ABSTRACT
Two notions underlie much of the current discussion about globalization. One is the zero-sum game: whatever the global economy gains, the national state loses, and vice versa. The other is that if an event takes place in a national territory, it is a national event, whether a business transaction or a judiciary decision. These assumptions about zero-sums and geography influence experts on the global economy as well as the general public. For experts it has meant that they have typically confined the concept of the global economy to cross-border processes, notably international trade and investment; and to a debate between those that think that globalization is destroying the national state and those that think that state sovereignty remains unchanged. This has produced a rather empirically and theoretically thin account about the features of economic globalization.
