Globalization and alter-globalization

Abstract

Globalization is an extremely complex phenomenon, from both a theoretical-conceptual and a practical point of view, and has received the attention of a multitude of research from various disciplines (sociology, political science, anthropology, geography, economics, and so on) due to its multidimensional nature. Moreover, the development of globalization is associated with serious negative and positive consequences. The alter-globalization movements emerged strongly to counteract these negative effects and to propose other ways of understanding the relationships between the global economy, environment and people. Among them, the social and solidarity economy (SSE) is one of the most comprehensive proposals which address the problems caused by globalization. The SSE confronts future challenges by prioritizing social and environmental needs in economic decisions.Globalization can be understood as a dynamic process of capitalism that has structured the different forms of capital accumulation throughout history: from the 15th century with the logic of the accumulation of mercantile capital, which allowed the dominance of the Atlantic centres over the peripheries of the Americas and other continents, to the current paradigm of technology as the basis for capital accumulation. Although the term 'globalization' began to be used in the late 1960s and early 1970s, it became popular from the 1980s onwards with Levitt's (1983) famous work, 'The Globalization of Markets'. It is no coincidence that this fact occurs at this particular historical moment: since the late 1970s and early 1980s, capitalist globalization experienced an unprecedented dynamism in our time, driven by neoliberalism, which encompasses political, geographical, cultural, social and economic spheres (Harvey 2005).Since then, this phenomenon has attracted considerable attention. The lack of consensus across academic spheres suggests that there remains great complexity in the analysis of globalization, and demonstrates why it is still the focus of a multitude of debates from different disciplines. In this sense, there is a strong controversy due to the wide diversity of approaches to different aspects of globalization, such as its definition and meaning, its historical origin, its dimensions, its ideological bases or its implications.We can understand globalization as an ongoing process of intensifying cross-border social and economic interactions which is enabled by the decreasing costs of connecting distant places through communication. The process of globalization facilitates the transfer of capital, goods and people across space, and leads to an increasing transnational interdependence of economic and social actors, an increase in both opportunities and risks, and an intensification of competition. Globalization is accelerated by factors such as political decisions (reduction of barriers to trade, foreign direct investment, capital and services, privatization and deregulation policies), technological developments (communication, media, transport) and soci...