, as evidenced by the speed of response of financial markets to events in individual countries.

• The culture is dominated by a tendency toward uniformity. The media are turning our planet into a “big village”. Millions of people witness events that took place in different places and become involved in the same cultural experience, which contributes to the unification (uniformity) of their tastes and preferences.

• With the current level of development of productive forces, the environmental problem. The destruction of the habitat shows that now we are talking not only about protecting humans from the forces of nature, but also about protecting nature from man-made interference and from its exploitation of nature. New weapons systems represent technologically advanced means of destroying humanity. All this requires the world community to coordinate environmental measures, join forces in protecting nature, and jointly fight to preserve peace on the planet.

• Globalization is often identified with Americanization, which is associated with the increasing influence of the United States in the world in the second half of the 20th century. Hollywood produces most of its films for worldwide distribution. World corporations have their origins in the USA: Microsoft, Intel, AMD, Coca-Cola, Apple, Procter&Gamble, Pepsi and many others. McDonald's, due to its prevalence in the world, has become a kind of symbol of globalization.
• However, other countries also contribute to globalization. For example, one of the symbols of globalization - IKEA - appeared in Sweden. The popular instant messaging service ICQ was first released in Israel, and the famous IP telephony program Skype was developed by Estonian programmers.

• Globalization is criticized not only by anti-globalists and some politicians (for example, Hugo Chavez), but also by a number of economists and scientists. For example, the famous economist Joseph Stiglitz has written several books that contain sharp criticism of a number of current trends in globalization. Stiglitz proves with numerous facts and examples that they destroy industry, contribute to the growth of unemployment, poverty, slow down scientific and technological progress and aggravate the environmental disaster on the planet. He criticizes the policies of global institutions: the WTO, the IMF, which, in his opinion, use globalization and its ideology (free trade, free access to raw materials, global patent law, the use of “paper” dollars and euros as world currencies, the intervention of international institutions in domestic politics, etc.) in the interests of several of the most developed states, to the detriment of most countries on the planet.