From the variety of foreign soft drinks on your local supermarket's shelves to your country's representatives taking part in international meetings, globalization is evident in virtually all aspects of our life, no matter where we live. However, common as it is, opinions still differ greatly on whether or not this trend is a good or a bad thing for our world as a whole. While globalization has been highly beneficial to world citizens in many aspects, the opposite can also be said about its harmful effects on nations worldwide, especially in terms of cultural, social and security matters.
Cultural aspects are perhaps influenced most heavily by globalization. On the good side, it has played a substantial role in promoting a "global culture", effectively bringing closer people from all parts of the world. Football fans in Southeast Asia shout and cheer at the victory of their teams in the Champion Leagues. Jeans and T-shirts become the uniform of young people in every continents, and little efforts are needed to see that Western food, beliefs and lifestyles have spread to many other regions in the world. In his book in 1998, Richard Buckley pointed out that people from all corners of the globe, linked together by TVs and the Internet, are now united by the same wish for freedom, material comfort and security. Some has expressed hope that as we interact and join together under the same influences, we might achieve a higher chance of a global understanding that would allow us to cooperate more efficiently. On a darker note, globalization is also accused as the assistant of the phenomenon known as "cultural invasion". This term reflects a concern expressed by many that the spread of cultural influences from developed countries, such as the Western world, can erase the unique parts of other countries' culture and might threaten the existence of cultural diversity.
Societies have also been fundamentally changed since the rise of globalization.
