Globalization took hits in 2016; will 2017 lead to more?

Economic nationalism is paying political dividends.

How so?

It's not just globalization that took a hit.

Civilization itself took several hits in 2016. With the mainstreaming of climate-deniers and science-deniers, it's legitimately questionable how long this experiment called "sentient civilization" will last. When we look at present-day circumstances, it's more and more plausible that a solution to the Fermi Paradox is: "Why don't we see more alien civilizations? Because they self-destruct when they get to our level of development."

We live under the "free market" ideology. And no ideology lives forever, especially when it justifies reduced living standards and runs counter to the public will. Any reader of history knows this. Bye bye, "free" markets and "free trade." Your time is up.

Economic nationalism was the vogue in the US in the 50s 60s and 70s, an era that saw growing middle class, rising living standards, equitable income distribution, strong worker protections and zero financial crises. We traded a good ideology for a bad one. Let's not make next ideology a bad one.

there are two predominant issues: (1) illegal immigration like the US and Europe; and (2) loss of middle income paying jobs.

Or is it that the people responsible for 2 (and their non-dom and passport-of-covenience media barons) are using 1 as a convenient smokescreen?

Globalization has to keep taking hits until it ceases to exist. All this bunk about "muh diversity", "muh interconnected global village", "muh economics views" or how we are in (((insert current year))) are all false. We don't need some stupid globalized interconnected world, do you really want to be "interconnected" with Arab and African countries? How about the fact that globalist politicians have the all too common and annoying habit of favoring foreigners over their ow constituents under the BS mantra of ((muh humane globalism))

Got stuck at the 'muh.' Is that a Greek symbol, ebonics, RWNJ dog whistle, what?

AiserXDEC. 18, 2016 - 01:39PM JST Globalization has to keep taking hits until it ceases to exist. All this bunk about "muh diversity", "muh interconnected global village", "muh economics views" or how we are in (((insert current year))) are all false.

Someone hasn't been studying their history. Humans have been interconnected despite ethnic and cultural diversity for longer than we've had the written word. Thousands of years BCE there was a trade network so extensive that artifacts from the Indus Valley civilization can be found in Mesopotamia. That means the cultural/ethnic groups many opponents of globalism are fighting to "protect" are actually younger than globalism itself.

We don't need some stupid globalized interconnected world, do you really want to be "interconnected" with Arab and African countries?

Um, yes. How is this even a question? I am part of a society where plastic is an essential component of almost every product, so I need access to petroleum. I depend on electronic devices that require minerals mined in Africa. Our culture's very symbol of romantic commitment is a gold diamond ring, something that is very difficult to get these days without contact with Africa. I enjoy chocolate, coffee, cous-cous, and fruits from Africa and the Middle East. And that's leaving out all of the intangible human cultural products I can access by having contact with people around the world.

If you want to be all xenophobic, you're welcome to go get an Internetless cabin in the woods and separate yourself from everyone who isn't like you. But to sabotage the global interaction that has been a fundamental part of the hominid experience for longer than there have been humans just because some xenophobes don't know how to compete in the global marketplace, that's just ridiculous.

@Katsu78

"Thousands of years BCE there was a trade network...."

Yes, and trade was mercantilistic, which was anything but "free." Trade was until quite recently strictly regulated in line with national interests, which in turn was tied in closely with private business interests. Trading with a rival power meant sedition and hence death to violators. This arrangement underpinned the rise of European and Western power and technological innovation that has lasted to this day. Later, the West adopted tariffs that reflected national interests.

But now, we've given that up, and compromised our own interests for the sake of globalization and "free trade" and ultimately the global elites.

This new arrangement has coincided with declining power and influence of the US and the West and the rapid rise of our biggest geopolitical adversary, China, which carefully protects its own economy. Watch out for Russia, too. The real wages of our workers and the middle class have stagnated as well,

Someone hasn't been studying their history.

JeffLeeDEC. 18, 2016 - 05:34PM JST @Katsu78 "Thousands of years BCE there was a trade network...." Yes, and trade was mercantilistic, which was anything but "free."

Erm, you need to review your history. Mercantilism was the predominant economic theory of Europe roughly from the middle ages to the Rennaissance, not the city-state civilizations that existed prior to the year zero.

Trading with a rival power meant sedition and hence death to violators.

Got a citation for that? Because closed or even closeable national borders are in the scope of human history a comparatively modern invention.

The fact is, humans have been mixing for as long as the species has existed - in fact, our branch of the biological tree has had mixing before humans even existed. The cultural/ethnic identity you ascribe to yourself - whatever it is - didn't even exist for most of the time that humans have been around. The boundaries of human groupings have been fluid and porous for millennia. To pretend they can be made rigid and permanent now is to practice delusion. It is our nature to mix.

People want to trade with other countries and globalization isnt the problem. Its the type of un elected globalised govwrnment that the current top globalist are selling. A centralized monopoly of power where you dont get to have a say on how you want to live in your own country. The globalist over reached their power and every nation accordding to their people should have a say on how they would like to live their life without other nations demanding they live otherwise.