2nd Draft - Reader Response to "The Double Edge of Globalization"

In "The Double Edge of Globalization", Chanda (2007) highlights on the effects that globalization has caused with much emphasis on the environmental degradation. On the contrary, Chanda also mentioned that globalization has helped the world to be more inter-connected through trades and also having to gather various governing entities to implement protocols to salvage the environmental issues.

I couldn't agree less with Chanda that globalization has helped to build the inter-connectivity around the world. In the article, it was pointed out that trades have increased with the demands increased as well. Information and awareness about the other countries had become easily accessible all around the world. This inter-connectivity has improved our lives and brings about rapid advancement in technology as well. Technology have brought everyone "closer" regardless of distance, where we are all connected through the internet, phones and many others. We are now able to easily access countries all around the world and expose ourselves to other cultures.

However Chanda says that with the world connected globally, demand and supplies have increased at the expense of our environment. China was taken as an example where large area of tropical forest was cleared to plant soybeans to supply for the demands as reported by Greenpeace. Chanda also mentioned that with China's productions and exports have caused chemical waste and threatened the environment around the world.

Chanda finds positivity in the Montreal Protocol where it is evident that it helped to shrink the ozone hole caused by deforestation and other environmental threats, many countries were supportive of the protocol which targets to reduce CFC emission through a number of years. However, Chanda also points out that the United States, being one of the biggest contributor to the emission of greenhouse gases, has refused to sign the Kyoto Protocol. I can appreciate the global effort in the implementation of these protocols. It is a challenging task to propose and convince nations to be supportive of an idea which may cause them to lose productivity. For instance, the recent case of Indonesia's forest fire. Burning of the forest to re-grow their crops will take a shorter time than cutting down the trees. It was mentioned by Martin Abbugao in "ASEAN urges Indonesia to ratify haze pact" that Indonesia is the only member which has still not ratified as an ASEAN Agreement on Transboundary Haze Pollution brokered in 2002.

In conclusion, globalization has brought about adverse effects on the environment. However, it is delightful to see that it has hence contributed much to the advancement of technology. Although without globalization, the deterioration of the environment may not have sped up so quickly but it may have been due to globalization that we have realized the degradation of environment and sourced for solutions with the help of globalization. In my opinion, I strongly thinks that globalization have played an important role in our development, be it as a nation or as an individual.

Reference List:
Chanda, N. (2007, 28 June). The Double Edge of Globalization. Yale Global Online.
Retrieved from
http://yaleglobal.yale.edu/content/double-edge-globalization


Martin Abbugao (2013, 30 June). ASEAN urges Indonesia to ratify haze pact.
Retrieved from http://www.foxnews.com/world/2013/06/30/asean-urges-indonesia-to-ratify-haze-pact/