The Impact of Globalization on Immigration Essay Example for Free

The Impact of Globalization on Immigration Essay Globalization could be the outcome of human interaction that came into existence because of the introduction or the prevalence of advanced transportation, means of communication, and recently information technology that facilitates political, economic, as well social coming together. Among the best definitions of globalization, looking at how the International Monetary Fund (IMF) perceives it might give a clear idea what it stands for. According to IMF Globalization is â€Å"the growing economic interdependence of countries worldwide through increasing volume and variety of cross-border transactions in goods and services, free international capital flows, and more rapid and widespread diffusion of technology. Another source that has a different take on globalization, the International Forum on Globalization defines it as â€Å"the present worldwide drive toward a globalized economic system dominated by supranational corporate trade and banking institutions that are not accountable to democratic processes or national governments. † What is interesting to note here is globalization per se does not have anything to do directly either with immigration or the movement of labor across borders. . Globalization had reached its epoch in the 19th century when there was interaction between European powers, the global European colonies, and lately the U. S. After the Second World War, the advancing of technology had enhanced it. It only takes to go back in history and visit some of the old civilizations such the Roman Empire and the Han Dynasty of China the Silk Road had facilitated its commercial activity globally. It is also possible to look at the earlier Muslim traders and explorers that had created a global commercial interaction. The Mongol Empire had also contributed to globalization by making its presence felt in all the areas it was conquering and putting under its control. In recent years, especially after World War Two those who were in charge that include big businesses, politicians, and economists surmise that protectionism was costly and wanted to do something about it. The coming together of such minds helped the coming into the picture of the Breton Woods Conference and in its turn, it was able to usher in establishments that started to operate internationally and received global recognition such as the World Bank, International Monetary Fund, and the World Trade Organization. This was the outcome of nations agreeing to come up with international trade organizations that will regulate global trade among member nations that have agreed to reduce tariff, as well as to open their market for each other. That was the time when the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT) came forward. Its aim was bringing down tariff and trade barriers among member nations, by eliminating or mitigating restrictions on the quantity of imports and subsidies given for home producers, as well to make arrangements with member nations as it is needed, to facilitate the flow of goods and capital across borders (MacGillivray, 2006). Overall, globalization focuses on trade more than the pattern of labor movement, whether it triggers migration or not, and its priority always had been the movement of goods and capital and especially how direct foreign investment could be introduced into a given country and what form it will take. It was also working how to apply existing technologies and new ones and how to integrate them with what is taking place around the world so that the outcome will be beneficial for all involved, without putting anyone at a disadvantage. Eventually, the fact that globalization is not only economical but it also has effect on the social and political sphere of the participating nations was also recognized. There had been also a change in the methods used to measure globalization using the above-mentioned indices such as the size of the flow of goods and capital. The new method introduced to measure a nation’s globalization level requires looking at the flow of the economic activity, the prevalent restrictions and barriers in a given nation, in whatever form they are. The kind of information flow that is permissible, including what kind of business interaction is taking place, and the kind of cultural intermixing that is taking place are also part of the method (Kitching, 2001). What this leads to, as the latest developments attested is to a free trade zone among nations that are in a close proximity, as well as among global trading partners, in spite of their geographical proximity. Advantages cited for such arrangements include, it brings about economical prosperity to those who join hands, could enhance civil liberty, as well as it could introduce an effective resource allocation. The advantage in fact extends into lowering prices, could create more employment, and could introduce higher output, resulting in raising the standard of living of the people in the participating nations. Those who support globalization claim that this kind of laissez-faire arrangement of trade will introduce some kind of economic freedom in the long run by enhancing democratic governance and capitalism, which are at the root of the system of the advanced regions. In addition, the members of such advanced regions would benefit from a much higher material wealth that will come into existence through the process. Numerous advantages had been attained because of globalization in such a way that it had ceased to be only the removal of trade barriers and creating favorable trade conditions among the advanced nations. Developing nations especially in the Americas had been benefited after the introduction of free trade agreements such as North America Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) that included a developing nation such as Mexico that had seen both advantages and disadvantages because of the introduction of free trade agreement where all barriers on trades had been removed and goods and capital could flow freely among the member countries. There are also Asian countries that had come together under the Association of South Asian Nations (ASEAN) that are among the developing nations benefited from the globalization that they introduced among themselves. There are also many developed countries that are being given preferential treatment by advanced regions by giving them a preferential trade agreement where some of the tariffs could be eliminated or could be reduced allowing these developing nation a better access to the markets of the advanced nations. Such measures alone have brought about changes where they have introduced many improvements. Among the improvements that were brought about through better trade arrangements that enabled the developing nations to export more of their products with minimum tariff or without any tariff into the advanced markets is income inequality, for the obvious reason where now commodities could not only command a better price but there is market for them outside of the usually depressed home market. When the standard of living of people in a given region is improving it is obvious that aspects such as life expectancy and infant mortality could be improved and that is exactly what had happened in most of the developing nations that were taking advantage of the liberalizing and globalizing of trade. Other areas such as democracy, universal suffrage, feminism, literacy, child labor, the use of electricity and other electronic gadgets had gotten a substantial boost because the dwellers of these regions are getting a boost from the economic activity created by globalization. Globalization also has other advantages especially with its latest version where new introductions had surpassed the stage of opening once border for trading partners without any barrier had. Big corporations from the advanced regions had their eyes on the cheap labor of the developing countries for a long time and had started outsourcing work by opening businesses there. That in fact had been the major breakthrough of globalization where an unprecedented level of employments had come into existence in the developing regions even if what they pay is miniscule when compared with what they are paying in their own country of origin or if they have to open business in other much advanced regions. The outsourcing itself had created enough problems in the nations where the jobs are migrating from by taking away good paying jobs abroad. The unionized and highly militant local workers who are demanding higher share of what the businesses are generating remain behind stranded and without equivalent job opportunity, the main reason why many businesses started outsourcing their work to locations where the labor is cheap. Those nations that are allowing these multinationals to open businesses, of course, are creating employment at a very high scale that could transform a given developing region into a high earning workforce. However, not all of these economic activities are without their disadvantages. Some are claiming that such huge economic activities have raised the poverty level, introduced inequality, injustice, and have eroded some traditions in the regions where they are taking place (Colombia University). It is very difficult to substantiate such claims even if it had been obvious that those who are in the countries of origin of the outsourced countries had been at a disadvantage to the point where the only sector that offered them job opportunity was low paying service jobs. Nevertheless, in the countries these jobs are relocating they are a source of new income that was not in existence and a windfall the involved nations cannot bring into existence by their own. The fact that any economic activity will introduce new changes is undeniable and it is possible to look at a handful of new changes that would occur. Other than that, many nations have taken advantage of globalization and have changed their economic and social status permanently while others are struggling to repeat the same feat. Therefore, overall, the recent development in globalization, even if it had availed an unprecedented advantage to those who have the money and the resources and of course, put those who are losing their lucrative well-paying jobs to regions where labor is cheap at a disadvantage, it had been found more beneficial (UOC). Immigration Immigration on the other hand is when people leave the country they were born in and change location outside of their country of origin to live and work, mostly long term. There are various reasons why people choose to immigrate and one of them is economical, although it does not have a direct correlation with globalization. Statistics has it that one-third or close to 190 million people around the world were immigrants in the year 2005. What contributes to immigration could fall into two main categories. The first category is â€Å"pull†, which means there has to be something, somewhere that attracts people and the major catalyst in the pull category is economics where people would like to immigrate somewhere they believe they will get a better chance of finding work. The pull reason cannot be limited to economic reasons even if for the majority of immigrants their main attraction is job opportunity and leading a better life than they have at home, for both themselves and their family members. The â€Å"push† aspect of immigration on the other hand is that there could be certain aspect that would force people to leave the place of their birth to find a new home that will offer them better than what they have at home in a form of employment, business opportunity, finding good health care for themselves as well as their family, good education for themselves and their families and at the same time to get away from political or religious problems at home whey they could have been persecuted. These are the major reasons that are the cause of immigration, as there are minor reasons where immigrants might want to be with their families abroad and the like. Not every country or geographical location is fit for immigration and the best location for immigrants for hundreds of years had been the Americas that did not relent since the discovery of huge landmass in the Americas. Most probably that would be the highest wave of immigration recorded in history, as many people were able to find their way to these regions unobstructed and often the European powers were facilitating their going to these regions every since they had discovered and started controlling these regions. The same is applicable today as the U. S. alone is receiving around one million immigrants on a yearly basis. The only difference is the origin of the immigrants is not only Europe as it used to be when the nations in the Americas started to be established. Currently, immigrants could originate from anywhere in the world. Even if the improved law whose pattern and requirement is constantly changing, still the borders of the U. S. and Canada are open and Canada at least allows up to 200,000 immigrants yearly that could originate from anywhere in the globe and some of them could be investors or entrepreneurs with capital. Mexico, China, India, and Philippines had been the leading countries where the new immigrants are originating from (Asia Pacific). Largely in the U. S. , there are those labeled as illegal immigrants that are in the country mostly to work illegally. Their main source of their origin is South and Central America although the majority of them could be from Mexico where the estimated number of illegal immigrants could reach one and half million. Without accounting for this group, the U. S. population had swollen by 2. 8 million people just between 2004 and 2005 revealing the influx has become worrisome to the U. S. administration that is coming up with various mechanisms to at least curb the number of illegal immigrants from countries such as Mexico. Just to reveal the effect of the influx in one of the western states of the U. S. California, the non-Hispanic whites who were at 80% in the 1970s now had come down to 43% in 2006.