Measuring Globalisation

Transcription

1 Measuring Globalisation

2 Axel Dreher Noel Gaston Pim Martens Measuring Globalisation Gauging Its Consequences 123

3 Axel Dreher ETH Zurich, KOF Swiss Economic Institute, Zurich Switzerland Noel Gaston GDC, Bond University, Gold Coast, Queensland Australia Pim Martens ICIS, Maastricht University, Maastricht The Netherlands ISBN: e-isbn: DOI: / Library of Congress Control Number: c 2008 Springer Science+Business Media, LLC All rights reserved. This work may not be translated or copied in whole or in part without the written permission of the publisher (Springer Science+Business Media, LLC., 233 Spring Street, New York, NY10013, USA), except for brief excerpts in connection with reviews or scholarly analysis. Use in connection with any form of information storage and retrieval, electronic adaptation, computer software, or by similar or dissimilar methodology now known or hereafter developed is forbidden. The use in this publication of trade names, trademarks, service marks, and similar terms, even if they are not identified as such, is not to be taken as an expression of opinion as to whether or not they are subject to proprietary rights. Printed on acid-free paper springer.com

4 For Nicole, Ifumi, Nic, Robin and Timo

5 FOREWORD For a new book on globalisation, it may be common practice in this day and age to begin with an apology for adding to such an immense literature. A Google web search in October 2007 resulted in over 16 million references to globalisation, over 29 million for globalization and nearly 10 million for mondialisation. Not only would there be countless millions more references in languages other than English, American or French, but the numbers by the time this monograph reaches the bookstores is likely to be understated several-fold. The magnitude of the numbers is indicative of the widespread concern with everything and anything to do with globalisation. We suspect that globalisation leaves few people untouched and indifferent. A visible manifestation, of course, is the protesters increasingly from all walks of life at WTO, IMF and G-8 meetings. It is clear that what may have been early unquestioned enthusiasm has been supplanted by genuine concerns about further global integration. As for an apology, we offer none. First, the sheer magnitude of the interest in globalisation reflects an interest in the effects that globalisation has on our daily lives. The Earth System may be the most complex entity that ever emerged in our universe and the contemporary process of globalisation may be the most intricate dynamic that will ever pervade that entity. Secondly, there is considerable confusion about what modern day globalisation really is. Globalisation is a polymorphic concept. When it comes to globalisation, each social commentator or academic researcher has something different in mind. It is hardly surprising that some researchers find that globalisation is a substantial boon for a nation s citizens, while others paint an extremely gloomy picture. It is one purpose of this monograph to focus attention on what globalisation is. We argue that an agnostic approach to the issue involves the scientific construction of sufficiently broad and encompassing indices of globalisation. In the following chapters, we define and then measure the forces of globalisation. Existing analyses of globalisation emphasise different factors as the key elements behind the contemporary impact of this phenomenon. Moreover, they each presuppose a different definition of globalisation. In our opinion, rather than attempting to define globalisation and determine its effects by emphasising particular aspects or factors, it would be far more useful to adopt a more multidimensional, pluralistic approach. This approach prevents an over-simplification of the complexities involved in understanding globalisation, while permitting a flexible definition of contemporary globalisation. To illustrate, consider those regression-based studies that analyse the relationship between greater flows of international trade and labour market outcomes, e.g., earnings inequality. Two well-known problems with multiple regression analysis (the workhorse for social scientists) underscore the pitfalls of an overly narrow focus of analysis. First, there is the problem of omitting important variables. To avoid biassed estimates of the impact of globalisation on inequality, all

6 viii Foreword relevant aspects of globalisation have to be included in a regression model. This list of omitted variables might not only include well-travelled economic variables, such as foreign direct investment, but also indicators of political engagement and social integration. Secondly, there is the ever pervasive issue of variable (mis-) measurement and interpretation. For example, economists tend to find the impact of trade liberalising agreements and greater international trade with less developed countries on the distribution of earnings to be quite small. However, it requires a substantial leap of faith to argue that globalisation has similarly small effects. It is hardly surprising that non-economists tend to view the sanguine pronouncements of economists about a more integrated world with a mix of disbelief and incredulity. To be in a position to evaluate the consequences of globalisation in a rational and scientific manner, objective indicators are needed. To assess the extent to which any country is more (or less) globalised at any particular point in time requires much more than employing data on flows of trade, migration or foreign direct investment. Although largely neglected in the economics literature, both political integration and social integration are likely to be important for income inequality. For example, in the absence of restrictions on capital mobility, a country is more likely to competitively lower taxes or offer subsidies to attract investment, the closer is a potential host country s culture to that of a source country and the easier it is to exchange information. Lower taxes may also lower social standards and this is one channel through which the social dimension of globalisation may be important for income inequality. On the other hand, political integration may ameliorate a potential race to the bottom, which may be induced by economic globalisation. Hence, while economic globalisation may increase inequality, political globalisation could actually serve to reduce it. While discussing the recent attempts to measure globalisation, we focus most of our attention on the KOF Index of Globalisation, which has arguably become the most widely used measure of globalisation used by academic researchers and social scientists. We also illustrate the usefulness of the KOF Index for investigating some topical issues. Specifically, we investigate whether globalisation has affected government spending and taxation and if there has been a race-to-thebottom in welfare state policies; whether globalisation has been good for economic growth; whether globalisation has contributed to declining union membership widely observed in many developed countries; whether globalisation damages the natural environment and, of course, whether globalisation has been responsible for the widespread increases in income and earnings inequality in the last two decades. To tantalise the reader, we simply note that while some of our results may be unsurprising, others shatter long-held beliefs and require a reevaluation of the true effects of globalisation. Finally, we would like to thank our colleagues at the International Centre for Integrated Assessment and Sustainable Development (ICIS), University of Maastricht, the Universities of Exeter, Mannheim and Konstanz, the KOF Swiss Economic Institute at ETH Zurich, the Globalisation and Development Centre (GDC) at Bond University, the Institute of Social Science at the University of Tokyo and particularly Christian Bjørnskov, Lotte van Boxem, Martin Gassebner, Ward Rennen,

7 Foreword ix Torsten Saadma, Jan-Egbert Sturm, Heinrich Ursprung, Roland Vaubel and Daniel Zywietz for helpful comments and discussion. We thank Lukas Kauer, Peter Knox, Jaqueline Oh, Nadja Paenzer, Christopher Prieß, Rolf Schenker, Gilles Winkler and Christoph Woodtli for excellent research assistance. Thomas Schulz deserves a special vote of thanks for his assistance with the data as well as other parts of the project; his efforts were instrumental in helping us to produce a far better manuscript. Finally, we are grateful and indebted to Marilea Fried and Nicholas Philipson of Springer for their overall support and advice in helping us prepare the manuscript. Axel Dreher, Zurich, Switzerland Noel Gaston, Gold Coast, Australia Pim Martens, Maastricht, The Netherlands

8 CONTENTS 1 Introduction 1 2 Towards An Understanding of the Concept of Globalisation Capitalism as the incubator of contemporary globalisation Technological innovation as the engine of globalisation Political dimensions of globalisation The Global Village and the social and cultural aspects of globalisation Globalisation and the environment Framing globalisation by its timeline Digression: The challenge of sustainable development in a globalising world 15 3 The Measurement of Globalisation The use of indicators to measure globalisation The literature to date The MGI and KOF globalisation indices Comparing the main indices 68 4 Consequences of Globalisation Reconsidered: Applying the KOF Index Government spending and taxation and the state of the Welfare State The composition of government spending Does globalisation spur economic growth? Globalisation and deunionisation Globalisation and inequality Globalisation and the natural environment Conclusion 173 References 179 Appendix A: Sources and Definitions 193 Appendix B: Descriptive Statistics 205 Author Index Subject Index

9 FIGURES Figure 2.1 The Globalisation Timeline 14 Figure 2.2 The Triangular Model 17 Figure 2.3 The IPCC SRES scenarios as branches of a two-dimensional tree 19 Figure 2.4 Future developments and the dynamics of capital stocks 20 Figure 2.5 A pluralistic approach to globalisation Figure 3.1 MGI raw data frequency distributions Figure 3.2 MGI transformed data frequency distributions 34 Figure 3.3 KOF Index of Globalisation 2007, map 51 Figure KOF Index of Globalisation 64 Figure 3.5 Economic globalisation 65 Figure 3.6 Social globalisation 65 Figure 3.7 Political globalisation 66 Figure 3.8 Development of globalisation across regions 67 Figure 3.9 Development of globalisation according to income 67 Figure 4.1 Development of average expenditure shares 97 Figure 4.2 Globalisation and deunionisation 147 Box Box A The IPCC Special Report on Emission Scenarios (SRES) 18

10 TABLES Table 2.1 Issues linked with the IPCC-SRES scenarios 20 Table 3.1 Maastricht Globalisation Index (MGI) variables 32 Table 3.2 Geographical adjustment: regression results for all indicators (1999 data) 35 Table 3.3 The Maastricht Globalisation Index (MGI) Table 3.4 Weights of variables in the 2002 KOF Index of Globalisation Table 3.5 Weights of variables in the 2007 KOF Index of Globalisation 48 Table 3.6 KOF Index of Globalisation, 2007 Rankings 52 Table 3.7 KOF Index of Globalisation 2007, 5-year averages 60 Table 3.8 Comparison of the main globalisation indices 69 Table 3.9 Ten most globalised countries across indices 73 Table 3.10 Rank correlation across indices of globalisation 74 Table 4.1 Studies using the KOF Index of Globalisation 75 Table 4.2 Globalisation and economic policy ( , OLS, static model) 86 Table 4.3 Globalisation and economic policy ( , dynamic model) 90 Table 4.4 Dimensions of globalisation and economic policy ( , dynamic model) 93 Table 4.5 Significance of variables in system regressions ( , 60 countries, 614 observations, SUR) 101 Table 4.6 Significance of variables in system regressions ( , 18 OECD countries, 255 observations, SUR) 102 Table 4.7 Detailed results ( , 60 countries, 614 observations, SUR) 103 Table 4.8 Detailed results ( , 18 countries, 255 observations, SUR) 107 Table 4.9 Detailed results ( , 60 countries, 614 observations, GMM) 112 Table 4.10 Detailed results ( , 18 countries, 255 observations, GMM) 116 Table 4.11 Globalisation and economic growth, low vs. high income ( ) 121 Table 4.12 Globalisation and economic growth ( ) 122 Table 4.13 Economic dimensions of globalisation and economic growth ( ) 127 Table 4.14 Social dimensions of globalisation and economic growth ( ) 131 Table 4.15 Political dimension of globalisation and economic growth ( ) 135

11 xvi Tables Table 4.16 Globalisation and economic growth, tests for robustness ( ) 137 Table 4.17 Globalisation and deunionisation (OLS, ) 144 Table 4.18 Predicted effects of globalisation on inequality 152 Table 4.19 Globalisation and inequality ( , OLS) 153 Table 4.20 Globalisation and inequality ( , GMM) 155 Table 4.21 Dimensions of globalisation and inequality ( , OLS) 156 Table 4.22 Dimensions of globalisation and inequality ( , GMM) 157 Table 4.23 Globalisation and the natural environment ( , panel) 162 Table 4.24 Dimensions of globalisation and the natural environment ( , panel) 164 Table 4.25 Globalisation and the natural environment (cross-section) 168 Table 4.26 Dimensions of globalisation and the natural environment (cross-section) 169