What tells a deglobalisation?

There are many events that seem to reverse globalisation and lead the world to a deglobalization path, such as Brexit, the tension between China and the US, and the failed TPP. We should have measures to measure whether the world economy is on the path of globalisation or deglobalisation.

Some researchers use indices to measure globalisation; however, such measure is partially subjective as researchers could have preferences about what should be included in the index measures and what weight should be given to different factors. I wonder if there is a strictly objective measure to measure the degree of globalisation.

Firstly, the correlation between countries’ economic performances should be an important measure. If the correlation (not necessarily positive) between economies that are distant is strong enough, it shows there are strong spillover effects across different economies, and we can see globalisation creates stronger spillover effects. However, economic performance is not necessarily everything. Secondly, we can use migration numbers as a globalisation measure, as globalisation allows people to move around countries. However, people’s decisions to move around the world are based on so many factors, globalisation is a part of the reason; therefore, if we only use migration number to measure globalisation, it should not be very precise. Thirdly, the number of multinational cooperate could be another measure. If there are more multinational companies, it measures more activities are done across borders. In addition, employees in multinational companies are likely to cooperate across borders and even move across borders. However, it could show the degree of globalisation partially.

To conclude, I think that it is able to use some objective measures to show if there is a positive or negative change in the level of globalisation, but there is no single objective measure that is able to tell the exact (or precise) change in the level of globalisation.