Essay #5- Julia Tew- Marginlized groups and globalization

    The modern era of globalization has certainly brought changes to the international landscape.  Inter, and intra-national, relationships are all impacted by modern globalization?s extensive, and speedy, reach.  Nations, networks, and individuals are now situated within a transnational community, or even many communities.  From a political standpoint, the increase in mobility and the speed and breadth of communication possibilities create more heavily intertwined interdependencies for states than in previous eras.  And the changes are not merely political. Increasingly, globalization, as its moniker implies, requires multi-pronged approaches.  Networks, organizations, and individuals interact with globalizing factors on multiple levels.  Sreberny-Mohammadi notes that ?issues such as peace, development, the environment, and human rights? can each ?assume a global character? (1996, p. 11).  Thus for transnational organizations like Amnesty International (AI), political, social, technological, cultural and personal aspects are combined within one universal movement- one that is also many in its multifaceted expressions.
    AI strives to promote global adoption of a universally understood and respected notion of human rights.  Rhetorical consistency is encouraged through explicitly stated objectives, beliefs, goals and methods of operation (Amnesty International 2007).  These draw from similar well-known and accepted documents from the human rights discourse, such as United Nations Declaration of Human Rights and are communicated to the various publics primarily through AI?s website (Winter, 2003, p. 384, Amnesty International, 2007).  The goal is ultimately global adoption and adherence to these beliefs and the formation and enforcement of local, regional, national, and international policy that supports this agenda.  
    There are some clear obstacles to AI?s success.  Some issues are technical- not all potential supporters have access to AI?s information and assistance through the Internet.  Although the organization also distributes information in the form of press releases that are frequently picked up by nation and international new agencies, again, access is potentially limited by location, with certain populations enjoying a greater degree of access to worldwide press and the necessary education to process the information.  These limitations act to reproduce informed and influential ?communities? of transnational elites, while still regulating certain people, perhaps those in the most desperate need of AI?s services, to the margins (Wresch, 1996).
    Despite marginalized positions, these less mobile, less connected populations are still experiencing the effects of a globalized human rights ideology.  As Mitchell explains, ?centre-margin binaries are no longer adequate for addressing the? relationships between? flows? (2003, p.79).  It is insufficient to simply call the marginalized marginalized without evaluating their interactions with the world around them.  Clifford draws on the analogy of traveling to illustrate how travel may occur without the benefit of bourgeois status (through virtual experiences provided by technology) and Gilroy rather poetically describes the transnational traveling experiences of a decidedly oppressed population, slaves, as they traversed the Atlantic in multiple directions (Clifford, 1992, p. 103, Gilroy, 1996).  Similarly, Ehrenreich and Hochschild draw attention to another, although globally mobile, socially invisible population of female migrant workers, hired by affluent Western families and businesses (2002).  All of these serve as particular examples of populations traditionally regarded as disadvantaged in the global community, but who are experiencing and in some cases leveraging globalization to their advantage, thus lending credibility to AI?s endeavors to reach populations sometimes considered unreachable.  In a recent Washington Post article, AI?s work in Afghanistan demonstrated some surprising tangible results for one such invisible population- the women of war-torn Afghanistan.  Despite an otherwise gloomy report on the state of affairs (and human rights), AI?s concentrated efforts have resulted in ?a better overall economy and more rights for women? (Washington Post, 2007, p. A11).  It?s a small but positive step for women in Afghanistan, but perhaps something equally worthy of note, is that this news of a minor Middle Eastern population is being reported in a major U.S. newspaper.

Amnesty International. (2007). About Amnesty International. Retrieved May 31, 2007,
from http://web.amnesty.org/pages/aboutai-index-eng

Clifford, J. (1992). ?Traveling Cultures.? In Cultural Studies, edited by L. Grossberg, C. Nelson and P. Treichler. New York and London: Routledge. p. 96-112.  Electronic reserve: http://www.lib.ncsu.edu/eresdocs/files2/h6048.pdf.    

Ehrenreich, B. and Hochschild, A. (eds.) (2002). Global women: Nannies, maids, and sex workers in the new global economy: Introduction. p. 1- 13. New York: Henry Holt and Company.

Gilroy, P. (1996). ?Route Work: The Black Atlantic and the Politics of Exile.? In The Post-colonial Question: Common Skies, Divided Horizons, edited by I. Chambers and L. Curti. London and New York: Routledge. Electronic reserve: http://www.lib.ncsu.edu/eresdocs/files2/h6047.pdf.

Sreberny-Mohammadi, A. (1996). Globalization, communication and transnational civil society: Introduction. In S. Braman and A. Sreberny-Mohammadi (Eds.), Globalization, communication and transnational civil society, p. 1-19.  Cresskill, N.J.: Hampton Press.  Electronic reserve: http://www.lib.ncsu.edu/eresdocs/files2/h6049.pdf.    

Winter, B. (2006). Religion, culture and women's human rights: Some general political and theoretical considerations. Women's Studies International Forum, 29(4). 381-393.

Witte, G. (Feb. 24, 2007). Afghans see marked decline since 2005: Violence, corruption, U.S. role add to unease and loss of confidence, report says. Washington Post. p. A11.

Posted at 01:37AM Jun 22, 2007 by TEW, JULIA in General  |  Comments[3]