Globalization

  • FCC rules limit media ownership concentration in radio and TV

    FCC rules limit media ownership concentration in radio and TV
  • Bretton Woods Agreements create World Bank and Monetary Fund General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade established to negotiate rules for trade in goods

  • United Nations Charter signed; dismantling of colonial empires creates indepent states in Asia and Africa and neocolonial economic relationships

  • Cold war begins; capitalism against communism

  • Universal Declaration of Human Rights drafted

  • UN Conference on the Law of the Sea discusses resource exploitation of outer continental shelf

  • Computer chip invented

  • Global Assembly Lines largely reliant on women increasingly dominate patterns of production of clothing and manufactured goods

    1970's***
  • Advances in computers, fiber optics, satellites and miniaturized electronics radically alter production and distribution of goods and services and patterns of global investment

  • Reagan and Thatcher - free market government and global economic strategies

    breaks air controller's strikes, opening an era of diminishing power of unions
  • Mexico tells creditors it is unable to pay its debts

    Third World Debt Crisis begins all around the globe as nations are unable to pay escalating debts incurred during the 1970's
  • Women activists from developing countries detail how neoliberal economic policies exploit and hurt women

    During UN Third World Conference on Women
  • World Bank and International Monetary Fund initiate structural adjustment policies in developing countries that promote trade liberalization

  • Fall of Berlin Wall ends Cold War

    leaves capitalism as single dominant economic system; Transnational Corporations (TNC's) enter former Societ bloc in a push toward privatization
  • Series of UN World Conferences dramatically expand the voice of NGO's in global, political, economic, and environmental debates

    1990's***; Regional and Bilateral Trade Agreements multiply around the world
  • Worldwide Web created, enabling instant communications around the globe

  • NAFTA signed with side agreements on labor and the environment, and in face of intense resistance from all three countries

    Maastricht Treaty creates the European Union solidying economic and political ties between, and expanding number of, European nations west and east
  • FTAA prorposal launched by U.S. to seek a free trade agreement for all of North, Central, and South America except Cuba

  • World Trade Organization GATT adds services, investment and intellectual property rights and government procurement to trade concerns

  • Telecommunications Act engenders further deregulation of media policy

  • Asian financial crisis triggers a global financial crisis when nervous investors rush to withdraw funds from Asian markets

    financial speculation becomes a major concern
  • World leaders gather for UN Millenium Summit, committing to the eradication of extreme poverty and other global social goals by 2015

  • World Conference Against Racism

    some Third World nations and activists link colonialism, poverty, racism, and globalization
  • Argentina's economic collapse and default on debts

    people rebel against economic austerity policies
  • NGOs and activists around the world join a "Global Call Against Poverty" to urge governments to make trade fair, cancel debts, and address the roots of poverty