Globalization, or globalisation, is the process of interaction and integration among people, companies, and governments worldwide. The term globalization first appeared in the early 20th century, developed its current meaning sometime in the second half of the 20th century, and came into popular use in the 1990s to describe the unprecedented international connectivity of the post-Cold War world. Its origins can be traced back to 18th and 19th centuries due to advances in transportation and communications technology. This increase in global interactions has caused a growth in international trade and the exchange of ideas, beliefs, and culture. Globalization is primarily an economic process of interaction and integration that is associated with social and cultural aspects. However, disputes and international diplomacy are also large parts of the history of globalization, and of modern globalization.
International relations (IR) are the interactions among sovereign states. The scientific study of those interactions is also referred to as international studies, international politics, or international affairs. In a broader sense, the study of IR, in addition to multilateral relations, concerns all activities among states—such as war, diplomacy, trade, and foreign policy—as well as relations with and among other international actors, such as intergovernmental organizations (IGOs), international nongovernmental organizations (INGOs), international legal bodies, and multinational corporations (MNCs). There are several schools of thought within IR, of which the most prominent are realism, liberalism, constructivism, and rationalism.
Global North and Global South are terms that denote a method of grouping countries based on their defining characteristics with regard to socioeconomics and politics. According to the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD), the Global South broadly comprises Africa, Latin America and the Caribbean, Asia, and Oceania. Most of the Global South's countries are commonly identified as lacking in their standard of living, which includes having lower incomes, high levels of poverty, high population growth rates, inadequate housing, limited educational opportunities, and deficient health systems, among other issues. Additionally, these countries' cities are characterized by their poor infrastructure. Opposite to the Global South is the Global North, which the UNCTAD describes as broadly comprising Northern America and Europe, Israel, Japan, South Korea, Australia, and New Zealand. As such, the two terms do not refer to the Northern Hemisphere or the Southern Hemisphere, as many of the Global South's countries are geographically located in the former and, similarly, a number of the Global North's countries are geographically located in the latter.
The Central European Free Trade Agreement (CEFTA) is an international trade agreement between countries mostly located in Southeastern Europe. Founded by representatives of Poland, Hungary and Czechoslovakia, CEFTA in 2006 expanded to Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Croatia, Moldova, Montenegro, North Macedonia, Romania, Serbia, Slovenia and the UNMIK.
The Southern African Development Community (SADC) is an inter-governmental organization headquartered in Gaborone, Botswana.
European integration is the process of industrial, economic, political, legal, social, and cultural integration of states wholly or partially in Europe or nearby. European integration has primarily come about through the European Union and its policies.
Information and communications technology (ICT) is an extensional term for information technology (IT) that stresses the role of unified communications and the integration of telecommunications and computers, as well as necessary enterprise software, middleware, storage and audiovisual, that enable users to access, store, transmit, understand and manipulate information.
The Commonwealth Business Council (CBC) was an institution of the Commonwealth Family that aimed to use the global network of the Commonwealth of Nations more effectively for the promotion of global trade and investment for shared prosperity. It was formed at the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting 1997 (CHOGM) in Edinburgh, United Kingdom, and replaced in July 2014 by the Commonwealth Enterprise and Investment Council (CWEIC).
Regional Integration is a process in which neighboring countries enter into an agreement in order to upgrade cooperation through common institutions and rules. The objectives of the agreement could range from economic to political to environmental, although it has typically taken the form of a political economy initiative where commercial interests are the focus for achieving broader socio-political and security objectives, as defined by national governments. Regional integration has been organized either via supranational institutional structures or through intergovernmental decision-making, or a combination of both.
Functionalism is a theory of international relations that arose during the interwar period principally from the strong concern about the obsolescence of the state as a form of social organization. Rather than the self-interest of nation states that realists see as a motivating factor, functionalists focus on common interests and needs shared by states in a process of global integration triggered by the erosion of state sovereignty and the increasing weight of knowledge and hence of scientists and experts in the process of policy-making. Its roots can be traced back to the liberal and idealist traditions that started with Immanuel Kant and goes as far as Woodrow Wilson's "Fourteen Points" speech.
Marxist and neo-Marxist international relations theories are paradigms which reject the realist/liberal view of state conflict or cooperation, instead focusing on the economic and material aspects. It purports to reveal how the economy trumps other concerns, which allows for the elevation of class as the focus of the study.
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs is the Netherlands' ministry responsible for foreign relations, foreign policy, international development, international trade, diaspora and matters dealing with the European Union, NATO and the Benelux Union. The ministry was created in 1798, as the Department of Foreign Affairs of the Batavian Republic. In 1876, it became the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
Serbia–Ukraine relations are foreign relations between Serbia and Ukraine. Serbia, as a direct successor to the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia, recognized Ukraine on 15 April 1994. Diplomatic relations between Ukraine and the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia were established on 15 April 1994.
Informatization or informatisation refers to the extent by which a geographical area, an economy or a society is becoming information-based, i.e. the increase in size of its information labor force. Usage of the term was inspired by Marc Porat’s categories of ages of human civilization: the Agricultural Age, the Industrial Age and the Information Age (1978). Informatization is to the Information Age what industrialization was to the Industrial Age. It has been stated that:
The Eurasian Economic Union is an economic union of five post-Soviet states located in Eurasia. The EAEU has an integrated single market. As of 2023, it consists of 183 million people and a gross domestic product of over $2.4 trillion.
The Foreign Ministry is the government body in the Sultanate of Oman responsible for organising and directing Oman's relations with other countries and with regional and international organisations.
The foreign policy of Ukraine is the strategic approach Ukraine takes to its relations with foreign nations, cooperation with international organizations, promotion of its national interests and protection of the rights of its citizens and diaspora abroad. Ukraine's foreign policy is guided by a number of key priorities.
Policies advocating Middle East economic integration aim to bring about peace, stability, and prosperity in the Middle East, which they believe can only be sustained over the long run via regional economic cooperation.
From the establishment of the European Economic Community in 1957 until the breakup of Yugoslavia in the early 1990s, thus during the Cold War period, the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia was the first socialist state to develop relations with the organisation. Notwithstanding occasional and informal proposals coming from both sides, Yugoslavia never became a full member state of the EEC.
