The Myth of Deglobalization: Definitional and Methodological Issues

This chapter first discusses the lack of consensus on how to define deglobalization, a term that is likely to become the buzzword of the mid-twenty-first century. There are at least three different accounts of deglobalization. First, deglobalization is defined as a series of processes that serve to “reverse” globalization. Second, deglobalization is celebrated as an emancipatory project decentering the West and aiming at reglobalization. Third, from a historical perspective, deglobalization is understood as a temporary phase or “wave” that is constitutive of global polity. Then, the chapter focuses on the popular indices and measurements of globalization that are employed to better grasp the current state of globalization and predict whether it will be replaced by deglobalization. While quantitative measurement and indices serve to provide the “big picture” in terms of comparing hundreds of nation-states across certain (economic, political, social, and technological) dimensions of globalizations, they attract much criticism, not only for their methodological nationalism, but also for overlooking the complex, nonmeasurable aspects of globalization.