[NSP Report 50] Trends in Globalization and Cultural Change Post-Economic Crisis: Citizenship, Multiculturalism, Democracy, Religion

Professor of Political Science and Diplomacy, Chung-Ang University. Professor Park Sung-woo received his bachelor's and master's degrees in Diplomacy from Seoul National University and his Ph.D. in Political Science from the University of Chicago. His major publications include "Plato's Menexenus, Athenian Imperial Identity, and Plato's Political Life" (Korean Political Science Review, 2007), "Conflict and Harmony between Democracy and Constitutionalism: The Meaning and Role of Originalism Debates in the U.S. Constitution" (Korean Political Science Review, 2006), and "The Politics of Eudaimonia: The Meaning of Philosophical and Political Life in Aristotle's Nicomachean Ethics and Politics" (Korean Political Science Review, 2005).

I. Introduction

1. Problem Statement

Today, we are experiencing an unprecedented global expansion, deepening, and acceleration of interconnectedness. Globalization is characterized by the dense connection of the world across all domains, including information, technology, capital, and labor mobility, not to mention population movement. This network encompasses various spheres such as politics, military affairs, economics, information, technology, and culture. How is the cultural sphere changing amidst the process of globalization, and what future does it face? The most significant impact of globalization on the cultural sphere is the demand for an understanding of cultural difference. In the past, cultural difference was often understood as belonging to the identity and attributes of nation-states.

However, today, cultural differences manifest at various levels within a single nation, including gender, religion, political identity, minority groups, and indigenous populations. While such cultural differences existed before the full onset of globalization, globalization has brought about the emergence of previously unacknowledged cultural differences or added new elements of cultural difference. Furthermore, these cultural differences are not confined to specific countries but are spreading globally. Amidst the process of globalization, the understanding of cultural difference generally reveals two simultaneous tendencies. With the development and spread of information and communication technologies and frequent population movements, culture rapidly disseminates worldwide, seemingly diminishing cultural differences based on spatial disparities. Yet, on the other hand, cultural differences that did not cause conflict when localized in the past are now rapidly spreading to every corner of the globe, leading to the worldwide proliferation of cultural differences and conflicts. In short, globalization has undeniably compressed global space and time, leading us to experience both cultural homogenization and heterogenization simultaneously.

The recognition that globalization simultaneously reveals these dual tendencies of cultural difference has provided an opportunity to depart from the so-called modern approach to culture. According to the modern concept of culture, it was seen as an inevitable developmental trajectory for dominant cultures to uniformly "standardize" and "rationalize" while "controlling" other cultures. In contrast, the concept of culture in the globalization process posits that culture is formed not by the unilateral standardization and rationalization of a specific dominant culture, but through the continuous replacement of existing cultures with new ones. As the ways in which cultural differences are expressed become more complex and diverse due to globalization, it has become impossible to understand culture through traditional modern approaches. The departure from modern approaches can be positively evaluated as it has provided an opportunity to understand culture more as it is. However, it is now time to develop new perspectives that can understand cultural differences, diffusion, and overall cultural phenomena within the context of globalization and forecast the future.

2. Three Perspectives

There are broadly three ways to understand cultural phenomena in the context of globalization. First, a perspective focusing on cultural clashes and conflicts; second, a perspective focusing on cultural homogenization; and third, a perspective focusing on cultural hybridization. While all three perspectives are based on the premise of globalization and consider relatively recent cultural phenomena, their fundamental assumptions reflect theoretical and philosophical currents that have existed for a long time. For instance, the first perspective, which views culture as an inevitable process of clash and conflict, relies on the romantic concept of modernity that emphasizes individual subjectivity in culture. The second perspective, which perceives culture as a process of homogenization, is fundamentally supported by the universalist worldview and the Enlightenment, which posit that human reason can converge in a single direction. Finally, the perspective that understands culture as a process of hybridization aims for a so-called postmodern thought that cannot be confined to modern currents. Let us now examine how these three perspectives, based on modern/postmodern thought, are unfolding amidst globalization and consider the measures we can take.

A representative theory approaching culture from the perspective of clash and conflict is Samuel Huntington's "Clash of Civilizations," which is now a relatively well-known thesis. Long before the 9/11 attacks or the International Monetary Fund (IMF) economic crisis, Huntington predicted in 1993 that the most crucial issue in future world politics would be the clash of civilizations, shifting from a Western-centric phase in international politics to conflicts between the West and non-West, and among non-Western civilizations (Huntington 1993). His argument focuses on Islamic forces, noting that the military tensions between Islam and the West, which have unfolded over centuries, have not yet eased. What is particularly interesting to us is his warning against the "military alliance between the Confucian and Islamic worlds." That is, he argues that the West must unite to counter the linkage between these two blocs through the flow of arms between East Asia and the Middle East. This implies that the West should unite not only Europe and North America but also Eastern Europe and Latin America, that Russia and Japan should cooperate more closely, and that the West should maintain its economic and military power by instigating conflicts between Confucian and Islamic states.

The Clash of Civilizations theory was debated in academic circles for a time due to the author's reputation and the novelty of his claims, but most of its arguments have proven to lack explanatory and predictive power in reality and are now largely ignored. We do not intend to verify the validity of Huntington's claims here. Rather, we wish to point out that his argument can be positioned as one perspective on viewing culture, and that this perspective remains applicable even as globalization progresses. The most noteworthy aspect of Huntington's thesis is his setting of culture as a new boundary for conflict. He particularly notes that the distinction between one's own people and other peoples is clearly evident in Asian cultural spheres. Here, culture is understood as a characteristic that enables the differentiation between one group and another, intertwined with ideology. That is, culture is a collective crystallization that distinguishes human diversity. According to this view, "bilingualism," "biculturalism," and "multicultural practices" are not considered culture. In other words, transnational cultural exchanges that transcend national borders, children born to multinational parents, and cultural diffusion arising from migration or trade do not fall within the category of culture from this perspective.

The perspective on culture assumed by the Clash of Civilizations theory does not acknowledge the coexistence of cultural differences within a single space. According to this view, culture is a unit that distinguishes and defines groups, and can be defined by the "billiard ball model" often used as an analogy in international relations theory. However, this concept of culture is unacceptable from an anthropological perspective. Anthropologically, culture is a system of learned and shared patterns of behavior or beliefs. "Learning" is not an impulsive act but a continuous process. Furthermore, "sharing," which is inherently socially formed, cannot be confined to specific spaces and histories. The boundaries of sociality cannot be artificially imposed. Therefore, when culture is understood as behavior and beliefs through "learning" and "sharing," culture transcends the limits of specific territories and histories and can be considered perpetually open. The inevitability of cultural conflict, as represented by Huntington's Clash of Civilizations theory, is based on a premise that is inherently difficult to establish. Huntington himself has already presented "The Third Wave" of democratization. At least in the dimension of democratic discourse, he acknowledged the retreat of cultural heterogeneity.

Secondly, the "cultural homogenization" thesis, often termed "McDonaldization," relies on observations that society is undergoing homogenization due to recent globalization, particularly the influence of multinational corporations. According to sociologist George Ritzer, McDonaldization is understood as "the process by which the principles of fast-food restaurants come to dominate a significant sector of society, not only in the United States but in many parts of the world" (Ritzer 1993, 19). What does it mean for McDonald's principles to dominate the world? Borrowing Max Weber's terms, it can be interpreted as leading the global process of rationalization in terms of the formal rationality embodied in principles such as efficiency, calculability, and predictability offered by McDonald's.

At the economic level, this rationalization process can be understood as capitalization, and its medium is again multinational corporations. Considering that multinational corporations are led by the United States, capitalization in the globalization process also signifies Americanization. Meanwhile, Americanization, at the cultural level, manifests as cultural imperialism through the influence of global cultural media or the universality of consumerism. Thus, the interpretation that globalization-induced cultural homogenization can exhibit imperialistic characteristics shares many commonalities with the Marxist interpretation of capitalization. If cultural homogenization is understood as a process that justifies capitalization and cultural imperialism in a Marxist sense, then cultural homogenization is difficult to avoid significant resistance and criticism (Alfino, et al. 1998; Smart 1999).

However, regarding concerns about cultural homogenization and subsequent cultural imperialism, scholars argue that economic globalization has not directly led to cultural homogenization but rather to cultural hybridization. For example, McDonaldization in Russia, rather than being driven by formal rationality such as speed, efficiency, and predictability, gives rise to new cultures through a process of "localization" tailored to Russia (Talbott 1995). McDonaldization in Russia was far from the rationality of finishing a meal quickly, the rationality of low prices, or the predictability of uniform menu choices. Scholars refer to this phenomenon as "global localization" or "glocalization" (Ohmae 1992) and focus on the fact that economic globalization, i.e., capitalization, does not directly lead to cultural homogenization at the cultural level but rather results in the creation of business models and new cultures suited to specific regions. That is, at the cultural level, globalization simultaneously proceeds with homogenization on one hand and diversification on the other. In other words, capitalization is ultimately inseparable from cultural hybridization (Comaroff and Comaroff 2001; Jameson and Miyoshi 1998; Appadurai 2001).

As a third approach, cultural hybridization fundamentally breaks down the taboo of purity. This means not recognizing the vested interests of traditional national identity and respecting the ambiguity or permeability of boundaries. The hybridization thesis is, in fact, a phenomenon that becomes more prominent with the progress of globalization... (continued)