Glocalization

Abstract

This chapter provides a conceptual overview of glocalization, tracing its origin, and the intellectual milieu in which this concept evolved. It also examines how glocalization helps researchers understand the interpenetration of “global” with “local” in various institutions and everyday life. In explaining the relationship between the processes of globalization with glocalization, this chapter highlights the potential usefulness of this concept in global studies. It also introduces a distinction between a thin theory and a thick theory of globalization, arguing that glocalization is conceptually closer to the latter. The chapter posits that in order to understand the dynamics of the current phase of globalization, a top-down view of globalization may not be adequate, and that one also has to recognize the growing transglocal linkages portending the emergence of transglocalization, a new phase of globalization that may even contest the hegemony of the top-down, neoliberal globalization.