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Globalisation is a process rather than a completed fact, and is more than a mere economic phenomenon. It has got many aspects and implications, including, of course, social, political, institutional, and technical as well as cultural ones.

Globalisation in economic terms is nothing but a process making the world economy an organic system by extending transnational economic processes and economic relations to more and more countries and by deepening the economic interdependencies among them, i.e. by globalising the international economy both "horizontally" (in the sense of territorial extension) and "vertically" (in the sense of creating lasting functional relations among its parts).

The progressing transnationalisation (globalisation) of economic relations can be observed in respect of

• the relations of ownership and control over development resources, means or capacities of material and intellectual production (as proved by the presence of foreign properties, capital ownership and the controlling position of foreign firms or personnel in the national economies, or as a result of international capital flows, by the fusion of national capitals and the forging ahead of transnational corporations, and by the spread of commonly owned assets and multinational institutions in the organizations of regional integration, etc.),
• the "vertical" relations in decision making and adjustment, namely between those making the decisions, initiating the changes or set the requirements, on the one hand, and all those obliged to implement the decisions, readjust their themselves to the changes, or meet the requirements (as exemplified by the process of decision-making on international monetary and financial issues, by the role of "conditionalities" set by the major creditors, and by the need of the less-developed countries to regularly readjust their economy to the structural changes in the advanced ones),
• the "horizontal" (though unequal) relations of specialization and division of labour (as demonstrated by the participation of practically all the countries, including since their re-linking with the world economy also most of the former "socialist" countries, in the world-wide division of labour and by the growing proportions of intra-industry division of labour as compared to intersectoral or inter-industrial one, which deepens, not only expands the world-wide system of economic cooperation),
• the relations of income distribution or redistribution (as shown by the impact of external factors, world market fluctuations, international monetary and financial conditions, foreign investments and income repatriations etc. on the growth and distribution of national incomes and by the various income transfer mechanisms causing redistribution on world level).

It follows from the above that global interdependencies in the contemporary world economy are far from being symmetrical. They markedly manifest and cause great inequalities in the development of countries.

The "organic" nature of the world economy means that the economic contacts between countries are not limited to international trade only (even less to the occasional exchange of products or to the flows of products and money among "independent" national producers or consumers), but factors of production (particularly investment capital) do also flow across the state borders and international division of labour and transnational ownership relations make interdependent all the partners. There are foreign assets within national economies; firms of individual countries are linked by international joint ventures, sub-contracting, mixed properties and "strategic alliances"; multinational joint-stock companies are operating; and networks of transnational corporations are extending; foreign workers are employed by local enterprises and foreign employment facilities open for (some of) the labour force of nations; foreign tourists make use of local services; the state-borders are crossed also by information and data flows, TV and radio broadcasting, Internet services; and so on...

All these mean that the already mentioned economic (both real and monetary) processes are getting increasingly transnationalized, along with the economic relations between countries, namely ownership, division of labour, decision-making and -implementing as well as income distribution relations.

It is to be stressed again that the resulting economic interdependencies are not symmetrical at all, which means that the partners in them are not of equal position.

Insofar as economic globalisation has been proceeding under the conditions of large-scale inequalities between partners, and no counter-balancing mechanism, counteracting measures of appropriate institutions exist (as yet), one can hardly be surprised if it tends to reinforce inequalities and asymmetries of interdependence between those involved.

Since such a process has increasingly been fuelled by progress in science and technology, the attempts or efforts to stop it are necessarily doomed to fail and it is rather futile to demonstrate against it (however understandable the reasons of protest may be).

As regards (a) the "horizontal" expansion of the world economy, i.e. its extension to more and more, finally all the countries of the globe, a historical yardstick is represented by the re-opening of the former "socialist" economies, their re-linking with the world economy in the wave of system-transformation of the former "socialist" countries, which has put an end to the former practice of individual or collective isolation of these countries, their economic autarky or marginal, indirect and "inorganic" relations only with the outside world. This is one of the reasons why the term "globalisation" has been such a fashionable, so frequently mentioned expression nowadays.

As to (b) the "vertical" deepening of economic interdependencies in the world economy, it has been primarily promoted (particularly recently) by the "revolution" in communication and information technologies, while being brought ahead further and further by its major "vehicles", namely the transnational companies with a world-wide activity, which follow a global strategy by means of their networks of production, services and marketing, FDIs as well as mergers and acquisitions, sub-contracting and outsourcing, "strategic alliances", etc.

The recent acceleration, however, of economic globalisation is most likely attributable, besides the above, also to the world-wide spread of economic liberalism, to the wave of a neo-liberal economic policy, "deregulation" and privatisation in the economy (i.e. the reduction of state interventions and public ownership, of "dirigisme" and government regulations, of the protectionist measures, foreign exchange and import control, of the size and role of the public sector, the decline of Keynesian anti-cyclical policies and the cut of welfare measures and expenditures, etc.) as well as to the final defeat of "socialist central planning".

One of the greatest shortcomings of most of the literature on globalisation (explaining its content, components and effects) and particularly of its fashionable perception in the public opinion and mass media, is the reduction of the substance and direction of this process to one or another part, movement, component only or to a specific motive force accelerating it in a given time. Another, not less significant mistake in its evaluations is the mixing up of its effects with (a) those originating from other conditions, circumstances of reality, and/or (b) certain abstract presumptions stemming from theoretical models.

(a) For example, very often such disequalising effects and harmful consequences are attributed to globalisation itself, as actually following from the given circumstances, the prevailing order of structural and institutional relations, international and intra-national systems of the world, under which globalisation has been proceeding.

What follows is an attack, resistance campaigns, series of demonstrations with the aim or desire to stop or at least to slow down the globalisation process, instead of efforts to change those unequal and disequalising conditions, to reform the prevailing order and world system.

The various "anti-globalisation" movements stemming from right-wing nationalist as well as radical leftist sources are acting with the belief that the process of globalisation can be stopped by demonstrations, street protests and disorder. They are in a sense similar to those movements, in the past, protesting against mechanization (and manifested in the machine-breaking actions of "Luddites", as attributing the growth of unemployment to the introduction of machines), which did also identify the effect of a process, namely technical development which can never be stopped, with the consequences of those given circumstances it was making progress.

(b) An opposite example is manifested in those naive or even apologetic evaluations identifying the expected results of globalisation with the idealized tendencies (of equalization, harmonization, convergence, growth with equilibrium, democratisation, etc.) which are attributed to the operation of certain abstract models (such as the H-O model). These desirable tendencies may actually come into force - according to the original authors of such models - only under certain perfect conditions (perfect markets, perfect equilibrium, etc.).

What may follow from such an approach is, on the one hand, the diversion again of the attention away from the need to change the prevailing conditions (bringing them closer to "perfect" ones) and, on the other, an apology for the prevailing order of the world.

As a matter of fact, economic globalisation (just like other economic processes) has got more than one, single "face". It has potentially favourable and unfavourable effects alike. It brings about a challenge but also an opportunity.

The greatest danger and harmful effect of globalisation is most often supposed to be the erosion of "national sovereignty" (more precisely: state sovereignty) and transfer of decision-making to outside the country. No doubt, the acceleration of the process of globalisation in the economy has been increasingly undermining the "national" framework of economic activities (which, as a matter of fact, had never been exclusive). Moreover, the non-economic processes and effects of globalisation tend to increase the role and influence of external forces, "international" factors in other fields of social life, too. Along with such changes, the actual sphere of competence and enforcing ability of government policy naturally tends to decrease.

The growth, since the end of the cold war, of the role and influence of international organisations and institutions (including, of course, the UN itself, but particularly the IMF, WB and WTO) does also reduce the free area of sovereign state policies. Although these institutions can hardly be considered yet "global" in the strict sense of the world, as they are based on the principle of representation of the existing states, instead of that of a democratic and proportional representation of the various strata of the world society as differentiated across the state borders, they gain a growing direct or indirect influence on decision-making in more and more aspects and widening spheres of politics that traditionally belonged to the competence of "national" governments.

It would be, however, a mistake to disregard such cases of interventions of external forces, international organisations as serving the very interest and benefit of the given society. (Interventions against dictatorial, oppressing regimes and in favour of human rights clearly show this point.) It is also to be noted that nothing can guarantee at all that decision-making remaining in "national" competence would necessarily bring about per se more benefits for the country, would promote more its economic development. The so often emphasized insistence on "national sovereignty" very often turns to be an insistence on the right to oppress the society and to appropriate the accumulated state assets.

What follows is that the conflict between globalisation and "national sovereignty" should not be assessed one-sidedly, either. While the progress made by the process of globalisation causes an erosion of the framework and frontiers of national economies, the successful and favourable participation of a nation in this process still depends (primarily, at least for the time being) on the efficient state regulation and stimulation of economic activities within the existing state borders. In other words, globalisation, which increasingly reduces the economic sphere of competence of the "nation"-state, at the same time, as a paradox, increases the necessity and importance of the role of the state in the economy.

One of the most heavily debated aspects of globalisation and (besides its impact on national cultures) perhaps the most crucial one is its effects on social welfare and security. Among the latter the following are often mentioned: (1) the tendency of growing inequalities between and within countries, and increasing pauperisation, (2) the exclusion of the poorer strata and nations from the benefits of economic and technological development, (3) the spread of unemployment, (4) the break-up of the "social safety net" and erosion of the formerly established welfare institutions, or their increasing costs of maintenance, in the developed countries; the loss of most of those "social entitlements" provided by the former "socialist" system in the "transition" countries; and the erosion of social (public health and education) development programs in the developing countries, i.e. in general, the reduction of social budgets, (5) a marked decrease in the ability of individual states to follow an independent, sovereign social policy, (6) an increasing marketisation and international commodification of welfare services, etc.

The impact of economic globalisation on social conditions and social policy may likely be just as double and contradictory as many other effects of it. Insofar as the globalisation of world market competition, the imperative need for adjustment to global processes and standards brings about a certain levelling in welfare systems between rich and poor countries, i.e. between those having a more or less well-developed welfare system and those lacking it, such a tendency is obviously favourable for the latter, and unfavourable for the former. At the same time the changes in the level of social welfare, in the quality of the related public services and in the distribution among those receiving it, may be very differentiated within the countries concerned.

In general, it is of course that (smaller or bigger) part of population engaged in the transnationalized sectors of the economy (i.e. sectors operated and/or controlled by TNCs), which can benefit more from the social services and allowances provided by the latter (in accordance with their global practice) and from the private insurance arrangements based on higher income. (In several countries to some extent the civil servants, the employees of the public sector, too, may enjoy a privileged position if they belong to a well-developed, mostly state-financed insurance system.)

On the other side, in the less developed countries, particularly in the South and (as a consequence of the collapse of the former state-run social insurance system) in most of the "transition" economies, too, the majority of society is excluded from the process of levelling, moreover may drop out from among those involved in social insurance and welfare system.

It is worth noting that without adequate compensatory measures the institutionalisation of a certain universal "global" norm of social protection and welfare service (just like the spread of universal environment protecting measures) may turn to be rather harmful for the financial position of the State or the world market position of enterprises of the less developed countries.

Among social problems the gravest one is undoubtedly mass unemployment in many countries. However, to what extent its growth can be attributed to economic globalisation is not quite clear. Nor can it be proved that the "revolution" in communication and information technologies, this motive force of the present-day globalisation, is the major cause of the increase in the number of unemployed in the world.

The employment effect of the introduction of new technologies is a rather complex one, which can hardly be properly evaluated simply on the basis of the number of labourers substituted and dismissed. As we have already stressed elsewhere, in regard to the choice of capital- or labour-intensive technologies in countries of mass unemployment, what really matters for the macro-economic employment effect (i.e. on the level of a national economy as a whole) is the very extent to which the new or expanding process of production applying the new technology will generate, by its input-output linkages, employment facilities in the national economy as a whole, rather than the number of jobs created or eliminated on micro-level, within the gates of the enterprise or industry applying the new technology.

Even if the "net balance" of the employment effects of those new technologies accelerating the process of globalisation can hardly be calculated yet, their impact on the structure of employment and the quality of labour is quite obvious. Just as well as the fact that, the actual distribution of their favourable effects will be very uneven in the world economy, and will vary from country to country, and from region to region - as depending on the national efforts made for their large-scale introduction and efficient application and also on the geographical allocation of those new industries and services given birth by the new technologies in question.

More or less the same applies to the employment effect of other components and motive forces of globalisation. Trade liberalization does not have a one-direction effect, either. Nor can its effect assessed in separation from those of technological changes and TNCs' activities.

As to the latter, one should not disregard the danger for certain countries or certain districts or towns within countries, that (owing to the drive of TNCs for a sort of "global optimisation" and the flexibility of their organizational structure) follows from the possibility for the TNCs to close down or transfer abroad any of their established or acquired factories from one day to another. This can cause a drastic fall of employment (and often other harmful consequences, too). What appears in this respect specific indeed is the occurrence of such cases independently of the actual economic performance of the given factory (i.e. no matter how efficient it happens to be). This phenomenon is explained by the very complexity of the capital investment and divestment motivations of TNCs (including the aim to acquire resources, to increase the aggregate rate of profit, to gain or monopolize markets, etc.).

The sharpening competition, reinforced by globalisation, particularly with the spread of the liberal and FDI-friendly economic policy in the world, exerts a growing pressure even in the market of skilled labour (versus the resistance of trade unions) for also a downward flexibility of wages, i.e. to reduce the wage level, especially, of lower-skilled labour. Parallel with such phenomena, there has also been a marked shift in the earlier well-developed social security systems (of Western and Northern Europe) towards a social policy characterized by "residualisation" (i.e. to spend the "residual" only on public health), individualization (i.e. with private insurance systems), and privatisation (i.e. with private institutions of social insurance and health service).

But a moral pressure has also been on increase, for a greater support to low-income strata, for a redistribution of incomes at the expense of the rich, and for an increase in the social expenditures of central budget. One can hardly doubt that a certain change in approach can also be witnessed in such "headquarters" of neo-liberalism and monetarism as the international monetary institutions.

From the point of view of the social effects of globalisation there is an undoubtedly positive phenomenon arising, namely an unfolding (although still in rhetoric only) global consciousness and responsibility feeling.

One of the main reasons why so many people object to and protest against globalisation is its assumed harmful effect on national cultures. It is criticized for leading towards a sort of universal "global" culture on the line of "cultural imperialism" . The latter would imply the dominance of the North-American or Anglo-Saxon culture which, owing to the markedly unequal international distribution of the means of communication, to the hegemonic role of the English language in printed and, particularly, electronic media (radio and TV broadcasting, E-mail, Internet, etc.) and the geographical extension of its use, as well as to the demonstration effects of the American life-style and consumer habits, would suppress the still existing cultures and languages of other nations and nationalities.

Among the manifestations of such a "cultural colonization" quite different phenomena and effects are mentioned. Such as: the international spread of the American type quick-lunch bars and meals at the expense of traditional local restaurants and national cuisines; the appearance of big shopping centres and hotel-networks threatening the survival of small shops, retail trade and family-run hotels; the substitution of poor quality imported commerce-literature and mechanized music, and entertainment programs arriving through electronic channels , etc. for national literature, dances and music; the spread of primitive, standardized "soap operas" and comic strips, of cheap films and video cassettes propagating violence and disseminating pornography; the dominance of American media and TV companies broadcasting all over the world (for business and political reasons) often biased information; the penetration into national languages, of a growing number of words from English, the knowledge of which becomes a general requisite world-wide; the spread of the American type of business thinking and behaviour, and the growth in the number of business schools disseminating the latter; the Americanisation of education, in general; the spread of individualism and hedonist spirit undermining the cohesion and solidarity within local societies; an international assimilation of the elite strata (alienated from the nation concerned) and also that of the teenagers' stratum sharing a standardised education and mechanized entertainment; and so on...

Although the above-mentioned rather mixed and excessively generalised phenomena are undoubtedly linked with the accelerated process of globalisation and imply not only a considerable challenge, moreover a source of conflict, but also a potentially great threat, indeed, for national cultures, they are by no means so necessary and inevitable concomitants of globalisation which an appropriate national policy would be unable to treat and counterbalance.

For the national cultures, however, there can be also favourable effects of globalisation and even of the above-mentioned phenomena attributed to it. For example, the English language of computers, Internet, E-mail, and, particularly, the new "on-line" interpretation technique, which may make its dominance temporary only, has considerably facilitated the communication among nations. The electronic telecommunication equipments and the world-wide network of radio and TV broadcasting are opening the opportunity for the culture of small nations, nationalities, ethnic and religious communities to be manifested and known elsewhere, for the differences (the fact of being different) to become recognized and accepted, etc.

The new communication and information technologies bring the inhabitants of remote countries and continents closer to each other. Thereby they may facilitate the mutual understanding of the problems, the ways of thinking and intentions of each other and can promote the rise of a sort of "global social consciousness" as well as the development of those mechanisms ensuring the representation, manifestation and reconciliation of the different interests of the world civil society and its various parts.

Owing to the globalising system of communication and world-wide tourism, some local singing, dancing and entertaining cultures, artistic activities, health protecting methods and natural therapies, diets and meals of national cuisines, wine cultures, etc., which belonged earlier to narrow circles, small local communities only, may disseminate and become known and enjoyed by an increasing number of people in other parts of the world.

In view of the above, here again the complexity, great variety and contradictory directions of the potential effects should be emphasized, the extent, intensity and final outcome of which largely depend on the responses of the individual societies and government policies, too.

The political implications, effects and consequences of globalisation have already been mentioned, partly in the context of those changes linked with its recent acceleration, in world politics, i.e. of the transformation of the former "socialist" systems and disintegration of the Soviet bloc, partly in relation to the wave of liberalisation in economic policy and its impact on the role of the State and also on social policy. However, over and beyond all these, globalisation or its motive forces and recent acceleration do have also other, more far-reaching and general effects. Such as the consequence of the end of the bipolar world system and cold war, namely the rise of a "New World Order" based upon US hegemony and the "Washington Consensus" coupled with the world-wide surveillance of the "Holy Trinity" (IMF, WB and WTO), which is considered by many people (not without any reason) as a dangerous outcome.

The worries about and criticism of this "New World Order" stem not only from assuming the adjustment of the world-policeman role of NATO and the USA to the national and business interests of the latter, but also from the consideration that the enforcement even of otherwise correct political principles and democratic rules may infringe on the "national" (more precisely: state) sovereignty of other countries and may be accompanied by a neglect of the wide diversity of the world society, of the differences in attitudes and way of thinking, reflecting special local circumstances, problems, social customs and traditional cultures.

In this context the opponents of the prevailing world order and, particularly, many representatives of the South often criticise the West for its hypocrisy in putting emphasis on such general political and legal requirements as e.g. the respect of "human rights" or the tasks of governments to provide social security and take care of the poor, or the application of standard labour norms, etc., while at the same time depriving the State of the developing countries from the economic ability to meet such obligations.

It is obvious that the opportunity of making use of democratic rights depends on economic conditions, too. Nor can it be denied that the very perceptions of general "human rights" are far from being identical in different cultures and traditions. On the other hand, the references to the latter can also be manipulated and (mis)used for apologetic purposes, just like the arguments of "hippocratic moralisation".

At the same time each step made towards globalisation of human rights, universal requirements of political democracy and social protection, social security and labour norms, is to be acknowledged as a great progress and manifestation of favourable effects of globalisation.

Over and beyond the above, it is worth taking into account another potential effect of globalisation, or rather that of the "revolution" of information technologies accelerating the latter. Namely the one, which, by extending almost without limits the facilities of interactive communication, may open new prospects for the development (both within countries and on world level) of direct democracy. Hopefully, in the future it may also ensure (depending, of course, on economic conditions) a direct participation for all the citizens of the world society in the decision-making on common issues.

Globalisation and convergence or polarisation?

The theoretical theses of conventional ("mainstream") economics on international trade, factor flows and economic growth postulate, as well-known, an international equalization of factor prices and incomes, i.e. in this way the convergence of the levels of national income and development of the individual countries. Insofar as among the premises of the theses in question (such as the Heckscher-Ohlin-Samuelson theorem) one may find the prevalence of (trade and/or "capital account") liberalisation, which is one of the motive forces of globalisation, the tendency of convergence seems to follow from the latter, too. Thus, one has no reason to be surprised if those insisting on the conventional theses naturally emphasize this assumed convergence-effect of globalisation as well.

The grave (if not the gravest) shortcoming of the Heckscher-Ohlin-Sauelson theorem which follows from the abstraction (among other simplifications) from international factor flows and the differences in the quality of the factors of production, appears, of course, as hardly reconcilable with such important and characteristic conditions pushing ahead globalisation as the international investment activities of TNCs and the rapid development of "human capital". In the case of the neo-classical thesis on international factor flows, on the other hand, it is the abstraction from international trade and division of labour, i.e. from another important component of globalisation, which has made irrelevant the link between the assumed convergence-effect of international factor flows and globalisation. Similarly, the former variants of neo-classical growth models, too, could hardly fit the interpretations of effects of globalisation, since they left the world economic processes, namely those of international trade and/or factor flows out of consideration or considered them as exogenous conditions. As a result, however, of the serious (partly theoretical, partly empirical) criticism of these models and theorems in question, a new variant of convergence theory has arisen which intends to link the investigation of the processes of international trade and factor flows with the empirical lessons concerning those comparative advantages based on knowledge-intensive industries.

Globalisation and even the wave of liberalisation, while accompanied by growing risks, vulnerability and potential disadvantages or dangers, may bring about new opportunities and potential advantages for the developing countries, too, in the field of trade, international capital flows, transfers of technologies, financing development programs, internationalised production, moreover, economic cooperation with other developing countries, too.

It will turn out only in the future whether such a world economy and society would (could) arise as ensuring for all the countries and nations an equal opportunity of development and equal chance for catching up (or, at least, bearable human life conditions, subsistence and security for all inhabitants of the Earth). For the time being, an investigation (like ours) should be confined to reveal, without forecasts, those opposite, contradictory tendencies and effects only which follow from globalisation. Specific features of the world economy as compared to developed national economies

The above-mentioned processes and relations, the progressive transnationalisation of which tends to make the world economy an organic (though not homogenous) entity, do not specify the institutional framework in which they are taking place.

The historical development of national economies shows that similar but local processes and relations within the countries have been the motive forces not only for the development of an integrated market economy but also for the establishment of a modern "nation"-state and an adequate institutional system more or less corresponding to the framework of the processes and relations concerned. However, the transnationalisation (or in other words: globalisation) of the outlined processes and relations have not produced yet

• (a) a fully integrated world market (particularly for labour),
• (b) nor has it been progressing under an adequate institutional regime (i.e. with really global institutions instead of, as at the present, inter-state bodies only). This fact is partly the consequence of the economic interventions of the states having a legitimate right (even if without efficient tools) to control their national economy and partly a reason why national economies have not lost yet their reality and relevance for analysis and action.
• (c) Another marked difference between the national economies and the world economy appears in the actual subjects and spheres of division of labour. While within countries the social division of labour naturally extends over all social activities, i.e. other than productive or economic activities, too, such as cultural, artistic, sport, research, educational, religious etc. ones, the international division of labour has been practically restricted (until now) to material production only and at best to services related to material production. Moreover, its very perception is also reduced to the latter.

  If within "national" societies, within all the individual countries a mixed economy coupled with a social welfare state and a pluralistic society seems to be the best among the realistically available alternatives for the time being (or even in the long run, perhaps), then "internationally", too, i.e. for the world society as a whole, a similar pattern should be developed, and the possible ways how to reach it have to be explored.

  A mixed economy involves both a private and a public sector. On the world level, however,

• (d) there is no real public sector, despite an ever-growing transnational sector of the private economy. A social welfare state institutionalises a "social safety net" and takes regular measures to re-allocate resources and redistribute, through taxation, income in favour of the poor, unprivileged and unemployed.
• (e) Such a "safety net" and institutionalised re-allocation and redistribution hardly exist as yet internationally. A pluralistic democracy presupposes the articulation, representation and reconciliation of the diverging, conflicting interests of all the different segments, strata or classes of the civil society and their proportionate participation in the process of decision-making and control over public issues. But
• (f) the world's civil society does not have such opportunities and rights. Consequently, the "countervailing forces", which are so important if a brake is to be put on the concentration and centralisation of power in the hands of a few, are either lacking or organized in dubious ways as alliances of some states versus others, with the risk of inter-state military conflicts.

  Human rights, which it is so fashionable to mention nowadays, mostly appear also in a false context, as the rights of citizens within their own country, to be respected and protected by their own state only. Thus they are totally confused with citizens' rights. While the latter are tied to citizenship, human rights in a real sense must belong to all members of humankind, of the world's human society, independently of citizenship, national, ethnic, caste and family origin, gender, social status, class, or religious, cultural or other differences.

• (g) Human rights in such a real sense are not yet respected even by the most democratic states. While they may fully guarantee citizens' rights to all their citizens, they enforce severe regulations to prevent the citizens of other states from exercising human rights in the territory under their sovereignty and control. Human rights include not only the right of emigration but also the right to immigrate, to choose freely one's place for living and working .

  Human rights which also include the right to security and development, to non-discrimination, to a peaceful and decent life, to a clean, unpolluted, healthy environment, to remunerative payment for work, at least to a minimum income and to satisfy basic needs, to develop one's potential, to access to education, culture and information, to free association and to participate in a democratic way in public affairs, to representation and to take part in decision-making, etc., can only be realized if they are guaranteed on the world scene, too, and respected all over the world. This is one of the only way to completely eliminate discrimination and exploitation, to make the world market really integrated and competitive also in respect of labour, to liberalise the flows of and access to all factors of production, to all products and services, including cultural ones, internationally too, and to democratise the governance of global interdependence.

^1. Barbara Parker (1998) investigates not only, though primarily, the economic sources and manifestations of globalisation (such as the appearance of global firms, some global changes in the structure, operation and power relations of the world economy, the globalisation of labour, the global challenges faced by enterprise management, etc.), but also the globalisation of technology, culture, politics and natural environment.

^2. See the concept of e.g. Prebisch, R. (1972), Singer, H. (1964), Lewis,A., and others in Szentes, T. (2002).

^3. For a detailed analysis of asymmetrical interdependencies of the world economy, see Szentes, T. (2003), Ch.III.

^4. Not only marginal but also "indirect" was their relationship with the world economy insofar as the state monopoly over foreign trade and foreign exchange transactions prevented the producers and consumers of these countries from making direct business and autonomous transactions with foreign partners. And since foreign direct investments were not allowed, nor were emigration and employment abroad, and thus, neither international ownership relations nor labour migration could develop at all, the international economic relations were not only limited and indirect but also "inorganic" only, i.e. excluding factor flows.

^5. "For example, the establishment of satellite TV and the availability of small receivers, and the spread of the use of electronic mail and the Internet make it difficult for governments to determine cultural or communications policy, or to control the spread of information and cultural products." - Khor, M. (2000), p. 5.

^6. See e.g. Tomlinson, J. (1991).

^7. B. Parker points to that the "major source of cultural globalization is entertainment media, including film, television, print media, games and human interactions, live and recorded performances, and other activities such as films, theme parks, and athletic performances. Unlike print media, electronic images and telecommunications are democratic, transmitted to broad audience including the educated and the illiterate alike." - Parker, B. (1998), p. 183.

^8. See Pronk, J. (1991).

^9. The Report of the South Commission (1990) correctly referred to the hypocritical distinction drawn between the labour services of the "South" as "immigration", to be controlled by national laws, and the technology-related services of the skilled labour of the North, which should enjoy free international mobility just like capital.