Steger contends that “globalization” has become the buzz-word of our time. He explains a growing number of scholars in the social sciences and humanities have invoked the term to describe a variety of changing economic, political, cultural, and ideological processes that are alleged to have accelerated since the 1970s. Scholars have also explored a number of additional aspects of globalization, such as the collective impact of globalization on the ecological health of the planet’s natural systems, the structure and direction of transnational migration flows, the emergence of transnational social movements such as the women’s movement, the spread of global diseases, the emergence of international terrorist networks, and the globalization of military technology linked to a transnationalization of defense production. Although a number of researchers have questioned the utility of such broad characterizations, only a few go so far as to deny the existence of globalization altogether.

Steger’s work on globalization and nonviolence has earned him both national and international recognition. His book, Globalism: The New Market Ideology won the 2003 Michael Harrington Book Award of the American Political Science Association and has been adopted in 120 college courses in the United States. In 1997, he was awarded the Teaching Initiative Award and was appointed as a Senior Research Fellow at the University of Hawai’i’s Globalization Research Center. He has delivered lectures on globalization and non-violence in the U.S. and abroad, including East Asia, Europe, Australia and the Middle East. In 2002, the U.S. Department of State identified him as one of the “leading scholars on globalization in the United States.” Comprised of 13 books, two-dozen articles and book chapters, and numerous reviews, Steger’s academic work has been widely cited and favorable reviews of his books have appeared in more than 25 academic journals, including the highly prestigious American Political Science Review, American Historical Review, and International Affairs. His research has been funded by institutions such as the National Endowment of the Humanities, and he has been an academic adviser to a PBS TV series on the rise and fall of socialism.