The Globalization Backlash: Exploring New Perspectives

• Author: Helen V. Milner,Edward D. Mansfield,Nita Rudra
• Published date: 01 November 2021
• Date: 01 November 2021
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1177/00104140211024286
• Subject Matter: Articles

Article

Comparative Political Studies

2021, Vol. 54(13) 2267–2285

© The Author(s) 2021

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DOI: 10.1177/00104140211024286

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The Globalization

Backlash: Exploring New

Perspectives

Edward D. Mansfield

1

, Helen V. Milner

2

, and

Nita Rudra

3



Abstract

Rising popular discontent with globalization in Europe and the United States

has occurred alongside increasing support for extreme right-wing parties,

protectionism, and anti-immigrant views. This globalization backlash seems to

be contributing to economic globalization’s abatement, especially with respect

to trade but increasingly foreign investment, immigration, and participation in

international institutions as well. What are the key forces driving these recent

events and what are their broader political and institutional consequences?

This special issue aims to provide an understanding of some central features of

the anti-globalization furor. The studies in this special issue provide fresh

insights into the economic factors contributing to the backlash while also

addressing how they might interact with cultural forces. It concludes with a

discussion of why the globalization backlash has not diffused widely to the

developing world.

Keywords

globalization, political economy, political parties

1

University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, PA, USA

2

Princeton University, Princeton, NJ, USA

3

Georgetown University, Washington, DC, USA

Corresponding Author:

Nita Rudra, Government, Georgetown University, Intercultural Center (ICC) 594, 37 & O

Streets, NW, Washington, DC 20057, USA.

Email: nr404@georgetown.edu

In Europe and the United States, growing popular discontent with global-

ization has occurred alongside increasing support for extreme right-wing

parties, protectionism, and anti-immigrant views. This globalization backlash

helped propel the United Kingdom’s vote to leave the European Union (EU)

and gave rise to support in the United States for Donald Trump and his

unabashedly protectionist and nativist policies. The contemporary era has also

been marked by a protracted and fierce trade war between the United States

and China, the world’s two largest economies; the rise of populist, nationalist,

and xenophobic political parties throughout Europe; and mounting stress on

international institutions—such as the World Trade Organization (WTO)

(2019)—that have helped to promote global economic integration. Indeed,

the backlash seems to be threatening a large number of facets of globalization,

including trade, foreign investment, immigration, and international

institutions.

This special issue aims to provide an understanding of some key forces

driving the anti-globalization furor. Our primary focus is on the rising hostility

to globalization in the advanced industrial world, although the concluding

essay addresses the developing economies, which have generally experienced

less antipathy to globalization. Globalization is a multifaceted phenomenon,

including economic, political, cultural, and other features. These features

often do not move in lockstep. We focus on economic globalization, and we

define the backlash against such globalization as a significant decrease in

support for it among the mass public, key interest groups, leading political

parties, or governments, as well as the imposition of policies designed to roll it

back (Walter, 2021). Existing research has focused primarily on two sources

of the backlash: (1) rapid economic and technological change and the pain felt

by those hurt by economic globalization (e.g., Autor et al., 2014;Colantone &

Stanig, 2018a) and (2) increasing resistance to “liberal social values.”The

latter involves an adverse reaction to cultural progressivism (such as efforts to

promote diversity and the acceptance of “outgroups”)—particularly among

the older generation, white men, and less-educated individuals—in regions

where globalization has been most pronounced (Bornschier, 2012;Norris &

Inglehart, 2019). The articles in this special issue provide fresh insights into

the economic factors contributing to the backlash while also addressing how

they might interact with cultural forces.

The Current Backlash and Trends in

Economic Globalization

To put the following articles, as well as broader debates about the current

antagonism toward globalization, into historical perspective, we start by

addressing patterns in the international political economy since the fall of the

Bretton Woods system in the 1970s. We find that trends in various facets of

2268 Comparative Political Studies 54(13)