At 05:41 PM 2/4/98 -0500, Ed Weick wrote:
>
>I'm not quite sure of what to make of this, but it strikes me as being a
>supreme example of assigning a single cause to a multi-faceted problem.
>Many populations have benefitted from increased trade. Others have not -
>for example, Sub-Saharan Africa. Natural resources are being exported from
>some Sub-Saharan countries and populations are being exploited and
>impoverished, but these populations have also faced other problems:
>depletion of soils, corrupt governments, civil wars, and inter-ethnic
>genocide. Is it the fact that they are hooked into trading loops that is
>the primary problem? Or is it that they are governed so ineffectively that
>large companies like Shell Oil can move in and walk all over them?
My understanding is that companies like Shell don't just happen, but are
part of the phenomenon. Free trade itself isn't a problem either, but rather
a tool in the concentration of wealth and power -- that is, as you ask
below, the monopolization of free trade. However, the free trade agreements
were entered into partly in order to accelerate the ease of market
domination and partly by small countries like Canada to try and get some
market share. But I don't think the results have been great for the
non-elite in any country, although I don't have figures at my fingertips.
There may be positive results down the road -- as necessary controls on the
"wild west" stage of the global economy are enacted, some of the worst
excesses will be attenuated. But the fact remains that the income gap
between rich and poor is widening in all regions as concentration of wealth
continues unfettered.
>
>When it comes to world poverty, where is the fault? Is it free trade or the
>monopolization of such trade? Or is it the incompetence and corruption of
>heads of governments willing to play along with monopolists and despoilers
>as long as they get their cut?
Sure, but who keeps the incompetent heads of governments in power? Since
1953, in the CIA's Iran experiment, democratically elected governments have
been undermined and, if necessary overthrown, when they dare to enact
policies that are in the interests of their citizens and counter to the
interests of the transnational corporations. Iran, 1953, Guatemala, 1954,
Dominica, 1960, Ghana, 1963, Chile, 1973, and the list goes on. Each time
these governments were replaced by violent, corrupt goons who maintained the
lines of "trade" (read exploitation) open. This is not secret information,
but was the subject of a PBS documentary a few years ago.
Or is it the fact that various ethnic
>groups, ideologues or religious zealots simply cannot get along and want to
>cleanse the world of each other and, in so doing, totally disrupt everything
>that goes into making life liveable and normal?
Having talked at great length with Rwandans about how genocide could happen
in such a formerly peaceful country, I understand that a climate of great
fear has to be engendered. Atrocities can be engineered, which are responded
to by further atrocities. It could happen here in Canada if Quebec were to
separate. It's not genetic. At the root is the exploitation of fears and
anxieties by some elite group.
How does this tie into free trade? I think free, autonomous populations are
anathema to global, monopoly capitalism. The rhetoric of democracy is used
only to reinforce the ideology of individualism. It rarely is invoked
against right wing dictators, for example, who are supportive of consumerism.
Or is it the fact that
>women are repressed and children cannot get to school and therefore can
>never learn the skills that would enable a better and more productive life?
>I would suggest that it is a combination of all of these things, and many
>more. But it is nothing short of downright silly to lay it all on the fact
>that I want to exchange something of value with someone living in some other
>part of the world so that we can both get more of what we want.
I think you oversimplify the global economy if all it is to you is the
ability to get something you want. The issue is not trade, but tarrifs. It
is the right of corporations to export cheap products to any country and
overwhelm whatever indigenous industry they think will be profitable. It is
also a means to make sure that the Asian and African nations never rise to
dominate the West.
For a more erudite analysis, read Walden Bello's "Dark Victory: the United
States, Structural Adjustment and Global Poverty", San Francisco, Food First
Books, 1994.
