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Friedman and Carroll have opposing views on the Americanization of
world culture. Friedman, in his paper titled “Revolution in US”
supports this notion while Carroll’s essay “American television in
Europe” shows that she is not entirely convinced that this is the case.
Let us examine their viewpoints in more detail.
SUMMARY OF FRIEDMAN’S ESSAY:
Since the Cold War and the fall of the Berlin wall, America has
emerged as the undoubted world leader. American policies, beliefs, even
American TV shows are being exported to the rest of the world. Several
countries and cultures, Friedman suggests, feel threatened by this
‘invasion’ of their cultural and social status by what they term as
‘Americanization’.
Since the Communist system has fallen, America has been, in a way,
spreading its culture and values through public media to other nations
of the world. Symbols of American culture and life such as Mc Donald’s,
Pizza Hut, Disneyland…even TV shows such as Friends and Sesame Street
can be found in every corner of the world.
Friedman proposes that America is spreading its influence across the
globe, and several countries feel that it is a conspiracy of America to
turn them into an appendage of the US by inflicting their society and
values and ways of life upon them.
He states that with the end of the Cold War, the coming century
belongs to America. Globalization is leaping forward and is globalizing
American culture, icons and lifestyle – showing and giving the world
the best and the worst of America.
However not everyone wants to have American values pushed on them.
World economies differ in their distribution of gains and methods of
marketing, and their way has worked for decades. However the world is
being pressured, whether they like it or not, whether America herself
wants it or not, to follow and emulate the American system of
capitalism and economic policies.
Just as Britain monopolized the world in the 19th Century and showed
the rest of the globe the way, today America is in the driver’s seat,
reinforced by developments in technology and infrastructure that make
it financially improbable for nations to adopt a different economy than
the American model. And many nations do resist and resent this fait
accompli presented to them, albeit on a silver platter.
Today, from economies to TV programming to the latest developments
in any sphere – it’s all marked with that hated logo – UNCLE SAM WAS
HERE. Friedman calls this the ‘second era of globalization’, which has
the distinctly American face of Mickey Mouse, Mc Donald’s and
Microsoft.
A world revolution is taking place, and it’s all churned out in the
American factories, then presented to the world. To many foreign
nations, there is no distinction between Americanization and
globalization, says Friedman. This can be expressed in a nutshell by
the words of Ronald Steel quoted in Friedman’s article: “It was never
the Soviet Union but the United States itself that is the true
revolutionary power. We believe that our institutions must confine all
others to the ash heap of history.
We lead an economic system that has effectively buried every other
form of production and distribution — leaving great wealth and
sometimes great ruin in its wake. The cultural messages we transmit
through Hollywood and McDonald's go out across the world to capture and
also undermine other societies.
Unlike more traditional conquerors, we are not content merely to
subdue others: We insist that they be like us. And of course for their
own good. We are the world's most relentless proselytizers. The world
must be democratic. It must be capitalistic. It must be tied into the
subversive messages of the World Wide Web. No wonder many feel
threatened by what we represent."
SUMMARY OF CARROLL’S ESSSAY:
Marnie Carroll is an American living in Switzerland. She has had an
opportunity to observe the reaction of the European people to American
culture and its so called icons, and she is not convinced that the
world is indeed being ‘Americanized’.
She offers several reasons and examples to support her theory. While
conceding that America is a powerful country and a world leader, and
that it does exert some degree of influence on the world via its
financial, economic and political presence, culturally America has not
made a very deep inroad into European lifestyle. European culture and
traditions are deep rooted and have been around fro a long time, even
before America ever came to be an independent nation.
She feels that although American TV channels are available in Europe
and several American TV serials and soap operas can also be viewed in
Europe, they seem to acquire a different flavor once they cross the
Atlantic. She offers the following reasons to support her claim that
American culture undergoes a transformation in the host European
countries:
(a) American culture is too young and too new to have much of an
impact in Europe. Nothing that America has invented is so original or
so path breaking as to provide a novelty to the Europeans.
(b) Even while American channels like CNN are available, in Europe,
they acquire the local European flavor when aired, to play to their
audience.
Thus there is no real influence of American culture on the
Europeans, as what they are seeing cannot be construed as wholly
American. These channels are transmitted in the local languages, not in
English.
(c) According to Carroll, language is the biggest barrier for the
rapid spread of American culture. Most people in Europe do not speak or
understand English, and since movies and other programs involve a depth
of knowledge of a language to comprehend it completely, most Europeans
are unable to fully understand programs when they are transmitted in
English.
Therefore there are several language channels in Europe, and even
the American channels, when translated to the local European language,
offer content and programming vastly different from its original.
In some cases, subtitles are given in the local language and often
the content of these subtitles is not exactly what was in the original.
(d) Another large barrier to the spread of American culture in
Europe, according to Carroll, is the fact that European channels do not
broadcast programs at specific times and on a regular basis as they do
in America. Therefore, while in America, it is possible for a person to
become attached to a particular program or lifestyle; in Europe, when
the frequency of programming is so sporadic, it becomes virtually
impossible for a person to get hooked onto a particular program.
(e) Carroll also contends that the invasion of culture is not just a
one-way process. It is not merely America colonizing European culture;
the same holds good the other way round as well. There are certain
European influences that have also seeped into American culture.
(f) Carroll therefore concludes her assessment by stating that it is
true that waves of American culture are descending into Europe, but in
the process of descent, they are modified, transformed and adapted to
fit into the European mold. And hence the ensuing product is not really
pan-American; rather it is a blended European-American motley in which
the European home element tends to predominate.
ANALYSIS:
It is interesting to note that Friedman and Carroll appear to be on
opposite ends of the scale. Friedman offers a perfectly convincing
argument, that indeed the world is now becoming truly global – leaning
heavily in the direction of Americanization. On the other hand Carroll
feels that the influence of American culture is not overwhelming.
She contends that it has had only a marginal effect. Since we live
in a global world, with international borders quickly dimming, the same
is to be expected, even embraced.
Both Carroll and Friedman are convincing in putting forward their
propositions and points of view. Which one is right? Perhaps in this
matter, there is o real right and wrong. Perhaps the answer lies in the
perception of the person making he analysis.
Carroll lives in Europe, and is therefore more in tune with the way
American culture can be seen to have crept in. However Friedman is an
American, born, bred and living; and therefore believes as all
Americans do, that his country is blazing the path of freedom and Big
Macs, and that every other nation is being led by the American leash.
There are some nations in the world who enjoy an old and ancient
culture, and there are also many people in these cultures, even in the
present day, who cling to the old and cherished ways. To these people,
America appears as the intrusive Big Brother – the gun toting, pizza
chewing bully cowboy, who presumes to impose his views on others.
But from the American point of view, we consider ourselves to be the
proponents and protectors of democracy world over. We feel that it is
our right and our duty to impose that culture which we know and embrace
as being so right and true, upon other unwilling people as well. An
example of this would be George W Bush’s desire to ‘democratize the
Middle east’.
Never mind that they have survived under a theocratic society for
centuries, never mind that they are up in arms against the US’ plan; we
know better and after all, once they get a taste of ‘American’ they’ll
never look back, eh?
Nevertheless it must be said that there is a great deal of
attraction towards the American culture world over. However there is
also much merit in Carroll’s argument that cultures thousands of years
old are not likely to switch over at a moment’s notice, or because a
couple of Microsoft PCs or American food or TV or movies have filtered
in. the reality of the situation is that people do look at America with
either yearning or envy.
The former long to experience the same freedoms that Americans take
for granted; while there are those who envy America for all that she
has achieved in so short a time. The cultural and traditional framework
in their countries is much too rigid to embrace the individual freedoms
that America advocates.
CONCLUSION:
So, in the end, it all boils down to a matter of Point of view. The
perception of the viewer. For example, if we were looking at an object,
the frontal view would be different from its silhouette or profile.
Similarly, depending on which corner of the globe we are viewing events
or their effects from, our perception would differ.
The media is indeed a powerful weapon and many ideas and opinions
from the US are being sent to other parts of the globe via the media.
However it must be remembered that the media, whether American or
otherwise, is only concerned with one thing – profits. Therefore it is
likely to tailor its program to meet the requirement of the viewers.
There is a saying that a government cannot be better than the
people. We might extend this concept and state that TV programming will
only represent what the viewer wants – and as Carroll so adeptly points
out - the fact that American news channels like CNN are adapting their
programming to suit the local market does seem to prove that staple
American fare is not yet palatable to the world taste.
REFERENCES:
1. FRIEDMAN, Thomas L. “Come the Revolution” – New York Times,
Op-Ed, April 2, 2003.
2. FRIEDMAN, Thomas L. “What Goes around” –
Published February 26, 2004.
3. LOCKARD, Joe. “The American Empire in
televised crisis” – Issue #57, October 2001.
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