Honors 101 Prompt 1

Rachel Akin

Honors 101 Prompt 1

14 September 2011

Though I had heard about the heated debate surrounding Globalization, I had never thought much about it prior to reading the article “Globalization Debates.” I now realize that globalization is a lot like sustainability because both want to achieve great goals, but the problem lies in how to achieve these goals. With this being said, I do not believe that it is possible for globalization to be implemented presently.

The quote by Kofi Annan states that in order to properly have globalization the global market must have values and practices that “reflect global social needs.” Like sustainability, globalization can only occur if the entire planet agrees to make certain changes. I do not believe this is possible. In The Story of Stuff, Annie Leonard tries to draw in the reader by discussing what some people on this earth do to each other to better themselves. We take land from each other, we harm each other’s natural resources, we seem to care more about monetary values than moral values, etc. Most importantly, we have wars over things like oil, and who gets to what resources first. With these things being said, how do we expect to get the entire globe to agree on certain “values and practices?”

In addition, it would only take one society to cause major problems that we do not currently have. Jared Diamond says, “Any society in turmoil today, no matter how remote…can cause trouble for prosperous societies on other continents…” Even if we could get a majority of the globe to decide on certain issues, it would be impossible for the whole world to agree on everything about everything! That does not even sound logical. I also have this problem with sustainability. Yes I think sustainability is important and obviously I want to save the planet, but the people on this planet are the ones who have to save it. People, corporations, countries, etc. will always have bad eggs in them that will place their personal benefit before the benefit of the globe as a whole.

The problem with both globalization and sustainability is not the ideas themselves; the problem is making these ideas become reality. Nothing could be better than having everyone unite to take care of our planet. In order to do this, though, our moral values must match. We need to save ourselves from ourselves. We are the problem.