Globalization is the process of contact, collaboration and assimilation with people, companies and governments of other nations. Globalization is done mainly for the purposes of international trade and investment. Information technology made globalization possible on a wide scale, but people have participated in trade, communication and collaboration with people of other nations for thousands of years. The main features of globalization include an economy that is dominated by investments all around the globe, multiple production locations and processes, low costs for transportation, the information and communication technology revolution, deregulation of national economies, and the relevance and ubiquity of major transnational economies.
Neoliberalism gets the “neo” part of its name because it is the revival of nineteenth century ideas in the twentieth century about laissez-faire economics and free-market capitalism. After World War II, the dominant economic ideas were Keynesian and that lasted until 1980. Neoliberalism is associated with economic liberalization, privatization, deregulation, free trade, austerity, and reduced government spending in favor of the private sector.
The Fourth Industrial Revolution is the one that is upon us now. It is the new era of digitization being extended in new and unexpected ways. The Fourth Industrial Revolution also covers the new robotics that give machines and humans new capabilities through artificial intelligence. The Industrial Revolutions of the past have began a new period in the lives of humans where a form of work has opened up new possibilities. For the fourth one of these revolutions the type of work is based on what the technologies of the Third Industrial Revolution created—information and communication technologies, robotics, and our human bodies. For instance, genomics are the hot topic in medicine currently, and biometrics is the safest way to secure one’s personal property. Artificial intelligence is advancing so that computers will soon be able to out think the humans who created them. If humans are still involved in industry it is because they are still the least expensive option.[1] These are all aspects of the Fourth Industrial Revolution.
Some of the stages of capitalism include the Early stage also called the monopoly stage or the state monopoly capitalism. It began with the cloth industry in England in the sixteenth, seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. Early stage capitalism featured the use of accumulated wealth to invest in productive enterprises such as expanding one’s cloth manufacturing business by purchasing an additional loom rather than investing in building another cathedral for religious purposes. The former created more wealth while the later hopefully bought a person a place in heaven but the return is not assured. Other features of the early stage of capitalism include colonialism and imperialism where rulers of countries invested in exploration of uncharted land in hopes that it would bring them wealth. They did not care that there were indigenous people who owned these lands. The mostly European rulers wanted to claim the land as their own so they could accumulate wealth from the resources found in these new lands. They enslaved indigenous people to work for them and imported slaves to work for them.
Once people saw that by investing the wealth they had in their business brought them more wealth, then the stage of capitalism changed to free trade and finance capitalism. This is the capitalism that Adam Smith, who many believe “invented” capitalism, endorsed. Smith said that when individuals have a free market in which to work, and pursue their own self-interests that promotes the good of the community. He also said that there was an “invisible hand” guiding the market even though it could appear chaotic at times. Since Smith’s time, capitalism has appeared in many different iterations mainly based on the private ownership of the means of production operating for profit and accumulation of wealth. Workers make a living and owners make profit. Neoclassic economics led to laissez-faire capitalism which says that if people are given the important information they will make rational decisions, so the market will right itself without government interference in the form of regulations, subsidies or tariffs.
After the Great Depression, economists favored Keynesian economics that said government intervention was necessary to a point to keep the market stable. However, in 1980, Ronald Reagan became president and initiated the trickle-down theory of economics that claims if wealthy people are given tax breaks, they will invest the extra money in building businesses that will hir
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