One interesting found from last week's class is that I remember the girl in front of me stated that "Globalization is not just a concept but rather, an ongoing process." in regard of my question.
My original question was "Does the new era of communication, thanks to the new technology, facilitate the process of globalization or hinder it? And following that "how do we define the essence/nature of globalization:is it encouraging more variety and diversity in a synergy fashion? Or is it encouraging more similarity and becoming a 'one world'?"
From my point of view, I think by examining how communication technology evolves over the decades is a good way to find out what exactly the globalization means to us. In short, I believe the evolution of international communication techniques and devices is a reflection of globalization process.
Before the appearance of newspaper, people were living under "unknown social circumstances"--they were not informed with much social, political and cultural actions and even if informed, not in wider dimensions and in-depth level. The coming of newspaper changed the political dynamic--public were more informative than before and they started paying attention to what was going on around their life. Kings and politicians found it more difficult to hide the news, and found a need to communicate with the people and the outside world in order to maintain the governance.
The birth of telephone dramatically shaped he way people communicate with each other. One no longer need to travel across half of the city or the entire country just to get their word out--They were using Telephone. Generally speaking, telephone and telegraph shortened the cultural and social distance between each individuals.
The emergence of telegraph changed the dynamic of international communication and it was the key factor in the World War I information battle. It was from this turning point that governments realized the need of communicating both with their allies and enemies. It was from there Propaganda has been putting into use. It was also from then, history witnesses the emergence of the 4 oldest international news agencies and the agency news era. It was from there that the international community realized the need to setting rules, common agreements and regulations on the international communication. In this regard, technology self-evidently changed the social, cultural and political construction of the world and the world became more and more synergized.
The coming of Television and Radio drastically changed the way people received information. People no longer highly reply on the reading or the listening, but rather than the vivid visual messgaes in terms of communication. It was from there the term "Mass Communication" actually started making the most profound meaning and Mass Commnucation, and Mass Media have became study subject for the scholars.
More importantly, it was also from there, the international communication was facilitated by this form of a gatther of sensual and visual emphasized communication medium. It is instant, fast and generally efficient. We now can also see that most of the communication medium of the AL-QAEDA are based on radio and video. That tells something.
The arriving the internet swayed the TV and Radio dynasty and has almost totally changed the way people live, communication and get together. Along side it's arrival was the new strategic communication strategy which is based on the social media. It has never been such a time in the history that the non-face-to-face, digital,virtualized and customized communication has taken a large proportion in the total amount of people's daily communicaton. The issues of individual privacy, copy rights, national security, information security arising along with this new communication techniques have also forced nation states to rethink about digital communication, it's essence and impacts, and also think about the public diplomacy strategy in this new era.
In the age of digital communication, the world has synergized more coherant as we witness individuals now have more access and various source for information. On the other hand, we also witness individuals could feel even more isolated and the feeling of alienation.
In summary, international communication is in a new era which new technology is playing a role more important than ever. Governments should pay more attention to it and make the best of this trend.
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