People can have several layers of loyalty. You can be loyal to your family and your community and your nation. So why can’t you also be loyal to humankind as a whole? Of course, there are occasions when it becomes difficult—what to put first—but, you know, life is difficult; handle it.

—Yuval Noah Harari, “Nationalism vs. Globalism: The New Political Divide” (2017)

The world is changing. It’s moving from a patchwork of individual nations to a collective mix of nations, corporations, and power brokers. It’s moving from nationalization to globalization. People may argue that this shift has been going on for decades, which it has, but now the excitement has worn off and the reality of change—that daunting task that underlies any big move—is setting in. We’re graduating from The Global Schoolhouse of the 20th Century and enrolling in the Globalization University of the 21st.

For some this transition is fraught with anxiety. Others see it as an exciting time full of opportunity and a better future. Regardless of our feelings, the actual transition can be painful. There are costs to change.

Think of the last time you moved: There was the time-consuming packing process, where we boxed everything up; the moving process, which left our backs sore and our muscles achy; followed by the unpacking process, which felt like deja vu after packing in the first place. Where do the boxes go? Where does the stuff inside the boxes go? Why do we have so much crap?! But possibly the hardest part of the whole moving process is the initial step: We must first decide what stays and what goes.

From my vantage point, this is where humanity finds itself today. We are trying to determine what to keep and what to throw out. This is an extremely difficult task for a world where we’ve accumulated enormous amounts of “stuff”—various different languages, religions, and cultural identities; unique customs, clothing, and holidays; separate currencies, laws, and governing bodies; and often differing political wills, motivations, and priorities. A global world requires that some of these historical accumulations are thrown out, some are kept, and most (if not all) are restructured, repurposed, and relocated.

The world is moving house. We’re going away to college. We’re moving into a crowded dorm with all sorts of people from all around the world. This is Globalization University, where navigating our own national heritage is just as awkward and messy as 18-year-old co-eds trying to “find themselves” at a Freshman kegger.

It is certainly an exciting time to be alive, but that doesn’t mean that it’s an easy time. We’re merely in the packing process—just getting started—and already there is global backlash. Much of this outcry comes from a combination of what psychologists call the endowment effect and loss aversion. Respectively, we put more value on things that are ours simply because they’re ours (endowment effect). And consequently, we perceive a more significant loss when our stuff is taken away. This includes ownership of concrete entities like factories and jobs becoming “redundant,” as well as abstract ownership like specific ways of life or cultural identity. When our way is in jeopardy, emotions run high, objections flow freely, and we fight like hell not to avoid loss.

It’s important to remember, however, that while packing and moving are difficult, we’re not alone. When we show up to Globalization University on move-in day and look around at all the other students unpacking in front of our dorm, we should remember that all those fresh faces went through the same process. They’re going through it now. Our global peers are struggling with this move too. Whatever nation we come from, global dorm life is something none of us have ever experienced. It’s not nations that solely cause globalization; technology stretches beyond political and geographic borders. We’re in this together (for better or for worse).

—

Harari, Yuval Noah. “Nationalism vs. Globalism: The New Political Divide.” TED. Feb. 2017. Lecture. (Source)

*This essay is a follow up to the series, “The Global Schoolhouse,” originally published on December 2016. You can read Part 1 here.