Obama said America's early steps in levying multiple rounds of sanctions helped isolate Russia from the start. And this weekend, despite the constant threat of disruption, millions of Ukrainians turned out to vote and select their next president. He said:. Those last five words — "without us firing a shot" — were not included in Obama's prepared remarks.
Obama also mentioned the ongoing nuclear talks in Iran, portraying them as still a tall order but also a chance for something momentous. He said the coalition he helped form to impose sanctions had successfully avoided a military conflict, at least for now. This is the example perhaps best suited to the Obama doctrine — a long, drawn-out process that might lead to a diplomatic victory over a military one. And it's one he will point to if negotiations are indeed successful with Iran and the six world powers.
And throughout these negotiations, it has been our willingness to work through multilateral channels that kept the world on our side," Obama said. This is American strength. Buffett is betting big on his favorite company. It might be time to follow suit. Inflation is at a year high. But these Mad Money megatrends could help you fight back. There was no company-specific news or developments, so why did the fuel-cell stock gain so much in value? Shares of the EV battery technology company had shot up The passage of a long-awaited infrastructure bill and growth moves from QuantumScape this week powered the stock higher.
This further produced more discontents among those who were left behind. Globalization essentially threatened national sovereignties by eroding established national institutions and governance systems Matten and Crane ; Scherer and Palazzo as foreign control of national industries by TNCs Ayres increased and non-governmental organizations NGOs , instead of governments, controlled much of the aid money Ahen b.
Others refer to this resentment and contestations as deglobalization, isolationism, economic nationalism Davies-Venn ; Kriesi and Pappas ; Spruyt et al.
However, the matter goes far beyond giving labels because it is complex and blurred—going beyond mere localization to a struggle for survival and human dignity.
Although the process weakened and destroyed communities, the world is told a different story of development and poverty Srikantia especially in the case of indigenous peoples Banerjee More prominently, the global interdependence and interconnectedness has meant that the coexistence of the irreversibility of globalization and the discontents with socio-economic environmental disequilibria points to chaotic and paradoxical scenarios.
There are urgent calls for human-centric practices of TNCs. Currently, serious forms of such practices exist more in the annual corporate sustainability reports and less in the realities of the resource-deprived communities around the world Ahen and Zettinig a ; Omoteso and Yusuf ; Srikantia The complexity of the structure of the current geopolitical and economic order leaves little space for superficial questions or simplistic answers but requires a critical perspective of the scope of the emergent turbulence.
In some ways, globalization has produced both wealth and inequality. The world is getting better with increase in novel science, health and information technologies as well as improving living standards Gates and Gates The fact that its economic liberalization is soon pulling close to 1 billion people out of poverty is significant.
In other ways, however, irresponsible and unsustainable human activities such as overconsumption and environmental destruction are pushing the world to a breaking point, symbolically, rhetorically, and materially Ahen and Zettinig b.
This much is neither under-reported nor under-analyzed, but there is more. The impasse about globalisolationism has gathered steam and neither the pro-globalization side nor the pro-isolationism side is giving up its guns any time soon. The globalizers mostly employ a mechanism of protectionism whilst the globalized have always existed in inter- dependence.
Rentier capitalism also allows above-normal profits from intellectual property, debt interest and other assets artificially made scarce Standing The globalizers also leveraged the production, distribution, packaging and sales capabilities of their TNCs Ietto-Gillies The globalized on the other hand have been no match for the level of rigged competition Dearden , thus far.
It has been a globalization in which the powers of the dominant or historically hegemonic group increased exponentially with growing prominence Piketty whilst other communities, especially those with natural resources became weaker, with less control over their natural resources Acosta ; Bougrine and political space Bauman This is no resource curse but a political design.
The rest of the paper is structured as follows: a theoretical background to the concept of globalisolationism is presented along with its defining characteristics. We discuss the central role of TNCs and emerging politics of insurrection against dispossession and planetary vandalism that cause environmental problems.
We further interrogate the nature of the problem by comparing the emerging changes in Western societies with Asia, Africa and South America. Finally, we provide proactive strategies for adaptation through human-centric management policies followed by conclusions. It is characterized by the escalating tensions between the globalized communities, nation states and the globalizers TNCs as proxy for the powerful economies.
It explains the collision between globalization on one side and isolationism, nationalism and indigenous resistance for sovereignty over resources.
Here, communities reactivate slack political resources by marshaling vociferous stance and new disruptive information technologies to legitimize and assert their visions. Anarchic globalisolationism stems from the simultaneous emergence of numerous historically unprecedented supportive phenomena and transmutations in the areas of technologies of governance, as well as populism, environmental and geo-strategic turbulence Ahen and Zettinig b ; Rosenberg In introducing the construct of globalisolationism as an umbrella term in contemporary political economy and international management scholarship, we situate our analysis in the heavily contested, yet interconnected discursive space where we underline the central role of TNCs and its implications for freedoms and wellbeing outcomes for humanity.
Such critical perspective properly captures the tensions between globalization and isolationism. At the same time, it does justice to the emergent issues of nationalism and rights of indigenous people who seek to protect not protest their resources from TNCs and their own crony governments.
The latter are seen as disempowering communities through the technologies of dispossession, destruction and death. Globalisolationism does not trivialize these issues nor does it pretend to be values-neutral to TNC monopoly over resources in cohorts with some governments Acosta ; Dearden in Asia, Africa and Latin America. Additionally, globalisolationism contributes specifically to critical management studies of emancipatory struggles Banerjee There is a nuanced analytical distinction between the two, except the root word globalisation.
Anarchic globalisolationism presents novel conceptual elements which are specific, historically contextual and do not seek to explain anything and everything. We underscore the current realities of community-consciousness Freire and new technologies where populations of the world, to varying degrees, do not try to be part of globalization where they feel shortchanged but actually reject the imposed systems, false historicities and one-size-fits-all interventionist approaches to development.
Globalisolationism takes graduated forms from silent grumble, online protests to violence accompanied by the marshaling of complex translocal resources and the galvanization of slack, dormant or apathetic political resources. Globalizolationism explains how people no longer seek permission to justify or legitimize their existence as fully human with inalienable rights while reserving the right to make moral judgment about the exploitation and human right abuses that affect every facet of their humanity.
Globalisolationism challenges narratives of discovery of a people who were once deemed primal and categorized as Others, by reverting back to their own ways as equally legitimate. Globalisolationism also includes an unglamorous man-made humanitarian challenge of In essence, the era of globalisolationism is a non-compromising, adversarial coexistence of globalization by globalizers through TNC management practices and isolationism nationalists, indigenous rights groups, etc. This is a new tension-filled paradox of geopolitical and international economic thug of war, crisis of national cohesion, identity politics and alliance formation Coughlan ; Davies-Venn The global-centric who see an irreversible path towards a new world order of integrated political, religious and economic institutions have now come against anti-globalization, deglobalization, nationalism or populism that seeks to reaffirm national sovereignty Rosenberg ; Xinhua in Western nations and of the translocal groups in Africa, South America and Asia.
In fact, both isolationism and globalization are approximative concepts and not accurate depiction because every isolationist geopolitical chess board game has changed its frame over time. Isolationism and globalization take different variant forms and degrees of influence of TNC practices at different epoch and contexts; either economic or political or mainly ideological.
To view globalization as mainly a trend is also to negate the current disruption in the form of deglobalization and strong forms of nationalism or economic protectionism. In essence, globalisolationism is a paradox in which there is a reversal of old trends and the disruptive injection of some dynamism into what used to be a fixed state of affairs—isolationism.
Isolationism can be either i self-imposed an ideological pursuit that isolates a nation , ii imposed retaliation and sanctions or iii both simultaneously. The sanctions hugely restrict the international trade of the respective countries, thus, impacting their economic stability and affecting the well-being of the local populations concerned.
First, trading blocks and protectionism and other trade distortion policies exist. The fact that more firms are internationalizing does not necessarily translate into the convergence of socioeconomic systems or regulation.
Counter arguments are also presented in turn. Although financial markets are more integrated now than they have ever been, national competitiveness, macro-economic and fiscal policies, as well as nominal and real interest rates still diverge allowing countries with strong currencies to benefit.
Increasing competition means production niches are still strong across the globe. Thus, given the differences in social systems of production, even same goods exhibit major price differentials across regions, and nations.
The third condition also rests on a very weak foundation. Several modern medico-techno-scientific endowments can only be appropriated and used in the presence of prior knowledge and learning by doing. This means product specific quality standards and tacit knowledge, educational priorities and forms of specialization affect specific products and services and remain niches associated with specific national flags.
In theory then, there is more divergence than convergence in global socio-economic systems of production and consumption based on national interests to protect key sectors.
This is a logically convincing explanation for the concept of globalisolationism since polity, norms, business systems, country specific approaches to labour unionization, investments and consumption patterns as well as their history and futures differ enormously.
Further, different constitutional orders, national visions to imperialize or ally with others or remain nonaligned are still the prevailing norms. The designed acceleration of globalization without responsibility towards the affected societies and their environment was clearly not the first optimal solution. All the above allowed TNCs to profit from internationalization and its limitless expansionism Ietto-Gillies These have benefitted the globalizers, mostly at the expense of the globalized in net terms, critics argue Stiglitz The consequences of global expansionism include massive socio-economic and environmental externalities Srikantia which have generated serious stakeholder pressures for accountability Ahen Table 1 sums up the key characteristics of globalisolationism.
The primary defining characteristic of globalisolationism consists of both turf protection and firewalling of socio-economic, political, cultural and territorial spheres. The second aspect of globalisolationism is race and religion as instruments of division for effective control of masses and resources Alam Concerns about these long-standing, taken-for-granted structures have now gathered steam due to how new information technologies are used to pit one group against the other.
The establishment seeks to maintain the historical status quo and the associated incentive structures and privileges. The marginalized both in the Centre and the periphery are on the other hand mobilizing resistance to reverse their fate especially where stakeholders see the neo-liberal capitalist system as deeply connected to economic structures of classism, inequalities and lack of opportunities.
This counter movement from diverse groups is what Spivak refers to as strategic essentialism. The third major aspect of globalisolationism represents a global socio-economic and geopolitical order in which those who were short-changed at the height of globalization now seek a new deal through vigorous contestation and renegotiation of the incentive structures and shared responsibility for global public bad whilst those who gained, seek to maintain the status quo at all costs.
It is characterized by lobbying through political action committees to capture law makers, governments and institutions. What Banerjee refers to as technologies of extraction as the organizational practice of planetary vandalism is what provokes the atlas of insurrection: resource wars. There are several firms and social entrepreneurs that seek to create value through circular and sharing economy, ecological protection and climate change mitigation strategies to satisfy stakeholder demands Ahen However, for honest firms, reputation loss is a huge damage to the whole ecosystem of the firms and it rather has negative effects on investors when managers relegate society to the margins but put shareholders first Stout Globalisolationism is restructuring the world order as we know it.
For example the Environmental Justice Atlas EJA offers a list of numerous local, national and regional organizations resisting different forms of exploitation around the world. Most of international business operates in noncompetitive markets because they are dominated by TNCs or state enterprises—from extractive industries to technology firms Standing Hymer explains that TNCs possess firm-specific advantages which allow them to offset costs involved in producing in host nations.
These are mainly resources, from core competences knowledge , brand names and access to various forms of capital which are intangible and wholly owned and are used to earn monopoly rents Eden and Hampson Corporate influence through lobbying and use of corporate political power limits the power of nation-states to embark on welfare-oriented policies.
For example, the dispute settlement mechanisms allow TNCs to sue governments even for the loss of potential profits. As argued although for artistic purposes, perhaps humorously and dramatically albeit seriously , in terms of the governance of global socio-economic order, to a large extent, there is neither democracy, ideologies nor nations any more due to the dominance of TNCs.
And thus:. There is only one holistic system of systems, one vast immane, interwoven, interacting, multivariant, multinational dominion of dollars. Petro-dollars, electro-dollars, multi dollars, Reich marks, rins, rubles, pounds and scheckles.
It is an international system of currency which determines the totality of life on this planet. That is the natural order of things today. This is the atomic and sub-atomic and galactic structure of things today.
There is no America. There is no democracy. Those are the nations of the world today. To paraphrase, there is only Google, Facebook, Microsoft, and Amazon, Big Pharma, weapons industry, oil industry, a network of financial firms, the extractive industrial complex and more Apple phones for the people who do not routinely question corporate irresponsibility and other smokescreen mechanisms for covering up corporate machinations Solon and Siddiqui ; Galloway For academic purposes, let us assume for a moment that these are meaningless conspiracy theories.
The critical question is what substantive counter arguments or evidence do we have in rejecting such claims? Currently, corporations control economies and even global governance Carlson ; Hamm ; Chomsky and they are not denying their powerful position. This could also be used as a mighty force for positive social change if they so wish—but capitalism imposes no limits to profits Wallerstein and the pillaging in weaker institutions by planetary vandals continues Manring ; Orr Corporations have the power it takes to serve as the force for good.
However, for Homo economicus , efficiency and cost reduction Friedman mean that ethical considerations mostly take a back seat allowing a system that favours proximate kinsmen to be kept in place in business activities Ahen ; Alam ; Ken There are losers and winners in globalisolationism. The rules are unfair; so the losers must endure their lot, or must they? There is a litany of prominent novelties that require concerted action for change rather than shiny bandages. The global economy is at the threshold of a complicated era and in a lot of trouble.
These problems include for example human activity leading to ecological imbalances, the shipment of toxic and electronic waste to developing economies, atmospheric pollutions, overconsumption not overpopulation , rising inequalities, human rights abuses, grand ethical quandaries, corporate irresponsibility Wettstein ; Kar and Spanjers ; Curtis and Jones In what follows in Fig.
African countries are advocating for more intra-African trade; trade not aid —a reversal of unequal international trade relationships with the West with its implicit hierarchy—hence a turn to China Rotberg There are also separatists across Europe seeking either cultural-linguistic and historical independence or control of their fiscal policies and resources.
Libya is still divided along the Tripoli-Benghazi lines after the ouster of their leader Muammar Gaddafi. Consider further the events that unfolded within a couple of weeks across the West in autumn As the altright met in Tennessee in their thousands in the US, anti-fascists battled Neo-Nazis in the streets of Gothenburg in Sweden Lowe and police battled Catalonians who were holding a referendum on independence YahooNews At the same time in Austria, the law that bans burqa the Islamic veil came into full force Nianias Much of this, however, is based on scapegoating out-groups for failed policies, but it works very well as an emotional bait for such politicians to get the votes based on the fear of the other.
There is more to the structure of the tragedy. Chydenius — , a famous Finnish scholar and preacher used ancient Rome as an empirical illustration to carefully articulate the weakness of the state as the enemy within. He charges that:. It is a curious fact that most states keep a watchful eye on those who are outside that society but often leave those within it well armed, since we ought to know that human beings are similar they are and are always more easily able to do harm under the cloak of patriotism than in the guise of an enemy, and under cover of spurious faithfulness than open hostility Jonasson and Hyttinen Nations, organisations, groups, and individuals are aware of the current anarchy just like modern day educational institutions do.
However, such enemies are allowed within to foment until they do unimaginable harm. What are the implications for economics in politics? It is the power of this psychic satisfaction that seems to be gathering support both in developing economies and in the West for different motives and different ends.
The interpretation of the structure of globalisolationism leads us to something more poignant such as social discords, international retaliation and increased racial tensions especially in the US. Unlike stakeholders who affect and are affected by the firm Freeman , stakeownership is about communities deciding and defining what and who they allow to affect and be affected by—a reverse supported by a countervailing power Galbraith The conceptual elements of stakeownership are indicated in Fig.
What is making the new post-truth even more complex is the disruptive anti-establishment positions and diverse social militarism by e. These are illuminating the public discourse on all issues by challenging the official versions with other types of data, without waiting for academics and their long publishing processes to govern what gets defined as truth and factually relevant. In the past, editors and publishers held an almost god-like position.
At present, influential vlogs, blogs and artistic productions presented in accessible language and instantly reaching millions hold as much sway in socio-political discourses as fact-based academic publications. These forms of resistance are facilitated by modern technologies such as Twitter, Facebook, WeChat, Instagram, WhatsApp and even drones to reveal environmental exploitation by some TNCs and complicit governments through independent investigative journalism.
These forms of media are also used to engage TNCs through dialogue. Additionally, researchers, think tanks and citizen scientists who are socially oriented and even students are rising up to undermine and delegitimize the credibility of the existing power structure in recent times.
This entire scenario is creating an anti-establishment militant group from different ideological persuasions, and they are becoming increasing formidable. Moreover, their distrust of institutions and claims of injustice are not unsupported because too many official versions do not quite add up. As Kobrin argues, under the climate of economic and identity nationalism, economically rational arguments will have less influence as interest group politics has now morphed into mobilizations against threats to the nation as a whole.
On the other hand, it can be argued, for example that, a threat to the Amazon territory of Brazil or rain forests in Africa by TNCs cannot be treated as interest group politics but a national or even global issue since climate change is a global challenge. Corporate public relations PR for damage control after unethical and illegal practices is now falling apart because smart phones allow citizens to capture phenomena that contradict corporate gimmicks Wickert et al. And there is more than just organised threat to the status quo.
Along with this are those who come up with trolls and serious conspiracy theories just to antagonize the existing system as a payback package for the dispossession and injustice by those who once held all the power information. Additionally, the exponential growth in information technologies thrives on a fair wind of other disruptive circumstances. These can be accounted for in the discontent with the high levels of inequalities, dwindling middle class, and the emerging peripheries within the Centre due to growing poverty in the West Zakaria In many developing economies, the neglect of indigenous people continues while some corporations take their resources Banerjee ; Carlson ; Srikantia ; Bakan There are also high levels of economic instability, volatility and uncertainty across the globe, described as new geographies of inequality Ahen a.
All these have woken up concerned citizens to wise up, critique and to take action against the machinations of the establishment Varoufakis in various nations about the current nature of globalization.
Across Europe however , mass immigration has also added to the hysteria that boosts populist political entrepreneurship Davies-Venn ; Kriesi and Pappas ; Spruyt et al. On the issues of global environmental sustainability and migration however, the futures and destinies of isolationists and globalizers are intimately intertwined, with more in common than what makes them superficially different—youthful populations versus increased aging populations and new geographies of inequality in both contexts.
However, before dismissing isolationists as trouble makers, mere bigots and antidemocratic interest groups who do not want to fall in line with the globalization agenda, it would be in the interest of intellectual honesty, curiosity and healthy skepticism to first consider their claims.
Even before that, it is more important to clarify the current state of global geopolitical and environmental turbulence which can easily be described as anarchic globalisolationism in the making, which could explain their concerns.
Current international management literature that seeks to engage this subject of global resource distribution and environmental in justice approaches the issue in a tricky fashion.
Here, scholars offer responses that are studied under the broader rubric of host country risks; how to neutralize antagonistic stakeholder groups in the quest to ensure that the extractivist project will succeed while maintaining a semblance of legitimacy as good firms Banks ; Doh and Ramamurti ; Oetzel and Getz ; Lin et al. Paul Adler writes in his book review:. My reading of Polanyi suggests that enterprises in a capitalist economy cannot change their environmental practices far or fast enough to avert environmental crisis—neither spontaneously under the influence of wiser corporate leaders, nor pushed by greener consumers, and not even forced by more active government regulation.
Whilst the extent of corporate political power is undeniable, it can still be confronted where there are strong institutions and enforcement regimes, or is it an already lost cause? The question about corporate irresponsibility in the era of sustainability is mobilizing masses for resistance. Their missions however, differ variously across regions and nations. For the peripheries within the centre or the underclass, the struggle appears similar to what happens in developing economies.
Also, discriminatory administrative fiat and corporate greed in the name of cost cutting led to years of distribution of contaminated water to poor neighborhoods.
This became known as the Flint water crisis where zip-codes determined life expectancy and health status CNN The vandalism has become unsustainable and such behaviours by some firms undermine the majority that is presumed to be working towards sustainability. The Trump foreign policy is beginning to approximate what Europe over the last three decades always claimed it preferred — a smaller footprint abroad for a more cautious, less reckless hyperpower. Some of us long ago predicted that the Europeans and the transatlantic elite would not really wish their dreams to come true — given that their gripe was not so much over what America did, but rather America itself.
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It has the makings of a Hollywood thriller: A determined dad rescues his teenage daughter from an alleged Seattle sex trafficking ring and then takes brutal. Isolationism kept us cut off From England and kept us from modernizing our military. It was the isolationist policies that gave the world the impression the US was not willing or able to fight. We apeared weak to other nations and unwilling to take a stand.
I really do not understand this question. As I can't see that we returned to isolationism During WWII, We sent our military all over the world to fight for the freedom of others. We cooperated with other Allied countries in planning major battles etc. The United States did not clearly practice isolationism during WW2. I think it caused us to have a difficult time seeing Germany for what she really was. Which again caused perhaps a lot of needless deaths ie Jews others who were singled out as threats to Germany, funny isn't it today we are in all parts of the world and yet people in the US say we shouldn't be there some lessons are hard to learn or perhaps remember.
Our isolationism prior to WW II caused us to neglect our armed forces since we never intended to use them. When the war started thousands of soldiers and sailors were killed or captured because of inferior equipment. The US had few tanks, 30 year old ships, too few soldiers, no foward bases, and aircraft that were outclassed by our enemies. Note: Pay attention to what China is building their country today and how much they are spending.
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