Human and physical influences on global interactions

The sense that places feel **closer** because faster transport and communications cut the **time and cost** of crossing the distance between them.

The **fall in travel time (and cost)** between two places as transport and communications technology improves.

No — its real size is unchanged. What shrinks is the **friction of distance**: the time, cost and effort of crossing it.

Sail to **steamship** to **railway** to **jet airliner** (plus container shipping and high-speed rail).

The postal letter to the **telegraph** to the **telephone** to the **internet** and **social media**.

Because it depends on **access** to technology — the **digital divide** leaves poorer and remoter groups with a large, slow world.

A body of cooperating governments that sets **shared rules** to smooth flows of trade, money and people across borders.

An agreed area within which **tariffs and trade barriers are cut**, speeding the movement of goods and capital between members.

A special industrial area offering **tax breaks and relaxed rules** to attract investment and accelerate export flows.

**MGOs** (shared rules) and **free-trade zones / EPZs** (cut tariffs, tax breaks) — both lower barriers to flows.

**Physical geography** (mountains, deserts, distance, isolation) and **poor access to technology** (the digital divide).

Political and economic **structures decide how fast** flows move; **physical geography caps how far** they reach — so they interact rather than simply compete.

Efforts by places, groups and governments to **slow, block or reverse** global flows of trade, people, money and ideas.

Organised **opposition** to free trade, global institutions and the power of multinational firms.

Putting your own nation's **interests, identity and control first**, often above international cooperation.

Politics that pits **ordinary people against a distant 'elite'**, often blaming globalization for everyday hardship.

Government policy that **shields home industries** from foreign competition, using tariffs, quotas and subsidies.

A **tax on imported goods** that makes them dearer so home-made goods can compete.

A deliberate **trade or financial restriction** used to punish or pressure another country.

When a state keeps **strategic resources** (oil, gas, lithium) under national or state control rather than open to foreign firms.

**Bringing production back** to the home country after years of offshoring it abroad, often with government subsidies.

It is **strongest where globalization's costs are felt most** — deindustrialised regions, communities facing rapid change, and states protecting sovereignty.

Flows **route around** barriers — trade diverts to third countries, sanctioned states find new partners, and digital flows are hard to block.

Resistance is **reshaping, not reversing**, the global economy — it re-routes and re-shores flows, but globalization is too embedded to reverse.