Globalization: The Crucial Phase

%name Globalization: The Crucial Phase%name Globalization: The Crucial PhaseGlobalization: The Crucial Phase%name Globalization: The Crucial Phase (University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology, $62.01), a new collection of essays edited by University of Pennsylvania anthropologist Brian Spooner, explores the anthropological roots of current globalization trends.

“The number of people interacting in a single arena has continually increased and now that over 50 percent of world population lives in cities, and that proportion is predicted to reach 75 percent in the coming fifty years, we are moving through the fastest period of increase in the numbers of people from different backgrounds who interact with each other on a daily basis,” reports Spooner. “This is therefore the crucial phase of globalization, the period of most intensive collective learning, and of innovation, continuously raising the limits of what we can do with our resources, but also the period of the greatest danger of conflict and natural disaster that could be catastrophic.”

The fifteen chapters of the book describe our world as it goes through this crucial phase and show how collaboration among seemingly disparate professional approaches is necessary for a comprehensive understanding of our place in the world and what the future may hold for our species.