IS GLOBALIZATION AN EVOLUTIONARY PROCESS?
One authoritative survey of recent debates declares that no single universally accepted definition of globalization exists [1]. But there is also widespread consensus on some of its essential attributes, and one possible definition would describe it as the (process of) emergence of institutions of planetary scope, and it is world-wide institutions that undergo transformation: economic (such as firms, markets or economies); political (modern states, alliances, international organizations); social (such as national or democratic communities), and informational (i.a. in the world of science and learning). On that view, globalization is a process of emergence that is multi-dimensional, historically significant, transformational, and therefore obviously basic to understanding global change. While the literature on globalization is wide-ranging and profuse, much of it describes the general and local characteristics and consequences of that process. The problem of explaining globalization, on
