Globalization and Justice

In the 1990s, as capitalism continued to expand its reach and influence, the term "globalisation" came to symbolise not only a more interconnected world, but the process by which a network of powerful financial institutions and multinational corporations gained increasing control over the world economy. For many in the industrialised West this process has seemed inevitable and fortuitous, the means of spreading prosperity and good fiscal practices across the globe. But for many others in the disadvantaged Third World globalisation appears to be a menacing spectre, the means by which already wealthy interests seek to aggrandise their power through hegemony while limiting further the economic, cultural, and social prospects of citizens in poor nations. Besides presenting evidence that capitalist globalisation is not achieving rising world-wide prosperity, Nielsen also shows the potential threat to democracy and the independence of nation states that globalisation poses.

Kai Nielsen is professor emeritus in the Department of Philosophy at the University of Calgary and adjunct professor of philosophy at Concordia University in Montreal.