Economic, Social and Political Globalization and Human Development

Increased global economic integration, global forms of governance, globally inter-linked social and environmental developments are often referred to as “globalization”. The target of this article is to prove the dependency of globalization on human development. The first part provides the methodology of measuring overall globalization with emphasis on the KOF Index of Globalization 2007. The Index of Globalization includes economic, social, and political contexts. The second part introduces one of the parameters of institutional quality – HDI (or rather IHDI as the real indicator of the level of human development) and its methodology. The Inequality-adjusted Human Development Index combines three dimensions: A long and healthy life, access to knowledge, and a decent standard of living. The third part compares indices and scores together, analyzes them, and confirms or refutes the empirical relationships between the Index of Globalization and its parts and the Inequality-adjusted Human Development Index. It is possible to conclude from the results achieved in the study that globalization remains primarily, a very strong and powerful economic phenomenon. But spurring growth rates and reducing poverty in countries with poor institutions cannot be done simply by globalizing their economies