Globalization, Culture, and Identities in Crisis

Abstract

Culture in its various forms now serves as a primary carrier of globalization and modern values, and constitutes an important arena of contestation for national, religious, and ethnic identity. Although reactions in Europe, Japan, and other societies where modern values prevail, tend to be symbolic, in areas of the developing world, especially in Muslim countries where traditional values and radically different notions of identity and society predominate, reactions tend to be very intense and redirected at external targets through forms of transference and scapegoating. Ultimately, this is not so much a clash between civilizations as a clash within civilizations.