Globalizations from Below

<p><em>Globalizations from Below</em> uses a Constructivist International Relations approach that emphasizes the centrality of normative power to analyze and compare the four globalizations ‘from below.’</p><p>These are: (1) the counter-hegemonic globalization represented by the ‘movement of movements’ of alter-globalization transnational social activists who try to put an end to the Neoliberal nature of the Western-centered globalization ‘from above’; (2) the non-hegemonic globalization enacted by ‘ant traders’ that are part of the transnational informal economy; (3) the partially similar Chinese-centered globalization whose entrepreneurial migrants are strongly influenced and instrumentalized by the Chinese state; and (4) the first wave globalization ‘from below’ that paralleled (and outlived) the 1870–1914 globalization ‘from above.’ This book identifies their common features and uses them to define the concept of globalization ‘from below’ as a set of socio-economic or socio-political processes that involve large transnational flows of people goods and/or ideas characterized at least in part by informality. They are enacted by entrepreneurial or activistic individuals who either take advantage of the normative power of the hegemon at the origin of an international order and an associated globalization ‘from above’ or – explicitly or implicitly – transgress contest and try to redefine dominant economic legal political and socio-cultural norms thus challenging the existing international order and globalization ‘from above.’ By constructing a unified theoretical framework this book attempts to open a new field of interdisciplinary research that should take globalizations ‘from below’ out of their current scholarly marginality.</p><p>This is one of the first scholarly works to collectively present more than one globalization ‘from below’ and will be of great interest to students scholars and researchers of International Relations International Political Economy Development Studies Economic History Anthropology Diaspora Studies and Chinese Studies.</p>