Effects of Globalization

Article Review: The effects of Globalization on Human Rights

Article Review: The Effects of Globalization on Human Rights

Indra de Soysa is director or Globalization Research Program and Professor at Norwegian University of Science and Technology, Norway. Soysa is also an associate Scholar at the Center for the Study of Civil War, Peace Research Institute, Oslo. Krishna Vadlamannati is a Research Associate at George-August University in Goettingen, Germany.

Soysa and Vadlamannati describe research findings that indicated the effects of economic, social, and political globalization on human rights. The time period of this study was between 1981 and 2005. Although the study was conducted a while ago the concept of globalization and its effects are prevalent today as current findings have shown. In fact, this article was recently published this month, showing the relevance of such information. The authors present arguments between liberals and skeptics to what they believe to be the effects of Globalization on human rights.

The author’s purpose of writing the article was to outline the different perspectives of globalization effects, more so providing a detailed account of methodology used to determine the overall effects and how each aspect relates to human behavior or human rights. Soysa and Vadlamannati conclude that the association between globalization and human rights is hotly-debated in popular and academic circles. They contend that liberals suggest that globalization and growing interdependence among nation states will improve the conditions of peripheral countries. Skeptics, on the other hand suggest that globalization leads to the emasculation of states, taking away agency of people and communities, and empowering capitalists over communitarian interest. They also suggest that globalization can suffocate social progress by leading to cycles of resistance and repression.

Before neither I nor any reader can agree to either argument, one must...