Why Global Efficiency Matters(Rough Draft)
In my eyes, global citizenship is the idea that involves looking past one’s ethnic or religious barriers and emphasizes the concept that each person has civic duties that they should work on in order to better the world as a whole. On the other hand, local citizenship involves identifying more regionally and being more interconnected to your local community. Although it is important to be a part of your local community and work towards bettering it, it’s more important to work towards the bigger picture of global cooperation. Global cooperation connects people and promotes internationalization. Some argue that globalization can be achieved through each individual nation solving their own problems. Despite the idea that each nation solely working on their own issues would work towards global efficiency, it is essential to work on solving problems on a more global scale, as global cooperation unites people and allows people to develop a sense of cultural empathy.
My personal experience growing up as a minority in a non diverse area has strongly impacted my stance on global and local citizenship. As a child of Indian immigrants being raised in a predominantly white town, I struggled with figuring out who I was and where I belonged. I believe a strong part of human nature is wanting to fit in and belong, no matter where you are. Everything from the way my parents raised me to my daily dinners were vastly different from everyone I knew. My friends would be so shocked by the slightest cultural differences that I expressed, which helped me realize even more how non-diverse closed off my community was. I personally have always felt so closed off to the world and other cultures. Growing up in a small midwestern town, I noticed that almost everyone around me was living in their own bubble. Ironically, my high school’s name was Magnificat and everyone in the school referred to the community as the ‘Magnifi-Bubble’. Most people were unaware of other cultures and didn’t seem very curious to explore much outside of their bubble. Instead they loved the comfort that their home town brought them, not wanting much to do with what existed outside of it. Because of my experience living in a very ‘bubble-like’ community, I believe it is important to work towards becoming a global citizen, that way everyone can be more aware and develop a sense of cultural empathy.
Consider the pandemic and how each nation approached the virus and its outbreak differently. While some nations were extremely cautious and took immediate action by mandating stay at home orders and starting lockdowns, other nations took a different approach and decided to continue on with daily life in an attempt to build herd immunity. “If you asked 10 people in the United States, what does success look like in fighting Covid-19, you would get 10 completely different responses. If you ask someone in New Zealand, what is success? They understand that it is eliminating Covid-19 in New Zealand”(Robbins). New Zealand has done a tremendous job at eliminating the virus with its strict lockdown and social distancing rules. They were also the first country to flatten the curve and in early June they were able to eliminate transmission of the virus. While some nations, like the U.S and the U.K were struggling with spikes of cases and overrun hospitals, other nations like South Korea and New Zealand were handling the virus very efficiently. If the nations came together and collaboratively worked off of each other, it is possible that the nations that were struggling with high cases for so long would have been able to lessen the spread of the virus. If nations came together and worked on a global level, they could have learned from New Zealand or South Korea’s strategies and applied it to their own nation, helping their nation’s corona crisis. Although most nations worked on their own and applied their own plan of action, it would have been more beneficial to collaborate on a global scale, not only to unite the nations but to learn from each nation’s mistakes and successes.
Admittedly, nations working on their own issues can help each nation prepare itself for global cooperation. If nations work on fixing their own problems, it will be easier to focus on global issues. This idea can be simplified into a stovetop example. If one person is trying to cook 8 bowls of pasta on a stovetop and another person is trying to cook 3 bowls of pasta on a stovetop, the person with more bowls will be more flustered and preoccupied. The bowls of pasta represent the problems a nation may have. If nations do work on their own problems and solve them internally, they may be more prepared for global cooperation. Nevertheless, if nations solely focus on their own problems, global efficiency will not be palpable. Certain issues such as climate change and oceanic degradation, must be addressed at a global level. These issues exist within every nation and can only be fixed when nations collectively come together to work towards a solution.
Therefore, it is imperative that we work together towards global efficiency in order to unite nations and increase cultural diversity. Not only does globalization promote a more efficient network and economy, it also increases cultural empathy. Cultural empathy paves way for more awareness and creates a more solid base for relationships with other nations. Working on a global scale towards larger issues can ultimately lead towards a more interconnected world.
