-Caveat Lector-
SEATTLE AND BEYOND:DISARMING THE
NEW WORLD ORDER
by Michel Chossudovsky (posted on emperors-clothes.com 11-25-99)
Professor of Economics at the University of Ottawa and author of
The Globalization of Poverty, Impacts of IMF and World Bank
Reforms, Third World Network, Penang and Zed Books, London,
1997.
[Note from www.emperors-clothes.com : Prof. Chossudovsky grants
permission for this article to be reposted unabridged on free
Internet sites or by email. (For other details see note at end) Please
reproduce this text in full including this statement.]
In preparing the Seattle Millennium meetings, Washington
in consultation with Brussels and the WTO in Geneva, is set on
weakening and dividing social movements and citizens' groups
which have converged on Seattle from all over the World.
Meanwhile, local organizers are busy -- together with the FBI
and the Seattle Police Department (SPD)-- in carefully planning
"security arrangements" for the official venue. An extensive
police apparatus has been set motion. Special Forces from the
FBI, the CIA and other federal agencies will be on the scene.
"Trouble-makers" are to be held at bay, well equipped riot police
are on hand including Gang Squads and SWAT teams of the
Tactical Operations Divisions which constitute the "more
militarized components" of the police force.1
Everything has been put in place to keep the Citizens'
Summit physically removed from the Ministerial Conference. As
in previous counter-summits (Rio de Janeiro, Madrid,
Copenhagen, Beijing, etc.), the intent is to ensure that the
numerous protest meetings, teach-ins and mass rallies do not
obstruct or in any way threaten the legitimacy of the official
venue. In Seattle, the holding of parallel sessions by NGOs
requires formal "accreditation" with the Seattle Host Committee
chaired by Microsoft's Bill Gates and Philip Condit of The Boeing
Company.
Several months ahead of time, the WTO and Western
governments had called for a "dialogue" with selected civil
society organizations in setting the agenda for the Millennium
Round. "Partner NGOs", namely those "we can trust" were
provided with funds to travel and organize their respective
"teach-ins" in Seattle. Already last year, the WTO had announced
a plan for "an on-going collaboration with partner NGOs" while
emphasizing that the WTO "recognizes the role NGOs can play to
increase the awareness of the public in respect of WTO
activities".2
Similarly, the European Commission had underscored its
"commitment to transparency and openness in trade
policy-making".3
Carefully screened "partner NGOs" were invited to participate in
a number of preparatory "issue-specific" events. The European
Commission held several rounds of consultations with selected
consumer, labor, environmental and development organizations
with a view to "to improve the transparency of WTO meetings"
including public access to WTO documents and the creation of
an WTO "information ombudsman".4 In the words of (former)
European Trade Commissioner Sir Leon Brittan:
"A Millennium round of trade talks should not just benefit
business. We can and should ensure that Consumers and
the environment also gain. The Commission has today
opened a dialogue with a wide cross-section of NGOs as it
believes transparency and openness are essential if a new
round is to reap its full benefits. NGOs are crucial partners
in preparing for the negotiations that lie ahead." 5
THE COUNTER SUMMIT
Controlled and financed by official donors and research
foundations, the hidden agenda is to install a "politically
correct" Citizens' Summit, namely to ensure that the various
teach-ins and public rallies in the streets of Seattle conform to
the dominant "counter discourse". The latter consists in
pressing for the inclusion of token environmental, labour and
human rights clauses, "poverty alleviation" schemes as well as
"institutional reforms" without defying the central role of trade
liberalisation.
The partner non-governmental organisations have, in this
regard, already committed themselves not to question "the
legality" or legitimacy of the WTO as an institution. Accredited
NGO participants have been invited to mingle in a friendly
environment with ambassadors, trade ministers and Wall Street
tycoons at several of the official events including the numerous
cocktail parties and receptions. In turn, an (official) "WTO
Sponsored NGO Symposium" is to be held for chosen NGO
participants one day before the launching of the Ministerial
Conference, with carefully worded opening statements by WTO
Director General Mike Moore and US Trade Secretary Charlene
Barshevsky.
In other words, the ploy in Seattle (supported by a lavish public
relations campaign) is to carefully diffuse an international mass
movement directed against the WTO and the powerful business
syndicates which lie discretely in the background. "Criticism yes,
that's democratic", but the "free market" system must prevail,
the legitimacy of the institutions --including their Geneva and
Washington based bureaucracies-- must not be challenged... In
return, the official conference will accept to embody on behalf of
the "accredited" labour and civil society organisations, various
token environmental and other concessions in their main
resolutions with a view to providing a much needed "human
face" to the WTO.
The Millennium Round meetings also purport to replicate the
habitual parallel "People's Summit" which now constitutes an
integral component of successive World venues. Repeated
almost annually since the 1992 Rio Environment Conference, the
People's Summit while providing a forum for critical debate, has
over the years largely become "a ritual of dissent" which largely
leaves the official Summit unscathed.
The parallel P7 ("People's P7 Summit") at the G7 meetings in
Cologne in June 1999, for instance, was put together in
consultation with the host organisers of the official Summit,
generously funded by the Heinrich Boell Foundation which is an
arm of the German Green Party controlled by Foreign Minister
Joschka Fisher. The structure of the Cologne P7 was geared
towards deflecting debate on controversial issues including the
"humanitarian bombings" of Yugoslavia... Meanwhile, more than
20,000 people from all parts of Europe had gathered in the
streets of Cologne under the umbrella of the Jubilee Campaign.
Their petition to unconditionally erase Third World debt had
been signed by more than 17 million people. World leaders
respectfully paid tribute to the Jubilee initiative, responding
with empty rhetorical commitments on debt reduction for the
World's poorest countries. The substantive proposal of the
campaign had been casually dismissed.
In Seattle, many of the accredited NGOs representing specific
interests (eg. environmental, labour, human rights, women's
organisations, etc) will be putting forth separate demands.
There is evidence that several of the key NGOs have been
infiltrated by Western intelligence agencies. The
Counter-Summit is to be fragmented into a "mosaic" of secluded
events focussing on separate and distinct policy issues. The
hidden agenda is to enable each of these separate venues "to
do their own thing" in a semblance of "people's participation":
the goal of the Seattle organisers is to mask the truth, prevent
the development of a mass movement, suppress real democracy
and uphold the authority of the institutions of the New World
Order.
In turn, the AFL-CIO joined by trade union bosses from around
the World, has called upon the WTO to "enforce minimum labour
standards... in the global market". Caving in to Washington's
demands, Labour's buzz-word is to "make the global economy
work for working families".6 A carefully drafted petition urges
the Ministerial Conference to adopt "trade and investment rules
[which] protect workers' rights and the environment".7 The
overall legitimacy of the WTO and of US trade policy is not in
question. In turn, the AFL-CIO has been put in charge of the
organisation of a mass rally which usefully serves the purpose
of deflecting the international protest movement on the streets
of Seattle...
In Seattle, the big divide will be between those who are
genuinely opposed to the New World Order and those "partner"
civil society organisations which have all the appearances of
being "progressive" but which in fact are creatures of the
system. Often funded by their respective governments, they
form part of a politically correct "Opposition" which acts as "a
spokesperson for civil society". But who do they represent?
Many of the "partner NGOs" and lobby groups which frequently
mingle with bureaucrats and politicians, have few contacts with
grass-roots social movements and people's organisations. In the
meantime, they serve to deflect the articulation of "real" social
movements against the New World Order.
This does not mean that "dialogue" with the WTO and the
governments should be ruled out as a means of negotiation. On
the contrary, "lobbying" must be applied vigorously in close
liaison with constituent social movements. The underlying
results and information of these negotiations, however, must be
channelled with a view to reinforcing rather than weakening
grass roots actions. In other words, we should not allow
"lobbying" to be conducted in an isolated and secretive fashion
by organisations which are "hand picked" by the governments
and the WTO.
A MORATORIUM ON LIBERALISATION NEGOTIATIONS
More than 1200 groups and organisations from more than 85
countries have called for a "Moratorium" on further
liberalisation under WTO auspices including the holding of an
"Audit" to be undertaken on the impacts of globalisation. Their
consensus statement ("Statement From Members of
International Civil Society Opposing A Millennium Round"):
"oppose[s] any further liberalisation negotiations,
especially those which will bring new areas under the WTO
regime, such as investment, competition policy and
government procurement. We commit ourselves to
campaign to reject any such proposals. We also oppose
the Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights
(TRIPS) Agreement. We call for a moratorium on any new
issues or further negotiations that expand the scope and
power of the WTO. During this moratorium there should be
a comprehensive and in-depth review and assessment of
the existing agreements. Effective steps should then be
taken to change the agreements. Such a review should
address the WTO's impact on marginalised communities,
development, democracy, environment, health, human
rights, labour rights and the rights of women and children.
The review must be conducted with civil society's full
participation.
The Statement constitutes an important step in challenging the
official Agenda. It is based on a carefully worded consensus of a
large number of individual organisations.
ILLEGALITY OF THE WTO
Yet this important Statement in demanding a "Moratorium" on
further liberalisation negotiations, fails to question the
legitimacy of the WTO as an institution. And indeed this issue
should have been included explicitly in the Statement.
The Marrakesh Agreement of 1994 constitutes a blatant violation
of fundamental social, economic and cultural rights. The stakes
in Seattle are fundamental and cannot be addressed with a
compromise Statement which tacitly accepts the legitimacy of
the WTO as an institution. The WTO was put in place following
the signing of a "technical agreement" negotiated behind
closed doors by bureaucrats. Even the heads of ountry level
delegations to Marrakesh in 1994 were not informed regarding
the statutes of the World Trade Organisation which were drafted
in separate closed sessions by technocrats.
"The Final Act Embodying the Results of the Uruguay Round of
Multilateral Trade Negotiations", was signed by ministers in
Marrakesh on 15 April 1994. The Final Act is a "technical
agreement" which instates the WTO as a World body. "The WTO
framework ensures a "single undertaking approach" to the
results of the Uruguay Round - thus, membership in the WTO
entails accepting all the results of the Round without
exception."
Following the Marrakesh meeting, the 550 page Agreement (plus
its numerous appendices) was either rubber-stamped in a hurry
or never formally ratified by national parliaments. The articles of
agreement of the WTO resulting from this "technical agreement"
were casually entrenched in international law. In other words,
the 1994 Marrakesh Agreement which instates the WTO as a
multilateral body, bypasses the democratic process in each of
the member countries. It blatantly derogates national laws and
constitutions while providing extensive powers to global banks
and multinational corporations.
These powers have in fact become entrenched in the articles of
agreement of the WTO.
In other words, the process of actual creation of the WTO
following the Final Act of Uruguay Round is blatantly "illegal".
Namely a "totalitarian" intergovernmental body has been
casually installed in Geneva, empowered under international law
with the mandate to "police" country level economic and social
policies, derogating the sovereign rights of national
governments.
Similarly, the WTO almost neutralises "with the stroke of the
pen" the authority and activities of several agencies of the
United Nations including the United Nations Conference on
Trade and Development (UNCTAD) and the International Labour
Organisation (ILO).
Moreover, the articles of WTO are no only in contradiction with
pre-existing national and international laws, they are also in at
variance with "The Universal Declaration of Human Rights".
Acceptance of the WTO as a legitimate organisation is
tantamount to an "indefinite moratorium" or repeal of the
Universal Declaration of Human Rights.
Moreover, apart from the blatant violation of international law,
WTO rules provide legitimacy to trade practices which border on
criminality, including "intellectual piracy" by MNCs, the
derogation of plant breeders rights, not to mention genetic
manipulation by the biotechnology giants, the patenting of life
forms including plants, animals, micro-organisms, genetic
material and human life forms under the TRIPs agreement.
In the sphere of financial services, the provisions of the GATS
provide legitimacy to large scale financial and speculative
manipulations directed against developing countries which are
often conducive to the demise of country-level monetary policy.
And the WTO Dispute Settlement Procedures upholds the
legitimacy of these various manipulative procedures...
THE BALANCE SHEET OF ECONOMIC AND SOCIAL
DESTRUCTION
Amply documented, humanity is undergoing in the post-Cold War
era an economic and social crisis of unprecedented scale
leading to the rapid impoverishment of large sectors of the
World population. National economies are collapsing,
unemployment is rampant; Wall Street banks are "taking over
countries" one after the other; regional wars have erupted
along strategic gas-oil pipelines and often behind the various
"insurgencies" are powerful corporate interests which
coincidentally are also lobbying for trade reform... In most
countries the standard of living has collapsed...
This Worldwide crisis of the late twentieth century is more
devastating than the Great Depression of the 1930s. It has
far-reaching geo-political implications; economic dislocation has
also been accompanied by the outbreak of regional conflicts,
the fracturing of national societies and in some cases the
destruction of entire countries. This crisis is by no means limited
to the developing countries. In Europe and North America the
Welfare State is being dismantled, schools and hospitals are
being closed down creating conditions for the outright
privatisation of social services. By far this is the most serious
economic crisis in modern history.
In a large number of developing countries, the services
economy and banking are already in the hands of foreign capital,
peasant economies have been devastated as a result of the
dumping of EU and US grain surpluses.
Genetically modified seeds produced among others by Cargill
and Montsanto (together with carefully engineered farm inputs
produced by these same agribusiness conglomerates) have
been forced upon farmers throughout the World often leading to
mass poverty and the fracture of rural economies, not to
mention the contamination of the food chain derogating the
rights of consumers Worldwide.
In turn, international agribusiness is intent upon driving the
family farm into bankruptcy. This process is by no means limited
to developing countries: up to 30 percent of grain farmers in
Western Canada are on the verge of bankruptcy specifically as a
result of the enforcement of WTO provisions concerning farm
subsidies by the Canadian government. And if this is happening
in Western Canada which constitutes one of the World's most
resourceful "bread baskets", what will be the fate of farmers in
other regions of World?
CHINA'S ACCESSION TO THE WTO
The terms of China's accession to the WTO agreed upon in
bilateral negotiations with the United States barely a few weeks
before the Ministerial Conference in Seattle, spells havoc in a
country of more than one billion population. It will devastate
China's agriculture; it will trigger a deadly wave of bankruptcies
of State enterprises leading to mass unemployment. The
provision of "national treatment" to Western banks could
potentially precipitate the fracture of the entire structure of
Chinese State banking...
The Chinese authorities, fully aware of the ramifications, have
attempted in a publicity stunt to convince Chinese public
opinion that "the benefits from the agreement would justify the
job losses and bankruptcies it will cause".8
In the words of China's chief WTO negotiator Mr. Long Yongtu "a
nation cannot develop and become strong without a sense of
urgency and a sense of crisis."9
ANALYSING & EVALUATING THE NEW WORLD ORDER
In the face of global economic and social devastation, is an
(official) "Audit" really required as put forth in the "Statement
From Members of International Civil Society" to ascertain what is
happening? Some of the NGO critics --including the trade
unions-- involved in the dialogue with the WTO argue that there
are both "positive" and "negative" impacts of trade
liberalisation. This position is ambiguous: the devastating
impacts of "globalisation" are already known and documented,
the NGO community has already produced a wealth of critical
analysis and research. Moreover, the audit proposal accepts the
legitimacy of the WTO, it presupposes that there are mistakes
and "lets talk and put this system on hold" for a few years "while
we re-evaluate".
Do we need an Audit to ascertain "whether or not" the World is
in crisis? And by whom will this Audit be performed and for
whom? The key "partner NGOs" have already positioned
themselves to undertake the relevant commissioned
background studies. Many of the organisations which signed
and endorsed the "Statement" were unaware that the Audit was
part of the "Dialogue" with the WTO and Western governments.
And these research contracts performed "sector by sector" in a
"politically correct" fashion according to pre-established
guidelines set by the funding agencies will take several years to
complete.
The conduct of an Audit has already been accepted by the
European Union in its consultations with the NGOs. Former
European Commissioner Sir Leon Brittan, on behalf of the
European Union had in fact proposed in 1998, "the
commissioning of a study on the impact of the new Round on
sustainable development" (European Commission, op. cit). In
other words, the Audit is also part of the official agenda of the
Seattle Round. In the meantime, while the Audit is being
conducted, economic, social and environmental destruction will
continue unabated.
THE MILLENIUM ROUND IS ALREADY "DE FACTO"
What happens to the World system does not depend solely on
the results of the Millenium Round. We must understand that in
many developing countries, many of the clauses of the
Millenium Round are already a "fait accompli". The are part of
the "conditionalities" contained in ad hoc loan agreements with
the IMF and the World Bank. Under the structural adjustment
programme as well as in the context of the IMF sponsored
"bailout agreements" (eg. Indonesia, Thailand, Korea, Brazil),
developing countries have already committed themselves to
many of the propositions contained in the Millenium Round.
Moreover, the hands of Third World delegates to Seattle are
tied, the vote of most of the trade ministers from developing
countries at the Seattle Ministerial Conference is controlled by
Western creditors. It is unlikely that much opposition will be
voiced from the official delegations from developing countries.
Many developing countries have accepted in the context of
agreements signed with the Bretton Woods instititions to
liberalise trade, deregulate capital movements, privatise State
public utilities, dismantle social programmes and provide
"national treatment" to foreign investors in a large number of
economic activities including services, banking, procurement,
etc. These provisions are often coupled with a "bankruptcy
programme" under the supervision of the World Bank with a
view to "triggering" the liquidation of competing national
enterprises. An "enabling free market environment" is
implanted (without recourse to WTO clauses pertaining to
"effective access to markets"), national producers are brutally
displaced and destroyed, countries are casually recolonised...
Wall Street bankers and the heads of the World's largest
business conglomerates are indelibly behind this process. They
interface regularly with IMF, World Bank and WTO officials in
closed sessions as well as in numerous international venues.
Moreover, participating in these meetings and consultations are
the representatives of powerful global business lobbies
including the International Chamber of Commerce (ICC), The
Trans Atlantic Business Dialogue (TABD) (which brings together
in its annual venues the leaders of the largest Western
business conglomerates with politicians and WTO officials), the
United States Council for International Business (USCIB), the
Davos World Economic Forum, the Institute of International
Finance representing the World's largest banks and financial
institutions, etc. Other "semi-secret" organisations --which play
an important role in shaping the institutions of the New World
Order-- include the Trilateral Commission, the Bildebergers and
the Council on Foreign Relations.
FINANCIAL DEREGULATION
To top it off, "perfect timing": the deregulation of the US banking
system was approved by the US Senate barely six weeks before
the Millennium Round meetings in Seattle. The new legislation
favours an unprecedented concentration of global financial
power. In the wake of lengthy negotiations which concluded in
the early hours of October 22nd, all regulatory restraints on Wall
Street's powerful banking conglomerates were revoked "with a
stroke of the pen". Under the new rules ratified by the US
Senate and approved by President Clinton, commercial banks,
brokerage firms, hedge funds, institutional investors, pension
funds and insurance companies can freely invest in each others
businesses as well as fully integrate their financial operations.
The legislation has repealed the Glass-Steagall Act of 1933, a
pillar of President Roosevelt's "New Deal" which was put in
place in response to the climate of corruption, financial
manipulation and "insider trading" which led to more than 5,000
bank failures in the years following the 1929 Wall Street crash.10
In other words, a handful of financial conglomerates will gain
effective control over the entire US financial services industry.
Coincidentally these same Wall Street financial giants are also
the main beneficiaries of financial services' deregulation under
the General Agreement on Trade in Services (GATS) which
provides "national treatment" to Wall Street's giants in banking,
insurance, brokerage services, actuarial services, etc. The GATS
is almost "tailor-made" to meet the standards set under the new
US financial services legislation. The financial giants oversee
the real economy Worldwide, they are creditors and
shareholders of high tech manufacturing, the defence industry,
major oil and mining consortia, etc. Moreover, as underwriters
of the public debt, they also have a stranglehold on national
governments and politicians. Ultimately, they also call the shots
on trade reform in Seattle.
Moreover, the clauses of the defunct MAI which was to provide
"national treatment" to foreign banks and MNCs (leading to the
dislocation of municipalities and local governments) is also in
the process of becoming a "fait accompli". The financial
conglomerates are now fully integrated with the insurance
companies. In turn, the latter oversee and control the
multinational health care providers which are actively lobbying
in Seattle for the deregulation of public health care under the
GATS. The institutions of the Welfare State are to be scrapped.
The struggles of the entire post-war period are to be erased.
The Worldwide scramble to appropriate wealth through
"financial manipulation" is the driving force behind this
restructuring of the global financial architecture of which the
new US banking legislation and the "Seattle Round" are an
integral part. In concert with the WTO, the US legislation favours
the elimination of remaining barriers to the free movement of
finance capital. In practice it empowers Wall Street's key players
including Merrill Lynch, Citigroup, J. P, Morgan, Deutsche
Bank-Bankers Trust, etc. to develop a hegemonic position in
global banking overshadowing and ultimately destabilising
financial systems in Asia, Latin America and Eastern Europe...and
this process is ongoing irrespective of the actual outcome of
the Millenium Round.
THE SPECULATIVE ONSLAUGHT
In turn, financial deregulation in the US allows speculative trade
to prosper Worldwide in a totally permissive environment. In
turn, the Millenium Round by calling for the deregulation of
capital movements will provide greater legitimacy to speculative
trade thereby empowering Wall Street to extend its global
financial domain.
Institutional control over the channels of speculative trade
provides the US and EU financial giants with the tools to
manipulate currency and stock markets and impair the role of
central banks. The ultimate objective is to take control over the
reigns of monetary policy and oversee financial markets all over
the World. In the 1997 Asian crisis alone, more than 100 billion
dollars were confiscated in a matter of months from the vaults of
Asia's central banks; similar speculative assaults were carried
out in Russia in 1998 and in Brazil in 1999. Derivative and option
trade including the "short selling" of national currencies were
behind these assaults leading to massive debt default and
financial collapse. Well documented, the IMF played a key role in
facilitating the speculative onslaught on behalf of Western and
Japanese financial institutions.
In a cruel irony, the use of these deadly speculative instruments
was formally legitimised in the Fifth Protocol of the General
Agreement on Trade in Services (GATS) in the immediate wake
of the Asian crisis. Totally disregarding the impending dangers,
the GATS protocol negotiations coincided chronologically
(October 1997) with the climactic meltdown of stock markets all
over the World.
WAR AND GLOBALISATION
And War is also part of the Millennium Round. What happens to
countries which refuse to deregulate trade and foreign
investment and provide "national treatment" to Western banks
and MNCs? The Western military-intelligence apparatus and its
various bureaucracies routinely interface with the financial
establishment. The IMF, the World Bank and the WTO --which
"police" country level economic reforms-- also collaborate with
NATO in its various "peacekeeping" endeavours, not to mention
the financing of "post-conflict" reconstruction under the
auspices of the Bretton Woods institutions...
At the dawn of the Third Millennium, War and the "Free Market"
go hand in hand. War does not require a multilateral investment
treaty (ie. an MAI) entrenched in international law: "War is the
MAI of last resort." War physically destroys what has not been
dismantled through deregulation, privatisation and the
imposition of "free market" reforms. Outright colonisation
through war and the installation of Western protectorates is
tantamount to providing "national treatment" to Western banks
and MNCs in all sectors of activity. "Missile diplomacy"
replicates and emulates the "gunboat diplomacy" used to
enforce "free trade" in the 19th Century. The US Cushing
Mission to China in 1844 (in the wake of the Opium Wars) had
forewarned the Chinese imperial government "that refusal to
grant American demands might be regarded as an invitation to
war."11
The "Seattle Round" purports to "peacefully" recolonise
countries through the manipulation of market forces, --ie.
through the "invisible hand". It nonetheless constitutes a form
of warfare. More generally, the dangers of war must be
understood. War and globalisation are not separate issues. The
citizens' campaign against the WTO must be integrated with the
anti-war movement against the bombing of sovereign countries
by the US and its European allies.
DISARMING THE NEW WORLD ORDER
The WTO, created from a "technical agreement" (Final Act of the
Uruguay Round), provides entrenched "legal" rights to banks
and global corporations. In turn the 1994 Marrakesh Agreement
sets up procedures --including manipulative Dispute
Settlements-- which are now conveniently embodied in
international law but which blatantly violate the rights of citizens
all over the World.
Under WTO rules, the banks and MNCs can legitimately
manipulate market forces to their advantage leading to the
outright recolonisation of national economies. In other words,
the WTO articles provide legitimacy to global banks and MNCs in
their quest to destabilise institutions, drive national producers
into bankruptcy and ultimately take control of entire countries.
Moreover, the Agreement formally instates a "triangular division
of authority" between the WTO, and its sister organisations the
IMF and the World Bank in a system of "global surveillance" of
developing countries' economic and social policies. This means
that enforcement of IMF-World Bank policy prescriptions will no
longer hinge upon ad hoc country-level loan agreements (which
are not "legally binding" documents). All the main clauses of the
IMF's deadly "economic medicine" will eventually become
permanently entrenched under the Seattle Millenium Round.
Countries will not only be "bonded" by external debt, they will
be permanently "enslaved" by an international body controlled
by the World's largest business syndicates.
These WTO articles will set the foundations for "policing"
countries (and enforcing "conditionalities") according to
international law.
In other words, we must act in relation to the original "iniquity"
and "illegality" of the Final Act of the Uruguay Round which
creates the WTO as a "totalitarian" organisation. There can be
no other alternative but to reject the WTO as an international
institution, to imprint the WTO as an illegal organisation. In other
words, the entire process must be rejected outright. And this
means that citizens' movements around the World must
pressure their governments to withdraw without delay and
cancel their membership with the WTO. Legal proceedings must
also be initiated in national courts against the governments of
member countries, underscoring the blatant violation of
domestic laws and national constitutions.
In other words, the citizens' platform in Seattle and around the
World must be geared towards disarming this economic system
and dismantling its institutions. We cannot postpone our
struggle and "wait a few years" in the context of an "Audit" and
meanwhile the World is consumed and destroyed. We must act
now. We must question the legitimacy of a system which
ultimately destroys people's lives.
We must challenge politicians and international officials, we
must unmask their insidious links to powerful financial interests
and eventually we must overhaul and transform State
institutions removing them from the clutch of the finacial
establishment. In turn, we must "democratise" the economic
system and its management structure, challenge the blatant
concentration of ownership and private wealth, disarm financial
markets, freeze speculative trade, arrest the laundering of dirty
money, dismantle the system of offshore banking, redistribute
income and wealth, restore the rights of direct producers,
rebuild the Welfare State.
Concurrently, we must also build the conditions for a lasting
World peace.
The military-industrial and security apparatus which sustains
these financial interests must eventually be dismantled, which
also means that we must abolish NATO and phase out the arms
industry.
We must combat the "media lies" and "global falsehoods" which
uphold the WTO and the powerful business interests which it
supports. We must combat the "false consensus" of Washington
and Wall Street which ordains the "free market system " as the
only possible choice on the fated road to a "global prosperity".
This consensus is now shared by all political parties including
Social Democrats.
To achieve these objectives we must restore a meaningful
freedom of the press. The global media giants fabricate the
news and overtly distorts the course of World events. In turn,
we must break the "false consciousness" which pervades our
societies, prevents critical debate and masks the truth.
Ultimately , it precludes a collective understanding of the
workings of an economic system which destroys people's lives.
The only promise of the "free market" is a World of landless
farmers, shuttered factories, jobless workers and gutted social
programmes with "bitter economic medicine" under the WTO
and the IMF constituting the only prescription. We must restore
the truth, we must reinstate sovereignty to our countries and to
the people of our countries.
The struggle must be broad-based and democratic
encompassing all sectors of society at all levels, in all countries,
uniting in a major thrust workers, farmers, independent
producers, small businesses, professionals, artists, civil
servants, members of the clergy, students and intellectuals.
People must be united across sectors, "single issue" groups
must join hands in a common and collective understanding on
how this economic system destroys and impoverishes. The
"globalisation" of this struggle is fundamental, requiring a
degree of solidarity and internationalism unprecedented in
World history. The global economic system feeds on social
divisiveness between and within countries. Beyond Seattle,
unity of purpose and Worldwide coordination among diverse
groups and social movements is crucial. A major thrust is
required which brings together social movements in all major
regions of the world in a common pursuit and commitment to the
elimination of poverty and a lasting World peace.
NOTES
1. The latter frequently position snipers at key positions. See
Paul Richmond, "An Assessment of the Police, What to expect
during the Seattle Ministerial Conference",
http://forward.to/walkout, September 1999.
2. WTO Press Release, Ruggiero Announces Enhanced WTO Plan
for Cooperation With NGOs, 17 July 1998.
3. European Commission Press Release, "Commission and NGOs
hold dialogue on the Millennium Round", Brussels, 17 November
1998.
4. Ibid.
5. Ibid.
6. See AFL-CIO, Make the Global economy Work for Working
familiies,
http://www.wslc.org/wto/index.htm, Ocotber 1999.
7. Ibid.
8. Financial Times, London, 17 November 1999).
9. Quoted in Financial Times, op cit.
10. See Martin McLaughlin, "Clinton Republicans agree to
Deregulation of US
Banking System", World Socialist website, 1 November 1999.
11. Quoted in Michel Chossudovsky, Towards Capitalist
Restoration, Chinese socialism after Mao, Macmillan, London,
1986, p. 134).
� Copyright by Michel Chossudovsky, Ottawa, 1999. All rights
reserved. Permission is granted to post this text on
noncommercial community internet sites, provided the essay
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this text in printed and/or other forms contact the author at
[EMAIL PROTECTED], fax: 1-514-4256224.
For other articles by Michel Chossudovsky:
Click on NATO Installs a Reign of Terror in Kosovo or go to
http://www.emperors-clothes.com/articles/chuss/chossnato.htm
Click on The KLA: Grim Origins or go to
http://www.emperors-clothes.com/articles/chuss/kla.html
For a discussion of the economic goals of the attack on
Yugoslavia, click on Yugoslavia was bombed - but was Europe
the target? or go to
http://www.emperors-clothes.com/analysis/corridor.htm
For analysis of the goals of US policy in the former socialist bloc,
click on Sean Gervasi's What Does NATO Want in Yugoslavia? or
go to http://www.emperors-clothes.com/articles/gervasi/why.htm
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