Page 13 - Nuvama | IC Report 2023

INDIA: THE 5D ADVANTAGE

Globalisation’s genesis: A Hegelian view

One view of history is that it is ‘one damn thing after another’ lacking any pattern or logic or direction.
Perhaps a more interesting and illuminating view of history comes from the 18th century German
philosopher GWF Hegel, who saw history as an intelligible process with a logic, structure and direction.

Such a construct offers the possibility of understanding the forces, choices and circumstances that
brought us to the current juncture. Hegel’s philosophy of history could be understood as a dialectical German
process with successive phases of thesis (starting proposition), antithesis (negation of thesis) and philosopher
GWF Hegel
synthesis (unification of two opposing concepts, which eventually becomes the new thesis).
viewed history
The driving forces behind this progression of history from one epoch to another are competition and as an intelligible
conflict between ideas and passions (self-interest?), which Hegel termed as the “warp and woof of the process with a
vast tapestry of the world history”. logic, structure
and direction
In the historical process, a thesis or an intellectual proposition takes shape through an interplay of
ideas and self-interest. It works for a while, but once the potentialities of a system are realised, the
members become aware of the inadequacies or pitfalls of the system. As a result, the rules, norms and
institutions that were embraced unquestioningly at one point, end up becoming obstacles. This is how
a thesis gives way to its antithesis, marking a beginning of a new epoch.
The zeitgeist of our age (the thesis) has been the idea of interdependence, which was based on the
article of faith that expanding democratic values, deeper integration of global trade and capital flows, In true
light regulation, spread of information & technology, and minimal government intervention would Hegelian sense,
deliver peace, freedom and prosperity for everyone. The idea attained ideological proportions with inadequacies
the fall of communism and the Soviet Union. The world was proclaimed to be flat and borderless. or pitfalls of
globalisation –
Surely, the age of globalisation did catapult the living standards in large parts of the world and delivered obscure or ignored
unthinkable levels of prosperity to certain sections of the society. In true Hegelian sense though, the while good times
inadequacies or pitfalls of the system – obscure, or ignored while good times lasted – are now coming lasted – are now
to the fore. The owl of Minerva may be flying. coming to the fore
With widening inequality, repeated bouts of financial instability, weakening democratic accountability
and inadequate social safety nets, among others, disillusionment is setting in. History seems to be very
much in action, and the antithesis may be emerging. Fukuyama was clearly hyperbolic.

Political trilemma of global economy

Harvard University professor Dani Rodrik’s political trilemma of world economy propounds that
it is impossible to attain economic hyper-globalisation, national sovereignty and democracy
simultaneously. At any given point in time, only two of the three can be successfully achieved, and
policymakers have opted for a different set of policy choices during different phases of history.

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