ABSTRACT
The twenty-first century consummated the revolutionary developments that have been occurring in the world since the 1970s. Trends like the transnationalization of capital, the internationalization of labor, the steady increase in global trading and communication, and the ensuing competition between cities have led individuals, businesses, industries, and governments to attempt to position themselves globally (King 1991). It follows that in a globally compressed world, constituted of national societies that are becoming increasingly aware of their ethnic and racial roots, the conditions for the identification of individual and collective selves become very complex (Robertson 1991). Any theory of globalization 2 must take into account a necessary recognition of the distinctive cultural and unequal conditions under which the notion of the ‘global’ was constructed. Globalization becomes difficult to comprehend without recognizing the historical specificity of traditional cultures, their colonization, and their later emergence as nation-states.
