ISSN NO. 0972-9445
Emerging Trends in Development Research
Vol. 31, No. 1 & 2, 2024
Globalization, Modernity and Sustainable Development: Conceptual Issues
Preeti Tiwari
Research Associate, Global Research and Educational foundation India (GREFI), India
Abstract
Development, as a concept, has been associated with diverse meanings, interpretations and theories from various scholars. In classical sociology, development was viewed as an evolutionary process and was related with the notions of growth and progress. However, this type of theories were almost rejected and in post-world war period, a three-fold classification of societies was adopted; traditional society, transitional society and modern industrial society. The goal of development was to achieve the condition/status of modern industrial society by the traditional societies which were also called developing societies or transitional societies. The “modernity” was set as a goal to achieve and this approach was termed as “modernization approach” to development. However, this approach was criticized on various grounds and an alternative approach based on Latin American countries experiences was formulated by neo-Marxist thinkers like A. G. Frank and Wallerstein, popularly known as school of underdevelopment and dependency theories. In 1980s modernization theory was criticized for not taking into account human development perspective regarding freedoms and self-esteem. Ecological critique of industrialization led to a new approach, namely, sustainable development which is a dominant paradigm of development for last four decades. The rise of global economy and communication revolution had initiated the process of transformation of the “modern industrial societies”. This process was termed as “globalization” which is transforming earlier modernity into a state of ‘high modernity” (Giddens). This formulation of globalization is multidimensional and included environ mental dimension of development. The present paper is aimed to discuss the interrelationship between globalization, modernity and sustainable development by taking into account the views of two basic thinkers of globalization on these issues at conceptual level.
Key words: globalization, sustainable development, high modernity, modernization, underdevelopment, dependency.
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