The State and the Economy under the Impact of Globalization
| Author | Ion Bucur |
| Position | Professor Ph.D., Faculty of Law, University of Bucharest |
| Pages | 291-298 |
Page 291
The complex character, the multitude of facets and the profoundly unequal consequences have placed globalization in the centre of the main theoretical debates.
At large, globalization is a controversial process. As an economical process and political project, the globalization has inflicted profound mutations in the ideas regarding the economical role of the state. Its economical and political processes have affected the autonomy and aptitudes of the state to sustain the economical and social regulation.
The stressing of the global interdependencies indisputably affects the traditional vision of the state and its capacity of acting as an autonomous actor in an anarchic international system.
The realism and the rigor of the undertaken analyses represent an essential condition of the validity of different opinions regarding the intervening changes, the way in which the globalization affects the state’s policies, as well as its capacity to react in the attempt to preserve the autonomy in a changing global order.
The correct evaluation of the new tendencies needs the insertion of new evaluation standards regarding the state’s activity in the area of economy. The debates regarding the role of the state in the globalization era are concerned not only with the internal organizational frames, but also with its relations with economy and society. If the common note is the recognition of the state’s metamorphosis, there are controversial opinions regarding the level of vulnerability or omnipotence, the crisis and erosion of the state determined by the forces of globalization, the existing bind between the market triumph and the state’s withdrawal, the point at which the convergence of policies and economic structures is achieved, the relevance of the internationalPage 292 operating level of the state in comparison to the local and regional level, the state’s reactions to the globalization forces, and so on.
Globalization is often portrayed as a process that undermines the action capacity and as a factor responsible for the crisis of the nation-state. Other analysts consider that the overemphasis on the globalization phenomenon and its consequences is inopportune. Despite these differences, the growth of the oppositions against the state, the establishment of new types of authority, the substitution of some of its functions and their assuming of these functions by new actors, the change in the nature of state’s power, the complexity of its relations with the non-statal actors, as well as the transfer of some decisions from the public sector to the private sector, become clearer.
The speed and impact of the changes generated by globalization are different. The asymmetrical distribution of globalization conditions the level of involvement and the reaction capacity of the world states.
The alteration of the realist paradigm and the ideological reorientation of the ‘80s acted as an impulse for the action of the factors that limit the state’s government capacity. The choice for economical liberalism accompanied by the active policies of privatization and regulation had a profound impact on the role and status of the state.
The beginning of the third millennium evinces, on the background of the globalization intensification and the emphasizing of economical interdependencies, a profound global economical and political instability, asymmetries and imbalances, the double state and economy crisis in the developing countries, as well as important changes in the content of the economical and political ideology.
Globalization establishes unusual relations between the economy and the politics, as important alterations in the nature, content and manifestation area of these domains of the social life. Under these circumstances, the understanding of the main transforming powers of economy and politics, the identifying of new manifestation factors of their interaction, become essential.
The reassessment of the fundamental problems of politics, power and economy must be achieved by to obeying some essential requirements and criteria: the political and economical transformations are registering different rhythms and intensities, the essential causes of the new evolutions are internal and external, the treatment of their alterations and implications at different levels (micro, macro and global-economical), the emphasizing of the importance of the socio-cultural and institutional factors, the materialization of synthesis based on the conclusions formulated by economical science, the international relations theory, political science and so on.
The dynamic character of the economical transformations, the political context and the ideology in which they were achieved are found in theses of great theoretical and practical importance: a profound transformation from a world dominated by the state to a world dominated by the market, the beginning of the new globalized capitalism, the second big era of capitalism and the new industrial revolution and so on.
The post-war economical crisis of the ‘70s forced national governments to take action by restructuring the economical policies and capitalism.
The theoretical and ideological fundaments of this new direction were offered by “the conservatory revolution” started in the ‘80s.
In this new vision, the states have no longer the capacity to handle the economy, which determines the dynamization of individual initiative. The neo-liberal revolution...
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