Unit 10 - Globalization; Networks, Risk, Liquids Flashcards
space of flows
Castells
- space now is no longer about territory (as in old modernity, about this country, that region), but instead space “flows” frome one node to another
- finances from America flow to a manufacturing plant inn China which creates products that flows to a distribution point in Europe
- it is radically decentralized as capital, information, and products flow over borders
- as a result, locales, functions, and people are disconnected from each other, subordinate to the “space of flows”
- the network connects some (node to node) but disconnects others less important to the network (workers, those without access to information technologies)
- his way of marking the spacelessness of the flow of international capital
- the people who have the real power in this new network society
timeless time
Castells
- because every node is interconnected over the globe, everything (information exchange, funding, production, distribution) happens in real (global) time rather than being tied to a local time
- 24-hour news cycles, production schedules, markets, all flow rapidly from node to node
- if your company is tied to local time, you find yourself behind, at a company disadvantage
- instantaneous communication technologies mean that time becomes detached from the ordinary rhythms that the modern world was used to
switcher
Castells
- has to do with power - also flows from node to node throughout the network
- there still is a hierarchy/ruling elite, but they are too mobile
- the real “ruler” is the flow of money that drives production/distribution/consumption
- the ones who can channel that flow (have control over the “switches” that turn nodes on or off, including or excluding people from the network flows) rule the globalized world
- “the switchers are the power holders”
“the new capitalism”
Castells
- in the new economic realities of the network, value is generated “in the global financial markets enacted by information netowrk in the timeless space of financial flows”
- the product is not the central concern, nor the worker - the financial flow is
- in this new economy - where the financial sector reigns supreme - the losets pay for the winners
- the financial network takes care of its “switchers” while things change for the worse for workers
- the line between employee and manager becomes blurred
- labor networks are spread across the globe
differentiation/segmentation/disaggregation
Castells
- differentiation - different tasks sourced to different nodes in the network
- segmentation - production broken down into various segments, specific tasks are assigned to wherever the skilled or unskilled labor is chepaest or most available
- disaggrefation - no more collective union representation because the workers are separated and spread over the globe
- the worker’s existence is fitted to the reality of the network of the flows of global capital
- the workers have less power in a world controlled by financial networks not tied to any single country or its laws (work itself becomes mobile, going to wherever the laws are most beneficial to the corporation)
“new social order”
Castells
- the network changes our social experience, produces a “new social order” that structurally changes our experience
- on an individual level, what appears to us as disorder is actually the logic of the network that subordinates our cultural and economic life to the “random sequence of events, derived from the uncontrollable logic of markets, technology, geopolitical order, or biological determination
- stuff happens, and it’s hard to see why
risk
Beck
- pre-modern societies didn’t have a notion of risk - there was so much they couldn’t control, terrible things happening were just givens
- the notion of risk is an offshoot of the modern conception as life as controllable (we make decisions that change outcomes in our world) and calculable (risk is manageable according to certain mathematical patterns)
risk society
Beck
- modern control is an illusion: risk tries to make the incalculable calculable through choice (trying to reduce risk, etc.)
- in the face of some dangers, our choices simply don’t matter much
- risk - and the awareness of risk in our world - is challenge to the modern ideology of progress and control, for it asserts: we’re not as much in control as we once thought
insurance
Beck
- insurance is both a symbol of this desire/pretense of ultimate calculability, and an important industry within modern society, protecting us from risk
- problem: the risks we face now are global in nature, and are absolutely uninsurable - we are drowning in uninsurable hazards
reflexive modernization
Beck
- the success of simple modernization leads to the dynamics that produce the reflective
- 5 dynamics: globalization, individualization, gender revolution, underemployment, and global risks
- reflexive modernization is a result of the “victory” of the simple, but also undermines it, corrodes it
- refers to the state of being hyperaware of our social situation, and that becomes especially clear in terms of “risk”
- we now live in the context of anxiety about processes that we ourselves have set in motion
individualization
Beck
- because we are focused on “choice” in risk society/reflexive modernization, the effect on our private and relational lives is an expanding of choice and a loosening of the grip of traditions that limited choice
- maximizing individual freedom allows for us to each find purpose and meaning are to be found within, in fulfilling potential, dreams, feeling authentic, etc.
- can lead to self-centeredness/consumerism, but also to a new globalized ethic and concern for environment, human rights, etc
- referring to a change in social structure that has to do with the rights and entitlements bound up in the welfare state: education, employment, mobility
- in this process of designing ourselves, we’re all in this together
- “we are condemned to individualization” - we have choice that we must make and cannot avoid
organized irresponsibility
Beck
- by being blind to risk, and even more, by assessing risk in terms of personal and not systemic risks, modern society remains in “constant denial of the suicidal tendency of risk society” - organized irresponsibility
- not only do the processes of simple modernization eventually destroy its own system, it also designs procedures that obscure the real nature of risk - the more we know, the less sure we are about our future
heavy/hardware modernity
Bauman
liquid modernity
Bauman
