Has Globalisation Destroyed the Power of the Modern State? Essay

There is not doubt that globalisation is one of the buzzwords of the twenty first century, radically transforming internationalist relations around the world, and directly or indirectly altering the way we view global politics, but how much has it affected nation states and their power? Globalisation is a complex and abstract term which has been given(p) many definitions and meanings. For the purpose of this essay, I shall use a single definition which is closest to what I think globalisation is, and when referred to in the essay, this is what is meant. Heywood (2011) states that Globalization is the emergence of a complex web of interconnectedness that subject matter that our lives are increasingly shaped by events that occur, and decisions that are made, at a great distance from us. The causes of this interconnectedness bear be broken down into three engines of globalisation Cultural, Political and Economic. Cultural globalisation is facilitated by technological advances in com munications and especially the internet.This enables a galactic amount of the developed worlds population instant access to vast amounts of information unaffected by physical borders (except when censorship is in place), which in turn is fashioning the world more culturally homogeneous. The rise of multinational actors like transnational corporations (TNCs (for example Sony, Nestl and Nike)), non governmental organisations (NGOs (for example Greenpeace, Oxfam and Amnesty International)) and other international organisations (eg UN, EU and NATO) means that there are more authoritative actors on the world stage, as opposed to historically, states being the only predominant actor.Globalisation means that the economic market is now truly global, as money can be shifted worldwide in an instant. This has facilitated businesses to operate in different countries to their home earth to take advantage of cheaper labour costs, local resources and other factors, which mean goods are now manu factured on a global scale. All these factors mean that geographical distance and territorial borders are becoming less significant (Heywood 2011). Since the creation of the modern idea of statehood after the Peace of Westphalia (1648), the nation state has been vastly the intimately predominant actor on the world stage. Sovereignty allowed states to have sole power over what happened within their own borders, and disputes between states usually brought about war. The genuine definition of a state as outlined in the Montevideo Convention has four features1) A defined territory.2) A permanent population.3) An effective government.4) The cognitive content to enter into relations with other states.