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If one were having a contest for the most wrongheaded prediction about the world after September 11, the winner would be the declaration of the noted London School of Economics professor John Gray that the date heralded the end of the era of globalization. Not only will September 11 not be remembered for ending the process of global financial, trade and technological integration, but it may well be remembered for bringing some sobriety to the antiglobalization movement. If one thing stands out for that event it is the fact that the terrorists originated from the least globalized, least open, least integrated corners of the world: namely, Saudi Arabia, Yemen, Afghanistan and northwest Pakistan. Countries that do not trade in goods and services also tend not to trade in ideas, pluralism or tolerance.
But maybe the most important reason why globalization is alive and well post 9/11 is that while pampered college students and academics in the West continue to debate about whether countries should globalize, the two biggest in the world, India and China (that represent one-third of humanity) have long moved beyond that question. They have decided that opening their economies to trade in goods and services is the best way to lift their people out of abject poverty and are now focused simply on how to globalize in the most stable manner. Some prefer to go faster, and some to phase out currency controls and subsidies gradually, but the debate about the direction they need to go is over.
"Globalization fatigue is still very much in evidence in Europe and America, while in places like China and India, you find a great desire for participation in the economic expansion processes," Jairam Ramesh, the Indian Congress Party's top economic adviser. ". . . even those who are suspicious now want to find a way to participate, but in a way that manages the risks and the pace. So we are finding ways to glocalize, to do it our own way. It may mean a little slower growth to manage the social stability, but so be it. I just spent a week in Germany and had to listen to all these people there telling me how globalization is destroying India and adding to poverty, and I just said to them, "Look, if you want to argue about ideology, we can do that, but on the level of facts, you are wrong."
That truth is most striking in Bangalore, India's Silicon Valley, where hundreds of throusands of young Indians, most from lower-middle-class families, suddenly have social mobility, motor scooters and apartments after going to technical colleges and joining the Indian software and engineering firms providing back-room support and research for the world's biggest firms, thanks to globalization. Bangalore officials say each tech job produces 6.5 support jobs, in construction and services. "Information technology has made millionaires out of ordinary people in India, because of their brainpower alone, not caste, not land, not heredity," says Sanjay Baru, editor of India's Financial Express. "India is just beginning to realize that this process of globalization is one where we have an inherent advantage."
Do a majority of Indians still live in poor villages? Of course. Do we still need to make globalization more fair by compelling the rich Western countres to open their markets more to those things that the poor countries are best able to sell: food and textiles? You bet. But the point is this: the debate about globalization before September 11 got really stupid. Two simple truths got lost: One, globalization has its upsides and downsides, but countries that come at it with the right institutions and governance can get the best out of it and cushion the worse. Two, countries that are globalizing sensibly but steadily are also the ones that are becoming politically more open, with more opportunities for their people, and with a young generation more interested in joining the world system than blowing it up.
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