STRATEGIC STUDIES OF PUBLIC POLICY (STRATEGIC STUDIES OF GLOBALIZATION JOURNAL)
Year:2015 | Volume:6 | Issue:16 (19) |Papers Count:8

The idea of transition from globalization has long been discussed in the elite academic circles of the world, especially the west. Although this subject is fundamentally economic; but, it has serious cultural and identity-related foundations. In the process of this transition, there have been substantial re-readings of the components, principles, signs, referents, examples, processes, structures and approaches. One of these concepts that has been transformed in its transition towards the post-globalization era is politics. According to the hypothesis of this article, in the present situation of transition and in the shade of the emergence of an era which may be called the late postmodernism or post-postmodernism, politics has got a different meaning in both theory and practice in comparison with the past. In the new formulation, this principle is understood in a plural, identity-based, society-centered, unstructured and pervasive context. This article intends to revisit and re-read Jacque Ranciere’ s concept of politics and gain an appropriate and rational understanding of this concept in the post-globalization era. Ranciere is the representative of a new spectrum of socio-political researchers. He tries to systematically introduce some concepts such as police, structural understanding of democracy, post-democracy, justice, oligarchy, the aesthetic foundations of politics, the true politics, archaic politics, meta-politics and para-politics etc. to understand and theorize the concept of politics with regard to the elitist necessities and the appended socio-political foundations of transition era of globalization.

The mutual relations between Iran and Europe which results from their foreign policies, have witnessed many ups and downs after the Islamic Revolution. After victory of the Islamic Revolution, relations between Iran and Europe were strained and because of Europe's all-out support from Iraq during the eight year war between Iran and Iraq the relations were at their lowest. After the imposed war, the " constructive administration" of Hashemi Rafsanjani tried to restore Iran's foreign relations while reconstructing the widespread destructions caused by war. Within this framework, critical dialog with Europe started which was stopped after Mykonos incident and all European countries recalled their ambassadors from Iran. After the seventh presidential elections in 23 May 1997, Seyyed Mohammad Khatami was elected as the president of the Islamic Republic of Iran. The significant difference in the discourse of the new reformist administration in domestic and foreign affairs and taking new policies and strategies such as dé tente and trust building, coalition for peace and dialog among civilizations led to improved relations between Iran and European Union. This study tried to explore and analyze the reasons behind the relative success of the reformist administration in improving relations with the European Union. To this end, constructivist theory which emphasizes on concepts such as ideas, identity, discourse, inter-subjectivity beliefs, and social and spiritual constructs of international relations, was chosen as theoretical framework of the research. Based on the teachings of constructivist school, social and spiritual constructs of international relations played a more effective role in improving relations between Iran and Europe during the reformist administration. The reformist administration's cultural, ethical and peaceful discourse which was based on interaction, dialog, mutual respect and toleration instead of conflict and war in international arena led to the formation of an inter-subjective belief and mutual understanding between Iran and Europe which resulted in their improved relations

There is an intertwined relationship between evolution of social movements and evolution of capitalism in Western societies in recent decades. After World War II until 1970, the nature of these movements in the international political economy has often been identity-cultural and focused on the divine needs and demands. Environmental, student, and women’ s rights movements are among those active social forces in the mentioned period. The structural crisis in capitalism in the 1970s and evolution of this system in the form of the division of labor and a new model of capital accumulation i. e. post-Fordism method of production and mobility of capital and technology against anti-system social forces, on the one hand paved the way for globalization of capital and a new structure of production and storage, and on the other hand, majority of the dissatisfied social forces have assumed a different character in response to the recent crises and in accordance with the logic of capital performance. In this regard, the question that leads this paper is “ What impacts has globalization had on the nature of social movements in the advanced Western societies? ” . The hypothesis is designed within the framework of Roland Inglehart’ s theory of value change, and it states that globalization has paved the way for the identity-cultural evolution in the nature of social movements of Cold war era to economic-materialist movements of post Cold war era. This applied research has employed descriptive-analytical method and library instruments.

Globalization is a powerful and progressive process that challenges the power of governments in all political, economic, technological, and cultural aspects and provides them with opportunities and threats in their policy making. Globalization theoreticians believe that information revolution has made the cultural aspect of globalization as its most powerful and widespread aspect challenging cultural policies of the countries and causing different reactions from their side. Studying reactions and cultural positions of Islamic Republic of Iran due to the cultural identity of its revolution is of special importance. Considering differing positions of Iranian statesmen towards globalization, this paper intends to investigate this issue from sociological perspective within Agent-Structure theory in during presidencies of Hashemi, Khatami, and Ahmadinejad. The main question is “ what is the interactional role of Agent-Structure in the cultural globalization process and formation of cultural positions in post war administrations? ” The hypothesis was that cultural positions of Islamic Republic of Iran towards cultural globalization during the three administrations have been different considering the Agent-Structure theory. As the purpose of the study is to scientifically investigate the relationship between agent-structure and cultural positions of Islamic republic of Iran in the globalization process, it is descriptive-explanatory and the data have been collected and analyzed through library-documentation studies method

Global economic crisis which started mid first decade of the third millennium after banks’ bankruptcy and the financial crisis in the U. S rapidly spread to other parts of the world. Europe was affected more than other parts of the world and is still suffering from its negative consequences, and the number of countries that are falling into the vortex of Europe’ s economic crisis is increasing. But the consequences of the financial and economic crisis of Europe which itself has been affected by the global economic crisis, are not limited to the economy, and the political arena is also involved. Accordingly, the main question of the article is “ what effects have global economic crisis and subsequently Europe’ s economic crisis had on European citizens’ trust on the democratic systems of their countries? ” In response to this question, the main hypothesis is that there is a direct relationship between Europe’ s financial and economic crisis and European citizens’ trust on their political systems and this crisis has led to a mistrust among European citizens towards neo-liberalist policies of the countries in the European Union and ultimately, it has led to undermining of fundamental democratic assumptions of these countries. Qualitative research method of scientific explanation and library data collection were employed to test the hypothesis and measure the degree of relationship and impact of independent variable on the dependent variable alongside inferential analysis of the data.

Globalization is a phenomenon that has led to many economic, social, cultural and political changes in the international arena. Accordingly, this phenomenon has become a major challenge among health policy makers. Although numerous studies have been conducted on the influence of globalization on health, there is no consensus about the impact this phenomenon has on the health and policies that must be enforced against it. The purpose of this study is to investigate the effects of globalization on public health, using a sample of 144 developing countries over the period 1970-2009. The research methodology is based on panel data regression using Stata11 software. To this end, infant mortality rate, under-5 year old mortality rate, and life expectancy at birth were used as health indicators, and economic, social and political globalization indices were used as globalization indicators. In addition, the number of physicians per 1000 people and GDP per capital unit were used as control variables. The results show that globalization leads to improvements in health indicators (infant mortality rate, the mortality rate for children under 5 years and the average life expectancy at birth). Also, the results reveal that the social dimension of globalization will have a greater effect on public health.

Administrative corruption is a phenomenon that exists more or less in all countries. However, the types, shapes, and extent of corruptions are different in every country. Today the administrative and financial corruption have become a global problem, and governments are aware that corruption leads to endless harms and knows no boundaries. The problem cripples the domestic economy, and disrupts the development of democratic institutions so to fight and control corruption, the factors influencing corruption must be identified. The main purpose of this study is to investigate the effect of globalization on administrative corruption in the Middle East and North African countries during the years 1995-2010, using a new economic globalization index (KOF). To this end, Corruption Perception Index is used for measuring administrative corruption (reducing Administrative corruption) in this group of countries. The research model is estimated by using the techniques of econometrics such as panel data unit root, panel data cointegration, Fixed Effects Model, and Generalized Least Squares Method. The results of this study indicate that globalization has a significant negative effect on the Corruption Perception Index (decrease in administrative corruption) on the surveyed countries. In addition, indicators of economic development, property rights, democracy, and human capital have positive and significant effects, whereas inflation, population index and the savings rate have significantly negative effects on the Corruption Perception Index (decrease in administrative corruption).

This research tries to study the possible role of satellite TV channels in forming the image of marriage in the youth of Tehran, and measure their impact on how the youth view marriage. Theories of the impacts of the media have been reviewed and among them the Cultivation Theory which emphasizes on the long term and gradual effects of the media, particularly TV on the image formation of the audience and their conceptualization of the social reality, has been selected. This study has utilized both quantitative and qualitative research methods. First, nine Tehrani youth aged 18 to 20 years were interviewed in depth and then the collected data were analyzed qualitatively and statements were extracted to form the questionnaire of the qualitative research. The statistical population of the research included Tehrani youth aged 18 to 29 years and through multi-stage cluster sampling, 306 of them were selected as sample population. Data analysis and obtained results confirm the hypotheses of the research based on which satellite TV channels are effective in changing the mental image of marriage among the youth while attracting their attention towards sexual issues. It seems that watching satellite TV channels has had an effect on patterns of spouse selection among Tehrani youth and has created a conformity of mating patterns among them. An insignificant difference is observed in the impact of satellite TV channels on the mental image of marriage among male and female participants of the study.