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Several concepts are useful for thinking about globalization in general, especially the global flows of focal concern here (Held et al. 1999).

1 How extensive are the global flows, relations, networks, interconnections? Obviously, such phenomena have existed for centuries, if not millennia, but what is unique today is how much more extensive they have become. They now cover a much greater portion of the globe, involve many more global flows, and will likely grow even more extensive in the future.

2 How intensive are the global flows, relations, networks, interconnections, and so on? While these phenomena may, in the past, have lacked much intensity and, as a result, been more epiphenomenal, they are now much more central and important. This is due, at least in part, to the increasingly frenzied activity associated with these flows, as well as to the similarly intense attention to, and concern about, them. For example, many people today are virtually addicted to such things as e-mail to friends throughout the world and to social networking websites that include participants from around the globe.

3 What is the velocity of global flows, relations, networks, interconnections, and so on? It is not just their extensity and the intensity that matters, but also the speed at which they move. It is clear that globalization brings with it, and is characterized by, increasingly rapid movement of virtually everything. Velocity is closely related to many of the concepts discussed above (and thereby closely related to globalization) including liquidity, gaseousness, lightness, and weightlessness. Increases in any and all of these characteristics tend to lead to movement around the globe at greater and greater speed.

4 What is the impact propensity of global flows, relations, networks, interconnections, and so on? Again, while these flows may have had little likelihood of having a deep and widespread impact in the past, the increasing propensity to have such effects is characteristic of globalization. Think, for example, of the huge global impact of September 11 because of the fact that it was known about, and even viewed, simultaneously throughout much of the world.

This same set of ideas can – and should – also be used to think about the various structures that have emerged to both expedite and impede globalization:

1 How extensive are the structures that expedite and impede globalization? It is clear that the structures designed to expedite globalization (for example, export-processing zones, see Chapter 4) are far more extensive than they once were and it is likely that they will grow even more extensive in the future. Structures designed to impede globalization (e.g. tariffs, customs restrictions, border controls, etc.) are undergoing something of a renaissance today, especially in light of the Great Recession.

2 How intensive are the efforts to construct or destroy, expand, or contract structures that expedite and impede globalization? At the moment, for example, efforts to further lower tariff barriers globally seem to have lost intensity, whereas efforts to create new barriers (e.g. physical walls and legal restrictions on immigration) seem to be higher in many countries.

3 What is the velocity of the efforts to construct structures that expedite and impede globalization? While the construction of the US–Mexico wall, for example, was halted by the Obama administration, Trump sought to resume building it along the border.

4 What is the impact propensity of the efforts to construct structures that expedite and impede globalization? Specifically, what is the impact of such structures on global flows, relations, networks, interconnections, and so on? In terms of that wall between the US and Mexico it is clearly hoped, at least by the American government, that undocumented immigration from and through Mexico will be greatly reduced. However, some in the US question its potential impact. The mayor of a border town in Texas said: “You can go over, under and around a fence … and it [the wall] can’t make an apprehension” (Blumenthal 2000: 12).