“The 3 Rounds of Globalization”
My friend Ashutosh Sheshabalaya recently wrote a great piece for The Globalist titled, “The Three Rounds of Globalization*”
He has analysed Globalization over the course of history and identified three distinct phases. In the article, Tosh argues that “globalization is not a new thing. It has been with us since the dawn of history”.
“…Well before trade in goods and services, globalization consisted of the exchange of ideas across distinct civilizations — as opposed to loosely structured nations and/or tribes. Such ideas helped form worldviews and shape the world materially….
Quite a few of these ideas originated in India, China, Greece and Rome. And undoubtedly there was significant cross-fertilization between these ancient civilizations, alongside the vanished memories of Babylon and Egypt….
…Evidence of such enriching exchanges are demonstrated in the writings of Megasthenes, the 4th century B.C. Greek Ambassador to India, or Chinese scholar Hieun Tsang, who visited India’s 2,000 tutor-staffed Nalanda University a millennium later…At the time, Europe, as we should recall, was only beginning to settle down after the trans-territorial forays of the Burgundians, the Ostrogoths and their energetic cousins.
…The Arabs were among the first ambassadors of the realm of ideas. Readers of the Islamic scholar Alberuni know that it was Arabs who transferred Indian science, medicine, literature and, above all, mathematics to western Europe….As Alberuni said, these are subjects which either are noteworthy for their strangeness, or which are unknown among our own people. This was the First Round of Globalization.. ”
