Cities Are Part of Toronto. This Polarization

¶ … cities are part of Toronto. This polarization is the result of socioeconomic factors that coalesce to produce the types of neighborhoods observed. Income plays a major role in deciding the living area of an individual. The author also identified a decline in the number of persons in the category called middle income. Ethnicity is another defining feature of cities along with immigrant populations, and employment. An interesting feature of the article was the warnings issued by various researchers and agencies. Of particular interest was the concept of poverty by postal code. Thus, there is a resulting consolidation of poverty in specific areas.

Hulchanski's writing was crisp and interesting very pointed with limited digression into unnecessary. The author provided generous rational for the use of various measures particularly where these measures differed from what may have been anticipated by the reader. The work also demonstrated how factors beyond the individual might be responsible for life chances and opportunities. Social workers are therefore required to consider multiple issues when addressing a client.

The influence of globalization on the lives of ordinary citizens expanded the discussion and conceptualization of separation presented in Hulchanski's work. The global village concept while existing for a long time has not always been a factor that is considered in the understanding of the forces that shape social work. The presentation of the role of global forces is pivotal to a more comprehensive understanding of social work. External forces, ideological forces and marginal forces influence how groups at the level of the society identify resources as well as the discursive elements that surround the process of problem identification.

This piece was particularly refreshing and expanded my conception of the integration of expansive streams of thought into the social work framework. These global trends cannot be ignored as the social worker engages with superiors and with clients. The only thing missing from the piece would be a clearer articulation as to how these trends are influencing social work theory. This is of particular interest to me, as the theoretical basis for practice requires greater explication in some areas of the discipline. The role therefore of global trends in theory formulation would have been of critical interest.

The article titled "New Systems" dealt with globalization from the perspective of a columnist. The dominant feature of the work was the expression of the culture of globalization that tends to make things all over the world the same. This tendency toward homogeneity is a critical feature of capitalism as it reduces the cost of doing business tremendously. Friedman takes great pains to paint a picture of globalization as a powerful force that was influential in the destruction of communism. The contrast between globalization and the cold war was useful but at times, the intent of the contrast became lost. The idea of the demographic pattern of globalization found resonance with the demographic patterns identified by Hulchanski's discussion of Toronto's neighborhoods.

De Rivero's work expanded on the trends presented by Friedman. The attention given to not only nation states but also multinational corporations added a necessary balance to the arguments raised by Friedman. The danger posed by MNC is an important consideration of the work and it gave an important call to understanding the challenge of a world dominated by bloodless corporations and weak world leaders. This work honed and sharpened the destructive role of multinational and transnational corporations in their quest for greater profits at the expense of national interests.