Globalization and its Impact on Individuals: A Case Study Analysis

This essay explores the multifaceted impacts of globalization, particularly its economic, social, and technological dimensions, through the lens of a fictional character, Farzana, a young girl from Bangladesh. The paper traces Farzana's life, highlighting the opportunities and challenges she faces due to globalization, including migration, employment in sweatshops, and the exploitation of cheap labor. The analysis delves into how globalization affects individuals in developing nations, examining the negative consequences such as poor working conditions and low wages, while also acknowledging the access to diverse products and potential for economic advancement. The essay critiques international business practices that exploit these conditions and emphasizes the need for a balanced perspective on globalization's effects on both macro and micro levels.

Running head: GLOBALISATION AND ITS IMPACT
Globalization and its Impact
Name of the Student:
Name of the University:
Author’s Note:

1GLOBALISATION AND ITS IMPACT
As opined by Lawrence and Almas (2018), globalization is perhaps the single most
important factor which has drastically changed the nature of the business world in the past
two centuries. Ritzer and Dean (2015) are of the viewpoint that the process of globalization
can be defined as the “trans planetary process(es) involving increasing liquidity and growing
multidirectional flows as well as the structures they encounter and create”. The emergence of
the construct of globalization can be traced back to the 19th century when the telegraph
system and the steam boats were introduced for the first time in the aftermath of the Industrial
Revolution (Mărginean, 2018).
Hopper, Lassou and Soobaroyen (2017) argue that the improvement in the
communication as well as the transportation systems were the major factors which propelled
the emergence of the construct of globalization. In a way it can be said that the process of
globalization by interlinking the different markets of the world has converted the entire world
into a global village wherein the different business enterprises regardless of the nation to
which they belong can conduct trade and commerce (Mărginean, 2018). In addition to this,
mention also needs to be made regarding the various dimensions of globalization like
economic, socio-cultural, technological and others (Banerjee & Jackson, 2017). These
dimensions of affects the contemporary organizations as well as individuals both at macro
and micro level because of their correlation which the various business processes and
products or services offered by these organizations to the customers. For example, it is seen
that the customers are having access to increasingly diverse products or services of different
brands or organizations and this has affected their lifestyle in a positive manner (Haque &
Azmat, 2015). This paper seeks to delve into the economic, social and technological
dimensions of globalization by analyzing the life of a young girl, Farzana.
Globalization offers better quality of opportunities to the individuals in terms of
culture, technology, lifestyle, industrialization and others yet the negative aspects of the same

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cannot be overlooked. This fictional character of Farzana is being used throughout the paper
to shed more light on this thesis statement. The primary focus of this paper is on the socio-
cultural, technological and economic impact of the process of globalization both on the macro
and the micro levels. The paper through the use of a fictional character intends to analyze the
positive as well as the negative changes that the process of globalization wields of on the
lives of the common people. The character belongs to an impoverished economic
background, that is, the nation of Bangladesh wherein globalization has just begun to make
inroads. Thus, it is likely that an analysis of the above mentioned fictional character will offer
insightful details regarding the socio-cultural, technological and economic impacts of the
process of globalization on the lives of the common people. The first section of the paper
brings to life a fictional character with a realistic background and life condition. The second
section of the paper will analyze the manner in which the different dimensions of
globalization wield an impact of the life of this character.
Farzana is a 14 year old girl who lives in the Kurigram area of Bangladesh. She has
no clear idea regarding the identity of her true father since her father left right after her
mother became pregnant. Her mother because of the limited amount of education that she
received and also the impoverished economic background from which she hailed worked in a
brothel. In addition to this, she had received no formal education and also does not have any
vocational training which is likely to help her to get a good high paying job. More
importantly, she is below the standard age of employment and this makes it even more
difficult for her to get a job in the area under discussion here.
Bangladesh is a developing nation with very limited amount of technological
advancement and also the quality of education which is being offered to the people is not
very high. In addition to this, it is seen that because of the plethora of political struggles,
strikes, turmoil and others that the nation has faced since its establishment had deterred many

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international business enterprises from establishing their business in the nation under
discussion here (Haque & Azmat, 2015). As a matter of fact, it is seen that more than 70.87%
people of the nation live below the poverty line because of the limited job and other kinds of
growth opportunities available to them (Sen & Ali, 2015). The net result of this is the fact
that the majority of the people still had to depend on agriculture for livelihood and it is only
recently that different international business enterprises following the path of globalization
are outsourcing their manufacturing process to this nation because of cheap labor.
The high percentage of people who live below the poverty line in the Kurigram
district can be attributed to the limited number of employment, financial and other kinds of
growth opportunities that are available to the people. This can at the same time attributed to
the lack of effective presence of different business enterprises in the concerned district of the
nation. The different international business enterprises following the path of globalization are
outsourcing their manufacturing and other important departments of their organization to
Bangladesh because of the cheap labor factor (Belal, Cooper & Khan, 2015). This is one of
the major reasons for the large number of sweatshops and similar kinds of industries in the
nation under discussion here which offers meager economic opportunities to the people
although they had to work hard for long hours for the same. Globalization is offering
economic and other kinds of opportunities to the people through which they are being able to
meet the basic requirements of their life. The people of the district at the same time had to
face the negative consequences of the process of globalization as well. For example, it is seen
that they had to work for long durations of time for very low wages. This is adversely taking
a toll on their physical as well as emotional wellbeing.
The fictional character, Farzana was raised in the Chilmari village until the death of
her mother. Her mother died when she was just nine years old and because her mother did not
leave behind any substantial value of property she had to look for work so as to sustain

4GLOBALISATION AND ITS IMPACT
herself. Living in the village in which she grew was not feasible for her because of the limited
amount of employability options that the village offered to her. This can be attributed to the
fact that the only employability options which were available to the people was to work in the
various sweatshops and because of her age it was not possible for her work in these
sweatshops. Moving out of the village she finally gets work in a sweatshop named Rana
Plaza in Dhaka. The major work that she was to do in the sweatshop was to stitch the cloths
and for this she was required to work for more than 12 hours a day. In addition to this, she
and more than 20 other people shared a small room in which they had to work in very low
light and also limited basic amenities (Dailymail.co.uk, 2018). This began to take a toll on
her eye sight and at the same time she started to show signs of depression as well. She soon
changed her work and started to work with the workers who used to mine sand in the
Brahmaputra river valley. This was an illegal job since the national government of
Bangladesh since the sand which was mined was illegally exported to other nations at a very
cheap price. This in turn adversely affected the national economy of the nation and this was
the main reason why the national government prohibited this activity. This job like her
previous job was also taking a toll on her physical as well as emotional health and thus when
she was given the offer to migrate to Singapore and work as a nanny or babysitter she readily
accepted. However, getting permission from the national government for migrating to
Singapore was not an easy task since she did not have a passport, birth certificate and other
relevant documents to gain permission. Thus, she took the help of some local brokers who in
exchange for money helped her to leave the nation illegally via the sea route in cargo ships.
Farzana after going to Singapore for around six months worked as a babysitter in a
family of three children. However, she was having difficulty in understanding the language of
the people of the nation (Mandarin). More importantly, the family tried to communicate with
her in English but because of her illiteracy she was not even being able to comprehend this

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language as well. The net result of this was the fact that because of communication barrier
she had to leave the job after six months. After leaving her job as a babysitter she joined an
Indian restaurant wherein her major job role was to clean the dishes. This was a suitable job
for her since did not had to communicate much with her employers and the manual or the
physical labor that she was required to perform actually suited her. More importantly, there
were other Bengalis working in the restaurant from whom she gained rudimentary knowledge
regarding the Mandarin language which she felt would help her to get better employment
opportunities in Singapore.
An analysis of the character of Farzana as well as the problems that she faced clearly
reveals the positive as well as the negative impacts of the process of globalization and its
different dimensions on the lives of the common people. For example, it can be said that the
social framework in she lived acted both as an opportunity as well as threat to her. In this
regard, it needs to be said that her lack of education and also the impoverished background to
which she belonged acted as an impediment to her. On the other hand, she was able to work
as well as economically sustain herself because of the opportunities offered by globalization
in the nation of Bangladesh.
The negative impact of the process of globalization gets manifested in the extremely
laborious work that Farzana had to do at the sweatshop, sand mining at Brahmaputra river
valley and others. More importantly, from the case of Farzana it becomes apparent that the
different international business enterprises taking undue advantage of the poor economic
condition of the developing nations like Bangladesh are outsourcing their manufacturing and
other processes to these nations for cheap labor. The net result of this is the fact that the
workers in these nations had to work for extremely long hours for very low wages and that
too in very uncongenial working conditions. These are adversely taking a toll on the physical
as well as emotional health of the individuals as becomes clear from the case of Farzana.

6GLOBALISATION AND ITS IMPACT
More importantly, these actions of the international business enterprises are helping them to
earn revenue yet they are not making any substantial economic contribution towards the
economic, social or technological growth of these nations (Banerjee & Jackson, 2017). The
movements of Farzana from one region to another in Bangladesh and finally to the nation
Singapore might at first glance represent her as a vagabond character who constantly shifts
from one region to another and constantly changes her profession. However, a closer analysis
of her movements as well as changes of her job roles indicates the impact that the process of
globalization had wielded on the lives of the common people. For example, the work that she
does in the sweatshops, sand mine and also the ones that she does in Singapore were
available to her because of the globalization of trade and commerce in the recent times. Thus,
it can be said that the process of globalization has affected the lives of the people positively
as well as negatively.
To conclude, the process of globalization has become an indispensible part of the
contemporary business world because of the plethora of benefits that it offers to the business
international enterprises. For example, an effective use of the process of globalization helps
the organizations to explore new business markets, earn a higher amount of profit and others.
However, there are various negative aspects of the process of globalization as well for
example it is seen that the different international business enterprises rather than positively
contributing towards the economic, social and technological growth of the nations in which
they are operational merely exploit their resources for the purpose of their growth. It is
pertinent to note that both the positive as well as the negative aspects of the process of
globalization becomes apparent from the analysis of the fictional character of Farzana who
has been described in this paper. In this regard, it needs to be said that there are various
dimensions of the process of globalization like socio-cultural, economic, technological and

7GLOBALISATION AND ITS IMPACT
others on which the overall effectiveness of the process under discussion depends
substantially.

8GLOBALISATION AND ITS IMPACT
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