GLOBALISATION AND SOCIAL CHANGE

C olonialism and the G lobal C onnection We began our story of social and economic development in modern India from the colonial period. You will recall from Chapter that modern capitalism had a global dimension from its very inception. Colonialism was part of the system that required new sources of capital, raw materials, energy, markets and a global network that sustained it. Often globalisation today identifies large-scale movement of people or migration as a defining feature.

You know, however, that perhaps the greatest movement of people was the migration of European people who settled down in the Americas and Australia. You will remember how indentured labourers were taken away in ships from India to work in distant parts of Asia, Africa and Americas. And the slave trade that carted thousands of Africans away to distant shores.