Page - 50 - in Limina - Grazer theologische Perspektiven, Volume 2:1

50 | www.limina-graz.eu The Great Recession of 2008 around the world revealed once again the par- adoxes (or contradictions) of the economic model upon which globaliza- tion was based. Capitalism has historically moved in “booms” and “busts.” The 2008–2009 recession was evidence of this. The experience of the re- cession reminded everyone that ever increasing globalization was neither inevitable nor inexorable. It could be stopped. Historians of globalization largely agree that the second round of globali- zation, which had begun in the nineteenth century, had ground to a halt with the First World War, and it would take more than forty years to restore trade relationships. The economic underpinning, a neoliberal creed, is pos- ited on the free movement of ideas, goods, and peoples. The free movement of goods was at the heart of neoliberal thinking, based on the belief that the market creates its own logic and self-management. In the 2008–2009 Re- cession, the banking and finance world proved once again that this was not to be the case. What had to this point not been adequately reflected upon in the neoliberal creed was the third free movement: the movement of peo- ples. There had been an increase in migration in Europe during this second decade of globalization, especially as countries in the former Soviet Bloc were incorporated into the European Union. But the world was not entirely prepared for what became starkly evident in the third decade of globaliza- tion—massive movements of peoples. The most recent decade of globalization, then, has been marked by a greater realization of the potential consequences of globalization. This combines in some fashion both the positive and negative evaluations of the previous two decades. It can be briefly outlined here as follows. First, the sheer enormity of the scope of globalization—something that was feared already in the first decade to result in a formless homogeniza- tion of the world—was now increasingly experienced even by those who had benefited from globalization. The poor and excluded of the world had always seen increasing globalization as a loss of some measure of control over their lives. Now, people in countries benefitting from globalization robert J. schreiter | Globalization and Plural theologies The experience of the 2008-2009 recession reminded everyone that globalization was not inevitable. It could be stopped. Globalization is posited on the free movement of ideas, goods, and people. But the third free movement had not been adequately reflected upon.