Has the State Lost Power in the Context of Globalization?

Running head: INTERNATIONAL POLITICS
INTERNATIONAL POLITICS
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1INTERNATIONAL POLITICS
Has the state lost power in the context of globalization? Discuss in relation to one of
the key theories.
Globalization is one of the most used terms of the recent times. It has been seen that the
term and the concept of globalization is now applied in every field of social, economic and
political scenarios. Marshall McLuhan had for the first time, even before the concept of
globalization was properly known to humanity made the term “global village” popular (Beck
2018). The idea of McLuhan’s “Global Village” was one world that was connected by a nervous
system of electronic gadgets and wires, which is presently true and his idea was that, this
scenario will lead to a better heterogeneousness of the world where the world population will be
behaving in a similar way. This is due to more connectivity among people and knowing each
other cultures in a deeper perspective which will give rise to cultural assimilation and a similar
type of cultural worldwide. This is the concept of “Global Village” with a “World Tribe” that
McLuhan was talking about in his various works, and this is what today the world looks like with
the phenomenon of Globalization fully operating. The world is no more a place with
disintegrated cultural variations that dot the whole planet and keeping themselves distinctly apart
from each other in every aspect. Though it is not true that all the diversities has been removed
due to the advent of globalization, but the truth is that the population all over the earth is going
through similar changes and having similar view points and philosophies about a wide variety of
issues (Amin 2014). The commercial revolution that turned like a tide and changed the face of
humanity for good, is one of the driving phenomenon of globalization.
The time that existed well before the advent of the phenomenon of globalizations was
mainly dominated by the nation states and the states which were more powerful were dominating
the weaker states and the individual states were all having their own closed door cultures and

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environments distinct and different from all other countries This situation rapidly changed with
the doors of the various countries opening up the borders for the purpose of trade and that was
the first instance of some form of globalizations was initiated and the various cultures around
the world had started inter mingling with each other for the purpose of trade and the cultural
assimilation was the byproduct of the international trade happening (Wenman 2013). The
religious movements worldwide for the mission of preaching started by the Buddhist
missionaries from India and then followed by Christianity and Islam much later also caused
religious and cultural assimilation. This was the time when the evident difference among the
countries were slowly fading because of usage of similar kinds of products and the presence of
similar religions in the countries worldwide. The actual process of globalization however did not
began until and unless the industrial revolution occurred in the Europe, especially in England
(Saskia 2017).
The states were the most powerful entities in the world and the rulers of the various states
were expected to win over other states when and in whatever ways it was required. This was the
state of affairs during the medieval era when the phenomenon of globalizations was completely
unknown to the human society at large. As already mentioned the process started with the
international trade relations being established. However the states did not have instant access to
knowledge from distant lands and whenever they wanted to connect to their family members or
friends they did not have any instant mechanisms to connect which meant that the news of the
distant countries remained unknown and there were pockets of knowledge and information
throughout the world where people formed their own primitive social groups which then gave
rise to the concept of the nations and then the primitive states which forms the basis of what are
today known as the political states or the countries (Fjäder 2014). Marshall McLuhan’s global