Decentering globalization: processes, conditions, and worldviews

This article argues that the notion of “globalization” that was popularized after communism’s collapse has become empirically defunct and intellectually indefensible. To decenter globalization, this article argues in favor of revising our understanding of the “global” beyond global modernization or the modernization of the “world.” The article proposes to pluralize the concept and adopt a trinity of terms: “global,” “glocal,” and “local.” This solution differentiates the substantive dimensions implicit in most analyses of the “global.” Each of these terms should be seen as analytically autonomous from the others; taken together, they form a trinity of mutually defined concepts. An overview of these concepts is presented, whereby specific terminology for each distinguishes among the processes signified, the conditions indicated, and the worldviews that express normative endorsement of each concept.