Globalization encompasses multiple changes in all areas of social life, especially economics and culture. While it is hard to deny the recent expansion of global interconnectivity, the specific ways in which globalization is stipulated as an objective reality are not always tenable, since globalization remains an ongoing project whose final realization might yet be interrupted. Intentionally neglecting the nature of globalization as an ongoing project, globalization advocates from both the right (e.g. adherents of the 'end of history/end of ideology' argument) and the left (e.g. those who still defend the cultural imperialism thesis) often ask misleading questions about the nature of globalization, such as the extent to which the world is globalized (Ryoo, 2005).Most discussions of the role of the state given globalization highlight relationships between state and market and yield two common but contrary positions. Neoliberals tend to offer a negative view of the state in developing countries, characterizing it as corrupt, self-interested and incompetent (Mosley et al., 1991). The imposition of privatization, deregulation, decentralization and further integration into the global economy have, not surprisingly, coincided with a decrease in public expenditures in such countries (Gonzalez, 1996). Under the force of such trends, some see the state as increasingly powerless or even obsolete given globalization, while liberated market economies progressively fulfill the traditional functions of state power. But other observers take the view that, although globalization is changing the role of the state, it will remain an important actor (Featherstone, 1990;Giddens, 2004;Ryoo, 2005).Within this context, many globalization theorists forecast the end of national boundaries, national corporations, national industries, and the end of national economies, where all will merge into corresponding transnational
