Chapter 24: Accelerating Global Interaction (pg. 747-755)

There are three factors that have magnified the human impact on the earth. For example, world population quadrupled in the 20th century consisting of massive use of fossil fuels, and enormous economic growth. There was an uneven spread of all three over the world, but economic growth came to appear possible and desirable almost everywhere. This lead to human environmental disruptions becoming a part of global proportions. Because of the doubling of cropland and corresponding contraction of forests and grasslands, numerous extinctions of plant and animal species, air pollution in many major cities and rivers, and chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs) thinned the ozone layer. By 2000, scientific consensus on the occurrence of “global warming” as the result of burning of fossil fuels and loss of trees. 

Environmentalism began in the 19th century as a response to the Industrial Revolution. It only became a global phenomenon in the second half of the 20th century which began in the West with Rachel Carson’s Silent Spring. Actions came from the grass roots and citizen protests. In Germany, environmentalists entered politics as the Green Party where environmentalism took root in developing countries in 1970s–1980s. This tended to be more locally based, involving poorer people, more concerned with food security, health, and survival, and more focused on saving threatened people, rather than plants and animals. Environmentalists sometimes have sought basic changes in political and social structure of their country.  

Women's issues in the Presidential Race

These two articles discuss the issue about free birth control for women. Personally, this issue is pointless and shouldn't even be a main concern right now. There are more important issues going on in the world that need to be attended to. I can take a stand fr both sides of this issue, but I believe that it shouldn't be a huge issue like it is now. There can be different methods and solutions that can benefit most people in this situation. It is more of a religious point of view then a political view.

http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2012/04/03/poll-birth-control-not-top-election-issue-for-us-voters/

http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2012/02/10/obama-birth-control-compromise-defuses-religion-issue.html

Chapter 24: Accelerating Global Interaction (pg. 740-747)

Modernity presented a challenge to the world’s religions. It provided advanced thinkers from the 18th to 20th centuries who believed that supernatural religion was headed for extinction. There was a sharp decline in religious belief and practice in some places which eventually spread scientific culture that convinced small minorities that the only realities worth considering were those that could be measured scientifically. But the most prominent trends of the last century have been the further spread of major world religions, in new forms, and their attacks on elements of a secular and global modernity. Buddhist ideas and practices were well received in the West. Christianity spread even further; majority of Christians are no longer in Europe and the United States. Islam also spread widely because of religious pluralism on a level never before seen. Fundamentalism is a major reaction against modernization and globalization. It has developed in every major religious tradition

with many features of the modern world that appear threatening to established religions. Fundamentalists have responded with selective rejection of modernity and actively use modern communication technology. The term “fundamentalism” comes from U.S. religious conservatives in the early twentieth century; called for a return to the fundamentals of Christianity. 

                                                                   

"Arab Spring" of 2011

This article emphasizes women's equality to men. Tunisian women have benefited/changed the world in multiple ways and are unrecognized about it. Personally, I never realized what an impact these women had until reading this article.

http://www.cnn.com/2012/04/03/opinion/pelosi-women-africa-democracy/index.html

Chapter 24 Accelerating Global Interaction (pg. 734-739)

The Globalization of Liberation: Comparing Feminist Movements. During the 20th century, the idea of liberation traveled around the world. In the 1960s, there was a protest movement around the world that suggested a new global culture of liberation in the United States. This included civil rights, youthful counterculture, and antiwar protests in Europe. These protests in Europe consisted of protests against unresponsive bureaucracy, consumerism, and middle-class values. In the communist world, there was an attempt to give socialism a human face in the Czechoslovakia  movement which was crushed by the Soviet Union. Furthermore, in China the Cultural Revolution development was the idea of a third world dream of offering an alternative to both capitalism and communism; cultural renewal third world ideology exemplified by Che Guevara. This was an effort to replicate the liberation of the Cuban revolution through guerrilla warfare in Africa and Latin America among all the liberation movements, feminism had the most profound potential for change rethinking of basic relationships between men and women began in the West in the 19th century.

Chapter 24: Accelerating Global Interaction (pg. 723-734)

I thought it was interesting that the discussion of Barbie and Ken dolls shows the power of global commerce today. It also shows the reaction to the values represented by Barbie and Ken elsewhere in the world, such as Iran. Iran created new dolls, Sara and Dara, that portrayed Iranian Muslim values and practices. However, the Sara and Dara dolls and the Barbie and Ken dolls were all manufactured in China. During the 20th century, a web of political relationships, economic transactions, and cultural influences brought the world together. By the 1990s, the process of accelerating engagement was known as globalization. Globalization has a long history upon which the 20th century globalization was built. The pace of the globalization increased rapidly after World War II. The term "globalization" refers to international transactions. This has come to seem inevitable to many since 1950. The global economic linkages contracted significantly in the first half of the 20th century, especially between the two world wars. The capitalist winners of WWII were determined not to repeat the Great Depression. After the global economic transactions, they quickened dramatically after WWII led to re-globalization.

Chapter 23 Independence and Development in the Global South (pg. 691-720)

I find it interesting that Nelson Mandela spent 27 years in prison for treason, sabotage, and conspiracy. It's even more interesting that in 1994 he became South Africa's first black president. In the 20th century Decolonization was very important. The newly independent states experimented politically, economically, and culturally. These states were labeled as third world countries during the cold war. Today they are now more often called developing countries or the Global South. They include a large majority of the world’s population and suffer from enormous challenges. I think it is wrong that there was a destructive impact of colonial rule in the 1st and 2nd waves. Not only were people suffering from racism, but their borders were re drawn based on how the British thought it should be. Their culture, religion, and economy were taken over and over powered by the British. Gandhi became a very significant leader in India because he joined a movement to fight for racial segregation there. He also developed a notion of India that included both Hindus and Muslims. This notion was an active but nonviolent movement. The British were not happy with this so they responded with repression and concessions. Not everyone agreed with Gandhi so there was conflicts there as well. Arguments arose but eventually South Africa won freedom from Great Britain in 1910. But its government is controlled by a white settler minority.