Ramadan in the age of globalization

Ramadan in the age of globalization

Although the use of the term globalization to describe what is happening in the world is modern, the phenomenon itself is very old, so if we understand globalization in the sense of rapidly diminishing the distances between Human societies, whether in terms of the movement of goods, people, capital, information, ideas or values, globalization seems to us to be equivalent to the emergence of human civilization.

With this wonderful introduction, Dr. Jalal Amin began his book Globalization and Arab Development, trying to show economic relations between Arab and the West, from economic progress, independence, colonialism, alienation and globalization.

Therefore, we can say that the human reaction to the phenomenon of globalization is as old as human civilization; it is true that the degree of human awareness of the phenomenon of globalization has varied strength and weakness from time and another, as well as the degree of its response to it. The extent of the motivation that man has found in himself to speed up the phenomenon or limit its speed, but the existence of this awareness of the phenomenon of globalization, in itself, must be very old.

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Therefore, globalization must have long aroused conflicting feelings of great enthusiasm in some people and of the fear and anxiety of others, such as what it is now.

One of the most important motivations of these feelings, whether those related to acceptance or rejection, is the effects of globalization on the standard of living on the one hand and cultural development on the other.

Those opposed to globalization and the extreme openness to the world fear the threat to their culture and their own identity on the one hand, and the marginalization of a significant proportion of their nation in the sense of reducing the level of living.

On the other hand, we see the proponents and enthusiasts of globalization showing great dazzle with the efficiency and power of modern technology, and full confidence in the ability of this technology to achieve a higher standard of living for all, They tend to underestimate the negative effects of globalization on cultural and cultural independence, and may even be optimistic about the ability of this same technique to strengthen national cultures.

As the centers of the radiation of human civilization moved from one geographical part of the world to another, the center of the driving force of globalization has also shifted from one human society to another.

The Arab world has been the center of this cultural radiation and this driving force of globalization, more than once throughout human history, but since the emergence of modern civilization, the Arab world has become a passive recipient of the effects of Globalization.

The phenomenon of globalization has many implications for investment patterns, consumption patterns and ecosystems in developing countries.

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This is because globalization, through its theories, policies, models, conventions and institutions, changes the components of the basket of goods available for consumption, thereby also changing the tastes of consumers.

Income inequality has also played a crucial role in this change in tastes, as consumption patterns of the poor tend to be influenced by higher-income consumption patterns.

This results in the fact that globalization, to the extent that it contributes to increasing income inequality, also contributes to changing tastes and influencing the constituent elements of national culture.

In the context of globalization, economic and political life is increasingly under the influence of market forces, which in turn are more influenced by the interests of domestic and international firms than by state orders.

One of the things that has almost become a recognition is that one of the most important features of globalization is the decline of the power of the state, especially in the less developed countries.

Just as the principle of consumer sovereignty is waning, leaving its place for the growing influence of producers on consumption patterns and consumer tastes, the sovereignty of the national State is also declining, leaving its place. More and more, producers of goods and services are under control.

One must therefore expect that the state's ability to influence the level and patterns of consumption, including even the consumption of essential goods and services, will decline.

Unfortunately, the phenomenon of globalization has spread to many aspects of worship, social, economic and political, and the most serious aspects of the doctrinal faith.

The month of Ramadan, for example, is being transformed year after year into an occasion for the intensive and sharp promotion of various commodities, contributed strongly by various media, especially television, and thus increasingly subjecting feelings Religious exploitation as a means of expanding the market, and sometimes even to promote the most distant goods out of religion, while religion and sex are mixed in television programmers in a way that must seem rebutted very for broad segments of society.

Since commodity promoters have long shown that images and feelings of sex can be an effective way to draw attention to and promote a commodity, they have also begun to use it in a much less acceptable cultural climate. as the principle of sexual freedom.

Globalization itself may provide developing countries with opportunities to raise awareness of the issue of the environment and provide them with the means necessary to protect them, all true, but the impact of globalization on the protection of the environment in states poor is undoubtedly more complicated than that.

From the above, it can be said, therefore, that it is inconceivable that globalization should not have very strong implications for development, as the diminishing distances between nations, both physically and intellectually, cannot have important implications for lifestyles. economic, social and cultural.

But globalization has its origins and its injury, it has its positive actors, and its negative receiving parties, and we cannot expect the effects of globalization to be the same as its second.

To be sure, the institutions of globalization have degraded and weakened our states through direct colonization, then through international financing, and finally through forced association with international conventions, the most famous of which are Gat, Uruguay tour and WTO.

In recent years, the world has witnessed an important development in terms of the trend towards greater globalization, in the sense that the Uruguay Round has resulted in international conventions to launch a new phase of Stages of liberalization of international trade in goods and services and liberalization of capital transfers.

The launch of this new era of international economic relations must therefore raise similar feelings and concerns, as well as all previous important steps towards greater globalization.

With many Arab countries signing these latest agreements, we must expect important implications for the economic life and economic future of these countries, and therefore in various aspects of life. Social, economic and cultural in the arab world.

In conclusion, we say:

The slogan of globalization is new, but the phenomenon is old and it has not been spared from any stage of its history of benefit, but the benefit is mostly due to the center of its transmission and radiation, and most of its damage is inflicted on the parties, among them parties. Of course the Arab region!!