The American Global Cultural Brand

This past week, we discussed the impact of the American Global Cultural Brand, and more specifically, the effect of “McDonaldization”. 

We first looked at Lane Crothers’s article on Globalization and American Popular Culture. This article talked about popular franchises in America, and the impact they have on American culture. Crothers defines a franchise as a “contracted relationship between a company that controls a brand label for a good or service and private individuals and companies that buy the right to use the brand’s name and products, but otherwise operate the business on their own,” (Crothers 134). In other words, a franchise is an individually owned company that shares its products and services with the main company under contract.

The advantages of franchising certainly outweigh the disadvantages. Franchising lessens the complexity of starting one’s own business, allows for the establishment of one’s own rules and regulations, reduces many costs, and already has a pre-existing network of vendors. It also offers a set regularity and predictability that large businesses do not. Also, with franchising, one can use advertising with a brand’s specific name. This would draw in customers who recognize the product and are familiar with its quality. So, even though the option of starting your own business is out of the question with franchising, one is able to advance further with familiarity drawing in more customers.

Crothers and Ritzer broke down the Global Presence of American Brands into two major franchises: Coca-Cola and McDonald’s.

Nationwide franchising for Coca-Cola began in 1899. The company established several zones of operation and bottling partners across the country to set ties and foundations nationwide. The familiarization with and expansion of Coca-Cola eventually stretched across the world by the early 1900s. The founders of Coke formed an alliance with the Olympics, and soon became part of the U.S. was effort during World War II.

Once Pepsi came into view, Coca-Cola felt threatened and decided to alter their formula to please consumers. However, many people disliked the “new” Coke. Crothers explained this rejection as follows: “Changes to the brand meant changes to the emotional connection many consumers had towards the soda and the soda’s existence as a cultural symbol,” (Crothers 144). To many Americans, Coke represented the values and symbols of American culture; and if Coke just changed suddenly, people would feel like their values would change, as well.

A similar situation occurred when Coke implemented the “white cans for polar bears.” They changed the color of the cans to raise awareness for polar bears during one winter. Many people complained that the white cans looked too similar to the silver cans of Diet Coke, thus convincing Coke to change their cans back to the original color.

Coca-Cola also invented the modern image of Santa Claus. Yes, they did! I was actually surprised when I read that. It seems that the modern image of Santa has been around for so long, and that it just came to be. Who would have thought that an American SODA company would impact the world in such an enormous way! The image of Santa evolved from a simple elf, to what we see today. Coke began advertising with this new Santa and soon the trend caught on.

However, Coca-Cola’s impact on the world is not just cultural. Coke has established a sense of economic globalization over the years, as well. The opening of thousands of bottling plants around the world has stimulated employment. New jobs in factories and trucking for transportation, as well as relations forming between local bottlers and providers, have increased since the beginning of the Coca-Cola industry.

McDonald’s is well-known all around the world, but mostly in America. However, with the vast array of fast-food restaurants present, McDonald’s had to do something to make them stand out from the rest. So, they updated their products to attract new customers. They began serving breakfast, staying open later, adding a drive-through and the McDonald’s Playland, and offering Happy Meals. They also introduced their new mascot, Ronald McDonald. Ronald McDonald soon became the face of Ronald McDonald House Charities, and people justified that if they ate at McDonald’s, they would be doing an act of charity.

                McDonald’s also offers different products worldwide. For example, in India, where beef is not allowed to be consumed, McDonald’s offers a variety of chicken entrees. McDonald’s products are serviced to suit the needs of its consumers. In Germany, they serve beer as a beverage, since it is a common drink there.

                McDonald’s became so successful because of what Ritzer describes as the “Dimensions of McDonaldization.”

1.       Efficiency

a.       McDonald’s offers fast, easy ways for consumers to get food. Drive-throughs and worker skills enable customers to get in, get full, and get out fast in order for the next customer to order.

2.       Calculability

a.       People quantify things to make it seem like they get more for less. McDonald’s “Dollar Menu” does just that. Also, people calculate time. Many believe that it would take less time to go to McDonald’s that it would to make dinner at home.

3.       Predictability

a.       McDonald’s offers a variety of products and many of them are found worldwide. Whenever a person goes to McDonald’s, no matter where they are, they will know what kind of food and service to expect.

4.       Control

a.       The lines, limited menus, few options, and uncomfortable seats all serve a purpose in McDonald’s – to get its customers in and out as quickly as possible. 

In all, McDonald’s is systematic in the way it operates and serves its customers. Everything is in order so that the company makes the most money in the shortest amount of time possible, while still providing quality service.

Overall, both McDonald’s and Coca-Cola implemented specific plans in order to satisfy customers while expanding their businesses worldwide. They did so by appealing to American values and symbolizing what the American culture seems to represent.

Crothers, Lane. (n.d.). “The American Global Cultural Brand.” Globalization and American Popular Culture 3:133-78.

Ritzer's "An Introduction to McDonaldization" article printed out in class.

Globalization and American Popular Culture

This past week, we discussed globalization’s role in American popular culture. We talked about the changes that globalization and popular culture have faced over the years, as well as the influence they have had on the American population.

Globalization has changed drastically since the 1900s, and has expanded all across the globe. Eitzen and Zinn (2006) give twelve instances in how globalization has evolved to fit in with popular culture:

1. Production

a.       Transnational corporations have continued building factories and manufacturing products from low-wage countries all across the world. This brought about the “global assembling line.” Since all these factories and production services has increases, many jobs have been supplying labor services.

2. Markets

a.       Goods and services are now marketed to the entire world. Companies will sometimes place markets and products in certain countries where they know the people will buy their product.

3. Technology

a.       New technologies have transformed information storage and retrieval, communication, production, and transportation. It is now easier to locate, buy, and send products and communicate via Internet to other corporations.

4. Corporate Restructuring

a.       Major corporations have internally reorganized to take advantage of the global economy. They merged and developed alliances with other corporations to ensure global success. The result of this is a decentralization of production and a concentration of economic power.

5. Neoimperialism

a.       Brecher et al. states that “globalization has taken from poor countries control of their own economic policies and concentrated their assets in the hands of first world investors.”

6. Changing Structure of Work

a.       Worker security has declined across the world since globalization has made an impact. Labor unions have lost their power, and employees can simply threaten to move the operation to a place where wages and benefits are lower.

7. Movement of People

a.       Immigration has increased under the current conditions of globalization. Women especially have moved from poor to rich countries. This so-called “feminization of migration” shows a worldwide gender revolution. This has caused a reverse flow of money, as immigrants send money back to relatives in their native land.

8. Global Institutions

a.       Many organizations have fostered transnational trade and provided economic development in underdeveloped countries. These new powerful forces quicken the process of globalization.

9. Neoliberal Ideology and Policies

a.       The neoliberalist theory argues that market forces will bring prosperity, liberty, and democracy if left unhindered by government intervention. Neoliberals promote privatization, deregulation, and dismantling of the welfare state, as well as free trade.

10. Governance

a.       Globalization has diminished sovereignty of nation-states. Because the national government accepts neoliberal ideology, they do not hinder corporate decisions regarding outsourcing and the movement of capital.

11. Permeable Borders

a.       Insularity is not possible now as environmental pollution affects everyone. Also, diseases are difficult to contain and criminal networks flourish where borders are permeable.

12. Global Culture

a.       Global culture is de-ethnicized and deterritorialized. It is established and maintained by the media, corporate advertising, and the entertainment industry. Because of this, a single world culture has been formed.

In Giddens’ essay, he depicts the vast expansion of globalization and its varying consequences. He states that globalization is not a single process, but a complex set of processes. Thus, globalization is the reason for the revival of local cultural identities all across the world. A major point that Giddens makes it that globalization “isn’t developing in an even-handed way…it looks uncomfortably like Westernization – or, perhaps, Americanization,” (2006).

                This concept of Americanization is evident in Crothers’ discussion of globalization in American popular culture.

                Soviet leaders and their allies referred to the West as culturally corrupt. They labeled Western (usually American) cultural products as insubstantial and meaningless, even going so far as to say that they promote poor moral values. Soviet leaders argued that Western values erode public morals and social order, and therefore banned any Western cultural products. However, this ban only made things worse. It stimulated interest among their citizens in American popular culture. Also, in denying their citizens access to Western culture, the governments of the Soviet bloc undermined their own legitimacy.

                Crothers states that a combination of economic, political, and cultural factors promote globalization:

• By making it possible to create more ties among people, social networks, and ideas that span traditional nation-state boundaries
• By linking people in new ways which makes it possible for work, travel, shopping, etc., to take place anytime all around the world
• By increasing the speed of communication and the expectation of instantaneous contact
•  By shaping and reshaping individuals’ ideas and identities as they are exposed to this complex world

Analysts of cultural globalization give three negative effects caused by the global spread of American popular culture:

1. Cultural Corruption

a.       Life in other countries soon became dominated by values such as consumerism, the pursuit of luxury and individual interests. People became more isolated and lacked traditional values. As a result, people’s life orientations shifted from dedication to the social good of their communities to the autonomous desire to satisfy the self (Crothers 27).

2. Cultural Imperialism

a.       The interaction of different cultures will inevitably cause conflict. Members of each culture will seek to destroy or get rid of the other. Increased cultural contact is likely to create violence and fragmentation, which is the opposite of what was promised by globalism’s proponents.

3. Cultural Homogenization

a.       Critics concerned with the concept of cultural homogenization agree that American popular culture may dominate the world. They fear that corporate-produced mass entertainment will ultimately move everyone’s values towards those associated with mass consumer capitalism.

4. Cultural Hybridity

a.       Hybridization has been defined as “the ways in which forms become separated from existing practices and recombine with new forms and new practices.” Hybridization does not always lead to equal cultural exchange, though. Also, Western societies can be as influenced as non-Western communities are influenced by the West. The term glocalization describes a process in which established cultures both shape and are undermined by the emergence of a new cosmopolitan culture whose values and ideals are determined by the demands of globalization.

The economic, political, and social aspects of globalization offer expectations from the promise of a democratic, free market future to the prospect of a global cultural war. Globalization has transformed the world into a interconnected world economy with sharing cultures and expectations.

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Crothers, L. (2010). Globalization and American Popular Culture. Globalization (Third Edition ed., pp. 1-36). Plymouth: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers.

Eitzen, D. S., & Zinn, M. B. (2006). Globalization: An Introduction. Globalization: The Transformation of Social Worlds (pp. 1-11). Belmont: Thomson Wadsworth.

Giddens, A. (2006). Globalisation. Globalization: The Transformation of Social Worlds (pp. 15-21). Belmont: Thomson Wadsworth.

Globalization and World Politics

The three readings for the past week by John Baylis et al., Anthony McGrew, and Ian Clark both discuss the evolution of Globalization and its growing impact on the social, economical, and political aspects of the world. They argue how differently Globalization has emerged since the early 1900s and how its present effects are changing world views.

                 

       Baylis et al.’s Introduction begins by discussing the transition of Globalization from international politics to world politics. The interest with world politics resides in that it is more inclusive and follows political patterns in the world, not only those between nation-states (Baylis et al., 2). The authors state that there are two main theories to world politics: idealism and realism. Their theory of idealism encompasses the view of how the world should be and tries to aid in events to make it that way. Realism, on the other hand, stresses viewing the world as it “really is” rather than how we would like it to be.

               

      Realism focuses primarily on the states. Their ideology is that human nature is fixed and therefore, selfish. Resulting from that, world politics “represents a struggle for power between states each trying to maximize their national interest,” (Baylis et al., 4).

While realism has been the prominent way to explain world politics over the last century, there are also many other theories present, including:

• Liberalism

o   Liberalists argue that human beings are perfectible, democracy is required for that perfectibility, and that ideas are important. They reject the theory that war is the natural condition of world politics and question whether the focus should be on the state or not.

• Marxism

o   Marxists believe that world politics occur within a world capitalist economy where the most important population is classes. In this setting, class conflicts are played out. They also believe the most dominant feature is global capitalism.

• Constructivism

o   Constructionists argue that we “make and re-make the social world and so there is much more of a role for human agency than other theories allow,” (Baylis et al., 5). People who view the world as fixed do not understand the possibilities for human progress and the enhancement of people’s lives.

• Poststructuralism

o   Poststructuralists are concerned with any accounts claiming to have direct access to “the truth.” They believe there is no “truth” that exists outside of power – which all power requires knowledge and all knowledge relies on power relations.

• Postcolonialism

o   Postcolonialists state that theories such as realism and liberalism have aided in securing the domination of the Western world over the global South, but are not neutral in terms of race, gender, or class (Baylis et al., 6). They believe that global hierarchies are made possible through social construction.

McGrew’s discussion transitions to discuss the economic and cultural transformation of the effect of Globalization. Over the decades, global interconnectedness has become increasingly evident through economics and cultural events.

McGrew continues on to conceptualize globalization, and characterizes it by:

• A stretching of social, political, and economic activities across political frontiers so that one region of the globe experiences its effects from another region.

• The intensification of interconnectedness

• The accelerating pace of global interactions and processes as transportation and communication becomes easier worldwide

• The growing extensity, intensity, and velocity of global interactions

McGrew states that globalization embodies a process known as deterritorialization. In this process, social, political, and economic activities are increasingly “stretched” across the globe, becoming a significant sense no longer organized solely according to a strictly territorial logic (McGrew 18). This theory also encompasses the idea of a “shrinking world,” meaning that the sites and subjects of power may be far apart.

The Westphalian Constitution of World Politics is also brought up in this discussion. There are three sections to this constitution:

1.       Territoriality

a.       Humankind is organized into exclusive political territories with fixed borders.

2.       Sovereignty

a.       Within those borders, the government has the right to supreme, unqualified, and exclusive political and legal authority.

3.       Autonomy

a.       Self-determination constitutes countries as autonomous containers of political, social, and economic activity within its borders.

In all, Baylis et al.’s Introduction and McGrew’s discussion of Globalization and it’s impacts and theories show that the concept of globalization is transforming the Westphalian idea of sovereign statehood. They also state that globalization is beginning to transfer from international politics to global politics.

                Clark discusses the different orders of globalization and how those have changed world views over the years.

                He lists four different typologies of orders:

1.       Globalized

a.       This typology focuses on the global system, and involves the end of national politics, societies, and economies.

2.       International

a.       This typology focuses on the states, and concerns itself with the agenda of sovereignty and stability.

3.       World

a.       This typology focuses on humanity, and concerns itself with human rights, needs, and justice.

4.       Globalized International (Clark’s viewpoint of Globalization)

a.       This typology focuses on globalized states. It concerns itself with the agenda of managing relations between states penetrated by the global system but still distinguishable within it (Clark 547).

Clark extends the Westphalian order theory from Baylis et al.’s and McGrew’s discussion. He talks about the post-westphalian order and how it ties into Globalization.

Globalization is usually seen as an effect of the cold war since it led to its further geographical spread. However, it should be understood that globalization is also a factor that led to the end of the cold war: “it was the Soviet Union’s marginalization from processes of globalization that revealed, and intensified, its weaknesses,” (Clark 552). So, from this it should be stated that globalization is an element of continuity between the cold war and post-cold-war orders.

Globalization can also be viewed as an extreme form of interdependence, which follows the idea of an outside-in development. But, if consideration falls so that globalization is seen as a transformation in the nature of states, then it would seem that the states are still the main focus of the order. This would follow the idea of an inside-out development because the globalized state would be in state form.

Overall, each chapter discusses the main elements of Globalization and some of their effects on the world. While the views of the evolution of globalization may differ, they all agree that globalization is transitioning. More social, economical, cultural, and political values are being spread throughout the world as access to travel and communication are becoming easier.

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Baylis, J., Smith, S., & Owens, P. (n.d.). Introduction. The Globalization of World Politics: An Introduction  to International Relations (5th ed., pp. 1-14). Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Clark, Ian (n.d.). Globalization and the post-cold war order. The Globalization of World Politics: An Introduction to International Relations (5^th ed., pp. 546-557). Oxford: Oxford University Press.

McGrew, Anthony (n.d.). Globalization and global politics. The Globalization of World Politics: An Introduction to International Relations (5^th ed., pp. 15-30).