ABSTRACT
Globalisation has become a familiar term in recent years. It may even have become a commonplace and overused term for a whole range of diverse developments in politics, economics and culture, where the term is broadly used to cover the growing connections between societies worldwide. The impact of global networks takes different forms. At one level it seems as if we live in a world where globalisation has become part of everyday life. In almost any major world city you can see the familiar yellow M signalling the presence of a McDonald’s fast food outlet. The high streets and shopping malls of most major towns and cities across the world look very similar with the same franchises and a uniform display of chain stores. Globalisation may be seen as focusing on the marketplace and the availability of goods around the world. Brands such as McDonald’s have global status because of their market availability. This is an availability that is the result of the successful promotion of US products across the globe. This has extended to parts of the world that it was previously thought the US market could not reach, for example Russia, China, and the states of what was formerly Eastern Europe. Terms such as ‘McDonaldification’ and Disneyfication’ have been coined to describe, albeit somewhat simplistically, this marketing phenomenon. Latin America and Africa have been brought into the global economic networks, most notably through agribusiness and land purchase in recent years. In the field of marketing and consumption, branding has been a particular feature of US international activity which has been taken up in other parts of the world, for example in Europe and Japan. The whole process has become much more sophisticated, as Naomi Klein argues, taking a critical stance on global marketing, in her book No Logo. Klein argues that it is no longer possible to identify the signs of US-dominated marketing and we are presented with a cultural mix, what she calls a ‘market masala’. This ‘masala’ involves a cultural mix, for example in advertisements targeted at young people in the ‘teen market’ of black and white ‘Rasta braids, pink hair, henna hand painting, piercing and tattoos, a few national flags . . . Cantonese and Arabic lettering and a sprinkling of English words’ (2001: 120). Klein claims that this kaleidoscope represents a new departure in globalised markets:
Today the buzzword in global marketing isn’t selling America to the world, but bringing a kind of market masala to everyone in the world . . . a bilingual mix of North and South, some Latin, some R & B, all couched in global party lyrics. This ethnic-food-court approach creates a One World placeness, a global mall where corporations are able to sell a single product in numerous countries without triggering the old cries of ‘Coca-Colonization’ . . . By embodying corporate identities that are radically individualistic and perpetually new, the brands attempt to inoculate themselves against accusations that they are in fact selling sameness.
