Jaajef wa G-L,
FYI
Yeenduleem ak jaama
Tony
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salam folks
Beginning the 30th of this month (i.e. day after
tomorrow, or
tomorrow, or today... depending upon where you
are, and when you
see this message) the world trade organization will
be meeting in
Seattle... But they won't be meeting alone! Along
with them will be
tens of thousands and thousands of protestors from
all over the
world to demand a variety of demands.
Many of us are from, or are living in the so-called
"third world" and
this will for sure impact our countries of origin, and
where we are
living. Important to understand the issues... so here
is an article
that discusses some of these issues. For
comprehensive coverage
of the World trade organization, and the protests
please see Z net
http://www.zmag.org.
Altaf
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A SHORT GUIDE TO THE WTO, THE
MILLENNIUM ROUND AND
THE RUMBLE IN SEATTLE
By Elaine Bernard, Executive Director, Harvard
Trade Union
Program
The World Trade Organization (WTO) is coming to
Seattle at the
end of November and tens of thousands of labor,
environmental,
and progressive activists are organizing to give
them a hot
reception. There are thousands and thousands of
pages out there *
on the net, in progressive journals, articles, even
books, on the
WTO. But rather like trade agreements themselves,
sometimes the
very volume of materials available on the topic
overwhelms the uninitiated reader. So, I thought I
would put
together a quick guide to the WTO, to the Seattle
meeting, and to
the various debates within the progressive
community on the WTO.
What is the WTO?
It's an international organization of 134 member
countries which is
both a forum for negotiating international trade
agreements and the
monitoring and regulating body for enforcing the
agreements. The
WTO was created in 1995, by the passage of the
provisions of
"Uruguay Round" of the General Agreement on
Tariffs and Trade
(GATT). Prior to the Uruguay Round, GATT focused
on promoting
world trade by pressuring countries to reduce
tariffs. But with the creation of the WTO, this
corporate inspired
agenda was significantly ratched up by targeting
so-called "non-
tariff barriers to trade" * essentially any national or
local protective
legislation which might be construed as impacting
trade.
So, Aren't we in favor of regulation?
Sure, but not the type of regulation proposed by the
WTO, a
powerful body of unelected bureaucrats, who
deliberate in secret
with an aim to turning the entire world into one big
market.
Officially, the WTO has two main objectives: to
promote and
extend trade liberalization (by breaking down
national "barriers" to trade), and to establish a
mechanism for trade
dispute settlement. In practice, the WTO is seeking
to deregulate
international commerce and break open domestic
markets for
foreign investors. Its rule making seeks to free
corporations from
government regulation which would constitute a
barrier to trade. It
permits relatively unrestricted movement of money,
capital, goods
and services, while at the same time providing
investors and
corporations with extensive protection of their
property rights. It
even extends corporate property rights through the
so called
"intellectual properties" provisions.
Intellectual property as defined by trade
agreements is not about
the creative powers of intellectuals. Rather, it is
about protecting
corporate ownership and monopoly over the
patenting of plants,
processes, seed varieties, drugs, and software.
The intellectual
property provisions are just one example of how
there is extensive
protectionism in this so-called "free trade" regime *
but protection
for corporations and punitive market discipline for
workers,
consumers and small farmers.
Freedom for Capital, Market Discipline for Labor
Here's an example of WTO thinking. The WTO says
that they can
not deal with social issues, only "trade" forgetting
that once you
start to deal with trade in services, you are indeed
dealing with
many social issues. It says that it can only regulate
"product" not
"process." With labor and environmental standards,
what we
normally regulate is process. It's been an important
acquisition of
the labor, consumer, and environmental
movements in recent years to move beyond the
simple regulation
of end
product and regulate process * how things are
made. It is in the
very production methods that we can improve
safety, eliminate
hazards and develop cleaner processes. The
difference between a
shirt produced by sweated labor under near slave
like conditions
and a shirt produced by union labor under decent
conditions isn't
readily obvious in the packaging (the end product)
but rather its
observed in the monitoring of the "process" of how
the shirt is
produced.
By contrast, when the WTO sees the interest of
investors and
capital threatened * it can spring into action and be
quite powerful
in its enforcement. So, for example, when workers
are being forced
to work with flagrant violation of labor law and
safety codes, the
WTO says there is nothing it can do. But let these
same workers
illegally produce "pirate" videos, or CDs
(challenging a corporations
copyright) and the WTO can spring into action
sanctioning all sorts
of actions against the offending country * in order to
protect a
corporations "intellectual property."
Ok, back to Seattle, what is the millennium round?
The WTO wants to continue its campaign of trade
liberalization and
in particular it wants to increase the trade in
services * including
public services. Unfortunately, this means further
turning over
services such as health care, education, water and
utilities to
markets and international competition and
undermining and
destroying local control and protection of
communities.
What's the problem with markets? Markets are fine,
in their place,
but they must not be permitted to replace social
decision-making.
Markets should not be confused with democratic
institutions.
Markets, for example, might be useful in
determining price of
goods, but they should not be mechanisms for
determining our
values as a community. Markets are oblivious to
morals and
promote only the value of profit.
So, what do we want to do about the WTO?
Resistance to the free trade agenda and the
continual drive to
undermine social decision-making and democracy
is the basis of
unity for all the groups protesting the WTO. Beyond
that profound
and important agreement, there are wider
differences about what to
do about the WTO.
Resisters want to abolish the WTO
Some of the groups coming to Seattle are
supporters of the
resistance movement * arguing that the trade
liberalization program
of the WTO is fundamentally flawed and we would
be better simply
abolishing this dangerous organization. They argue
for building the
global resistance and constructing global solidarity
from below.
Reformers believe they can transform the WTO
Others, in particular much of organized labor argue
that while the
WTO trade liberalization program is deeply flawed,
it's now well
established as a powerful organization and that the
concept of
negotiated trade regulation is vital to the health and
welfare of the
world community. They argue that if core labor
rights,
environmental protections, and what the Europeans
refer to as a
"social clause" was inserted into the WTO's
mandate and practice that it could be transformed.
Resisters, reformers and rebels from around the
globe will be
gathering in Seattle later this month in a
remarkable international
solidarity action challenging the WTO's corporate
agenda. While
there are important tactical differences in
approaches to the WTO,
there is also a fair degree of unity in action and in
identifying the
WTO as an important global institution promoting
policies which
are contributing to the growth of inequality and
the undermining of democracy. The protest in
Seattle maybe be
both the last major, international demonstration of
the century and
the beginning of a new powerful global solidarity
movement.
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