-Caveat Lector-
>From AntiWar.CoM
www.antiwar.com/justin/justincol.html
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December 6, 1999
SLAPPED IN SEATTLE – GLOBALISTS RETREAT
The Battle of Seattle has provoked a storm of outrage in elite business and
political circles, a chorus of sneers and imprecations not heard since that last
great outbreak of political and social turmoil known today as The Sixties.
(Actually, the mid-sixties and early seventies: but, never mind.) Back then, the
source of the elite's outrage was a spontaneous and massive movement to end an
odious war: the elites' response was derision on the op ed pages of the nation's
newspapers, bipartisan solidarity against the antiwar rebels, and massive police
repression. Today, our outraged elites are railing against a protest, similarly
unauthorized, against an emerging global trade cartel known as the World Trade
Organization. The op Ed pages are filled with the fulminations of both the
liberal-left and the ostensibly "free market" right against the "rioters,"
united in their outrage that ordinary people dare to have an opinion on the
benefits of the WTO one way or the other.
CLUELESS ON SEATTLE
The complete cluelessness of the chattering classes on this subject is
exemplified by Andrew Sullivan, writing in the London Times, who starts off his
sneering piece homing right in on what is, for him, the central issue of our
times. Sullivan quotes one of the protesters, Mike Crudes, trade unionist, as
saying: "Look, don't get me wrong. I think those guys who marched around dressed
up like turtles are probably fairies. But as long as they're against the same
thing as me, I got no problem. I think this shows how bad the World Trade
Organization is, that so many different people can protest together."
CRUDE, RUDE, AND POLITICALLY INCORRECT
Well! How, uh, crude, huffs the openly gay former editor of the New Republic,
who has written extensively in favor of gay rights, including a decent book,
Virtually Normal, and strikes quite a figure as a gay Catholic expatriate Brit
who is often mistaken for a conservative. The horrified Sullivan haughtily
opines that "his was not the only epiphany to be found on the mocha-strewn
pavements of the northwest capital": the leftists at the Nation magazine, he
relates in a similarly stricken and astonished tone, "rhapsodized" over the
protesters, praising them as a "phantasmagorical mix of tens of thousands of
peaceful demonstrators [who] stood against the WTO." For them, Sullivan can
hardly contain his contempt: "Phantasmagorical gets it just about right. Fat old
union bosses and multi- pierced grunge kids who last saw shampoo in 1992 joined
hands with right-wing militia groups from the Rocky Mountains and frizzy-haired
professors who still keep their Vietnam posters in the sideboard."
THE VANITY FAIR SCHOOL OF SOCIAL CRITICISM
This weirdly apolitical critique might be called the Vanity Fair school of
social commentary. Never mind all this nonsense about such side issues as
globalization and national sovereignty: Andrew Sullivan sees the world through
the lens of an aesthete focused on the important issues, like fashion and
physical attractiveness. Who cares what those "union bosses" – who are, after
all, "old" and "fat" – have to say about anything? Not to mention those
frightfully homophobic right-wing "militia groups," who don't seem to realize
that olive green combat fatigues are out, out, out this year. And as for all
those scruffy tweedy middle-aged "professors" among the protesters – everyone
knows that anyone with "frizzy hair" simply cannot be taken seriously.
IN THE BASEMENT
But what drew 50,000-plus demonstrators into the streets in what was clearly an
attempt to shut down the WTO? According to Sullivan, "Anyone who knows Seattle
will not have been over-surprised. The northwest isn't home to only Boeing and
Microsoft; it also has more than its fair share of 1960s leftovers. The smell in
the streets might have been tear gas last week, but usually it's a mix of dope
and coffee. For months, dogged lefties in basements across the country had been
e-mailing their way to a mass demonstration in this center of grunge protest.
They succeeded beyond their wildest dreams, and they should not be denied their
brief moment of joy."
THOSE "MOCHA-STREWN STREETS"
Sullivan "knows" much less about Seattle than he would have us believe. To begin
with, to describe the streets as "mocha-strewn" is stretching it just a bit.
Anyone who has actually been there would know that the constant rain is more
than enough to wash away any mocha buildup on the pavement.
A NEW YOUTH REBELLION
Secondly, Sullivan's crude caricature of the protesters as Sixties "leftovers"
is not based on any fact – another danger in commenting from a distance while
relying on second- and third-hand information. Although the national mainstream
(i.e. print) media is spinning the Seattle rebellion as the second childhood of
Sixties leftovers, on the scene reports from Seattle media indicate that
thousands of local high school and college students participated in the
protests. This is, once again, a movement of the young that is being excoriated
by the pundits and pounded by the police. That old fogies – left, right, and
center – are on the other side of the barricades is not exactly a surprising
development, but rather what seems to be a law of social development. As in the
Vietnam protests, the liberal left and the respectable right have issued what
amounts to a joint declaration of their disdain for rebellious youth – and, in
the process, missed the social and political significance of yet another turning
point in American history.
A MOMENT OF JOY
The hallmark of the Vanity Fair school of journalism, a glossy complacency that
manages to trivialize (and misperceive) everything, is here displayed in
Sullivan's slick dismissal of the protests as a transitory "moment of joy" – as
if nothing can or ever will change the cultural and political status quo.
Furthermore, this analysis of the protests as a leftist conspiracy hatched over
the Internet – a "story" the British tabloids are currently running with –
contradicts his own observation about the ideological diversity of the anti-WTO
movement. What about all those "right-wing militia" types – were they mobilized
by "dogged lefties in basements"? Sullivan would have it that Pat Buchanan
packed his bags and headed for Seattle just as soon as he got that email from
the Rainforest Action Network – but don't you believe it.
AN AMERICAN THING
Sullivan may, perhaps, be forgiven if he misperceives the Seattle rebellion as a
victory for what he calls "America's latte left." In his native Britain, the
only protest movements are on the left: there are no Tory revolutionaries.
Unable to imagine the mass appeal of right-wing populism, which has no real
equivalent in his native country, he reflexively labels the Seattle events as a
conspiracy of the far left. This is, by the way, a favorite tactic within the
Blairite Labor Party in purging all resistance to the Prime Minister and his
Third Way.
BEYOND LEFT AND RIGHT
But this import won't sell on the American side of the Atlantic for the simple
reason that the ideological divide between left and right is, here, much less
well-defined. The left-right dichotomy originated in Europe and reflected the
struggle between feudalism and rising capitalism, between the aristocracy and
landless peasants, and is not all that applicable to the American character and
political landscape. Yet Sullivan labors mightily to bend the American reality
to his European model. Aside from the Nation, Sullivan goes on to cite Ralph
Nader – certainly one of the most idiosyncratic political figures since Jerry
Brown – as typical of the leftist character of the anti-WTO crusade. Yet the
other day on Crossfire, as I related in my last column, it was Nader scolding
the dim Mary Matalin on a question that has long concerned many American
conservatives: preserving America's national sovereignty: "Why Mary," he
chuckled, "I'm surprised at you that you would be willing to give up American
sovereignty so easily." In the politics of the new millennium, left and right
meet and merge and switch places – but it won't be the first time politics
switched polarities.
TRADING PLACES
Being a "liberal" used to mean opposing state power: the great classical
liberals of the 19th and early 20th centuries were considered men of the left
because they were the great defenders of individual rights and laissez-faire.
Conservatives were absolutist defenders of the centralized state and the divine
right of kings. Political categories and terminology are in constant flux, and
during a period of crisis – war, or some other great struggle – often change
into their opposites. The Battle of Seattle is not the first indication that we
are approaching such times, nor will it be the last.
A TROTSKYITE PLOT?
Sullivan labels Nader a "socialist," but all the real socialists are in the
Democratic Party. Nader is running for President as the official candidate of
the Green Party, hardly a Marxist cabal, and his presence on the ballot in more
than a few states could mean bad news for Al Gore – perhaps another reason why
Sullivan sounds so peevish. As further evidence that this is all a Trotskyite
plot, Sullivan cites trade union leader Gerald Entee, who "told the cheering
throngs in Seattle. 'We have to name the system that tolerates sweatshops and
child labor and that system is corporate capitalism.'"
WHAT IS "CORPORATE CAPITALISM"?
But what, exactly, is corporate capitalism? ? Isn't all capitalism "corporate"?
Naturally, no practitioner of the Vanity Fair school of journalism would ever
stoop to defining his terms; and, besides, why bother with all those tiresome
details? They don't call economics "the dismal science" for nothing! But when it
comes to matters that require more than having a good fashion sense, such as
economic and political analysis, Sullivan is really in over his head: "The
notion that people, as consumers, have anything to gain from corporate
capitalism was apparently lost on the protesters. As was the notion that the
poor, huddled masses of the developing world might have something to gain from
freer, less regulated trade. In Seattle were gathered not only the stylistic
contradictions of the counter-cultural, but also the political contradictions."
"FREE TRADE" AND FRIZZY HAIR
Whatever "stylistic contradictions" the Seattle protesters may be guilty of –
such as "frizzy hair" or dandruff – it is the contradictions in Sullivan's own
argument that were shown up in very short order. Sullivan's thesis was exploded
the day after it was published, when "the poor, huddled masses of the developing
world" rejected the WTO's attempt to impose labor regulations on their nascent
industries. The international extension of the Third Way into the Third World
was nixed, at least for now, and this is what really annoys Sullivan and the
other enthusiasts of "corporate capitalism," from Washington to London. For
"corporate capitalism" is known to economists and political theorists as state
capitalism, or corporatism – that is, an economy no less centrally-planned than
the classic Marxist model, in which the planners are corporate executives and
financiers acting through and in coordination with the instrument of government.
"Corporate capitalism," in short, has nothing to do with the free market, just
as the WTO was not an effort to usher in an era of free trade.
"FREE TRADE" VERSUS
FREE TRADE
What Sullivan and his fellow economic illiterates fail to understand is that a
truly free trade policy pursued by the US would not require a 15,000-page treaty
– only a unilateral declaration by the US government that we were immediately
dropping all tariff barriers to entry on our markets. This would take up
considerably less than a single page – even alongside an ultimatum that would
cut off all foreign aid to countries that did not reciprocate. But the "free
traders" of Sullivan's ilk are not advocating this: instead, we are asked to
give up our sovereignty to secret "trade tribunals" and a shadowy transnational
bureaucracy.
LIKE THE FOAM ON A MOCHA
The Seattle protests will come to nothing, avers Sullivan: "As protest
politics, Seattle was a spectacular success. But like the foam on a mocha, it is
likely to evaporate sooner rather than later into the city's mist" because there
is (and can be) no real vehicle for anti-globalism. "The deeper irony, of
course, is that the only mass party that has any claim to the anti-corporate,
protectionist, isolationist bandwagon is the Reform party, and that is now being
fought over by Pat Buchanan, the former Republican, and Donald Trump, the
multimillionaire. Neither of them has very solid left-wing credentials.
Moreover, all four big party candidates – George W Bush, Al Gore, McCain and
Bill Bradley – support free trade and the WTO."
FREE TRADE, GLOBALIZATION – AND "THE DONALD"
Now there is a sure mark of the Vanity Fair school of social criticism – taking
the alleged presidential campaign of "The Donald" seriously. Or, for that
matter, taking Donald Trump seriously about anything outside of real estate,
gambling casinos, and dames. Just as Sullivan misperceives the Seattle rebellion
as an effusion of the left, so he underestimates the mass appeal of Buchanan.
Blind to a populism where the only credentials are the ability to tap into
popular sentiment – and get a place on the ballot – he cannot see how the
Buchanan campaign is effectively erasing the ill-drawn and often fuzzy lines
between left and right in America.
THE USURPERS
As collections of acronyms – WTO, NATO, EU, etc., ad nauseum – usurp the
traditional functions of the nation-state, the battlelines are being drawn in
the struggles that will dominate the new millennium. While the centralizers and
global planners seek to impose their political and economic hegemony on the
post-cold war world, they are meeting opposition from the left and the right.
But it won't be long before the various components of the anti-globalist revolt,
having a common enemy, will forge a common analysis of what is wrong with the
new order – and how to right it. For the outlines of that new order are coming
into focus with alarming rapidity, and elements of both the left and the right
have major problems with it.
FROM KOSOVO TO SEATTLE
What seems to be emerging from the mists of the post-cold war world is an
evolving de facto world government, with NATO as the military arm, the UN
Security Council as the nascent executive branch, the evolving World Court along
with the various War Crimes Tribunals as the judiciary, and the IMF, the World
Bank, and the WTO regulating and dominating the world economy. From Kosovo to
Seattle the emerging world state is reaching its tentacles into every aspect of
life on this earth, from trade and the environment to the use of military force
– but the monster got slapped in Seattle. Every patriot is cheering.
A RISING MOVEMENT
Let the chattering classes, of which Sullivan is the epitome, titter and carp
from the sidelines; let them critique the dress, hairstyles, and fashion sense
of the anti-globalist rebels. The rest of us have more serious subjects to
discuss. The British Euroskeptics, the European opponents of NATO and the EU,
the rising populist movements in Switzerland and Austria, the growing Pan-
Slavic reaction to Western incursions into the Balkans and the Caucasus – all
these rising movements are part of a worldwide reaction to the newly-aggressive
and emboldened corporate and political elites and their vision of a completely
statized and globalized corporate capitalism. They include every sort of
opposition to the global monoculture and its evolving political superstructure,
including a growing nationalist and "isolationist" sentiment in this country. To
this list we can now add the Seattle protesters.
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Justin Raimondo is the editorial director of Antiwar.com. He is also the author
of Reclaiming the American Right: The Lost Legacy of the Conservative Movement
(with an Introduction by Patrick J. Buchanan), (1993), and Into the Bosnian
Quagmire: The Case Against U.S. Intervention in the Balkans (1996). He is an
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{{<End>}}
>From WSWS.Org
{{<Begin>}}
World Socialist Web Site www.wsws.org
WSWS : News & Analysis : World Economy
The social meaning of the anti-WTO protests in Seattle
By Editorial Board
6 December 1999
Back to screen version
The protests and clashes between demonstrators and police outside the World
Trade Organization meeting in Seattle are a harbinger of things to come. These
events reveal the explosiveness of the social tensions building up within world
capitalism, and especially within America.
The Seattle protests were the biggest American civil disturbances sparked by
political issues since the Vietnam War era. Except for disturbances where race
was a major factor, as in the 1992 Los Angeles rioting sparked by the police
acquittal in the Rodney King beating, it has been nearly thirty years since the
National Guard was called out in a major American city.
The scale of the protests and police mobilization in Seattle did not, of
course, approach those of the 1960s antiwar demonstrations or ghetto
rebellions. But they are nonetheless symptomatic of new interest in political
and social issues among American working people and youth.
Those who came to the Seattle in the tens of thousands raised a myriad of
issues related to the environment and the exploitation of child labor and
workers in the Third World. But what united the overwhelming majority of them
was concern over growing social inequality and hostility to the domination of
the transnational corporate giants over working people, not just in America but
all over the world.
As the Washington Post commented, describing the protesters: "They are folks who
don't check each day to see how their 401(k) is doing or hang out with people
who have become millionaires when their companies went public ... What they all
seem to agree on is that giant corporations have gone too far in gaining control
over their lives and defining the values of the culture and that the WTO has
become a handmaiden to those corporate interests."
According to one public opinion poll released during the Seattle conference,
American attitudes toward the agenda of the WTO and the transnationals are
sharply divided along economic and class lines. Among families making less than
$20,000 a year, there was a three to one majority believing that free-trade
agreements were harmful. Only among those with incomes over $50,000 a year was
there a narrow margin in favor of such agreements, with broad support only among
those in the highest income brackets.
It is clear that such sentiments reflect, not hostility to foreign trade in the
abstract, but deep suspicion of the globalization of the world economy under the
control of a few hundred giant transnational corporations, and fear of its
impact on jobs, living standards, working conditions and democratic rights. The
protests in Seattle were noticeable for the relative absence of crude
nationalism or American chauvinism, which was limited to the AFL-CIO bureaucrats
and the handful of Buchanan supporters. Many of the demonstrators were either
espousing the interests of the peoples of the less developed countries, or
directly representing them, in delegations which brought to Seattle
representatives of peasants and exploited workers from many countries. Social
polarization in America
The emergence of such anticorporate, anticapitalist sentiments among broad
layers of the population is a political fact of the greatest importance. It is a
product of the extraordinary polarization of American society over the past two
decades, in which the privileged layer at the top, perhaps five or ten percent
of the population, has grown wealthy beyond their wildest dreams, while the vast
majority of middle class and working people face an increasingly difficult
struggle to maintain a decent life for their families.
This socio-economic polarization—documented in countless studies in recent
years—has been accompanied by a parallel political process. The American two-
party system, always a tool in the hands of the monied elite, has become more
and more removed from the interests of the bulk of the people. The result is
that when serious social issues are raised in America, the authorities have no
answer but police truncheons, tear gas and rubber bullets, turning the downtown
of a major city into a war zone.
The events in Seattle demonstrate the increasing distance between the
representatives of big business and ordinary people. The public reaction to the
protests, especially in Seattle itself, has been generally one of sympathy
toward the protesters and revulsion toward the police tactics. But corporate
Seattle fumed at the failure of the police to act more forcefully against the
demonstrators who were disrupting the conference.
The shocked reaction to the anti-WTO protests on the part of the ruling elite
and the mass media which it controls shows their own disorientation. What else
did they expect, when they summoned a conference to discuss the fate of the
world economy, in which only big business and its political stooges were
represented?
It is not merely the undemocratic and secretive operation of the WTO itself, as
Clinton and the American media sought to suggest. The US government is just as
much the instrument of the corporate elite as the WTO. In no other
industrialized country are the interests of the non-wealthy so completely
excluded from the political system and the official media as in the United
States. The ruling circles, believing in their own propaganda that the stock
market boom of the 1990s has benefited every American, are as oblivious to the
real conditions facing working people in America as they are to the suffering of
child laborers in Bangladesh.
Among the most rabid exponents of free market ideology, the reaction to Seattle
was a mixture of incomprehension and contempt. The British business journal The
Economist editorialized against any concession to anti-WTO protests, declaring,
"It is hard to say which was worse—watching the militant dunces parade their
ignorance through the streets of Seattle, or listening to their lame-brained
governments respond to the 'arguments.'" The Wall Street Journal denounced those
concerned by sweatshop exploitation in the Third World, saying: "if you are a
Salvadoran mother desperate to feed your family or a Chinese teenager with no
local job prospects, that 'sweatshop' and 'exploitation' might look more and
more like opportunity."
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>From Intellectual Capital
{{<Begin>}}
The Geneva Connection
by Pat Choate
Thursday, December 02, 1999
When the Clinton administration brought the completed General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT) to Congress for ratification in 1994, one of the president's principal selling points was that this pact would create a new body -- the World Trade Organization (WTO) -- that would "provide an effective remedy against foreign unfair trade barriers." Clinton also promised that the U.S. "will continue to be able to use Section 301 and Super 301 to enforce our rights." The 301 provisions were those parts of U.S. trade law that allowed the president to deal directly with those nations that unfairly discriminated against U.S. exports.
Congress accepted these promises and ratified the GATT agreement in December 1994 at an extraordinary lame-duck session. Almost five years have passed. Now, we have sufficient experience with the WTO and its operation to ascertain whether this powerful new global body has, will or even can meet these high expectations.
How we got the WTO
While the WTO is a relatively new international body, the concept dates back to the immediate period following World War II. Then, the Truman administration, along with the British government, envisioned a post-World War II global economic structure that would reside on three pillars. The World Bank would help finance the reconstruction of a war-torn world. The International Monetary Fund would guide the global flows of capital. And a new trade body named the International Trade Organization (ITO) would be a supranational organization, empowered to regulate world trade completely: investment, imports, exports, worker dislocation, adjustment and unfair economic practices.
Although Congress accepted the idea of a contractual agreement -- GATT -- to reduce tariffs and quota (then the principal barriers to trade), the Senate refused to ratify a treaty creating the ITO, fearing that such a body would impinge on U.S. sovereignty. During the 1950s, the ITO idea re-emerged but was again rejected by the Senate and for the same reason -- sovereignty.
By default, therefore, GATT became the essential multilateral agreement on global trade. Following the initial GATT negotiations, the United States led the world in seven additional rounds of talks -- the last ending in 1993. The common feature of each -- until the last that is -- was consensus. No GATT decision was binding on any participant, leaving governments to negotiate acceptable agreements among themselves.
The problem faced by the United States in the 1970s and ‘80s was that other nations kept erecting new barriers to replace those negotiated away in the GATT talks. In 1988 after a bitter and prolonged legislative battle, Congress enacted tough new trade laws, called the Super 301 provisions, that empowered the president to close the U.S. market to those countries that erected protectionist barriers to competitive U.S. exports. Japan, Canada and the European Community, among many other nations and organizations, protested loudly.
Meanwhile these and other countries continued to negotiate the new GATT pact.
By late 1990, however, the negotiators were at an impasse. To re-ignite the trade talks, the GATT staff, led by Director-GeneralArthur Dunkel, developed a draft version of the pact, commonly known as the Dunkel Draft Text. Using this draft as a starting point, negotiators returned to Geneva. Tucked away as the last provision in the Dunkel draft were provisions to create a new administrative institution called the Multilateral Trade Organization (MTO). In reality, the MTO was the ITO under a new guise.
In December 1994 during the concluding moments of the GATT negotiations, the name of the MTO was changed to the World Trade Organization.
All disputes must go to the WTO… No exceptions
The WTO's champions were those nations targeted by the Super 301 legislation. They supported and got the treaty to include a provision that prohibits any WTO member from taking any unilateral action againstpredatory or unfair trade practices. All disputes must go to the WTO. No exceptions.
Moreover, the WTO charter provides that each member shall ensure the conformity of its laws, regulations and administrative procedures with its obligations as provided in the annexed Agreements.
Consequently, U.S. laws, regulations and administrative procedures -- including those of state and local governments -- that do not conform to the World Trade Agreement can be challenged as unfair trade obstacles. Administratively, a WTO- appointed panel decides whether challenged U.S. laws conform or not. If the WTO rules against the United States, the president and Congress have three choices - - changeU.S. laws and regulations, pay penalties to other nations or leave the WTO. However, the WTO can authorize economic retaliation by other nations if the United States withdraws from the WTO.
Confronting foreign-trade barriers
Since the early 1980s, the United States Trade Representative has been required by law to submit an annual report to the president and Congress that identifies the principal foreign barriers to U.S. exports.The National Trade Estimate Reports are remarkable for their detailed information.
Compiled by the several federal agencies, these reports identify hundreds of export barriers in 49 nations, the European Community, Taiwan, and Hong Kong -- that is, the primary U.S. export markets. Many of these barriers violate international trade agreements.
The WTO does little to reduce protectionist barriers
Because the United States is no longer able to deal directly with foreign protectionism, it must depend on the WTO. Yet, the WTO does surprisingly little to reduce protectionist barriers.
In the first four years of its operation, the WTO took in only 171 requests for action. As of the WTO¹s fourth anniversary (April 1999), these requests translated into only 29 adopted panel reports, 18 active trade-dispute panels, and 70 pending actions. The remaining requests were withdrawn.
Put into perspective, the WTO is handling a global caseload that is substantially lighter than that of virtually any sitting federal district judge.
The due-process issue
The WTO trade-dispute procedures are a stunning reversal of those used for decades at the GATT. GATT required a consensus decision to impose a penalty recommended by a dispute panel. However, the WTO requires a consensus decision of all 135 members to reject a panel's proposed penalty, including that of the plaintiff nation.
Moreover, these WTO dispute panels operate in a manner quite different from U.S. judicial procedures. For instance, the panelists are drawn from a list of WTO experts, none of whom are obligated to reveal fully any conflict-of- interests. In addition, citizens of governments in a dispute cannot serve on a panel, and the disputing parties cannot oppose WTO's panel nominations, except under extraordinary circumstances.
As per the WTO agreement, panel deliberations are kept secret. Opinions expressed in the panel report by individual panelists are secret. The votes of individual panelists are secret. No amicus briefs are accepted, unless presented as part of a government’s submission. The USTR alone decides which cases the United States will pursue.
WTO rulings on disputes can be appealed only to the World Trade Organization's
Appellate Body, and all WTO judgments are final.
By joining the World Trade Organization, the United States agreed to abide by its judgments and pay fines or suffer international trade concessions if it ignores those rulings.
Is withdrawal inevitable?
The United States has the largest, richest market in the world. Access to this market is a privilege of enormous worth. Yet, by relinquishing decisions of that access to a Geneva-based international body, the president and Congress have forfeited their primary means of opening closed foreign markets to U.S. exports.
And even if the WTO could meet its promised potential, its closed, Star Chamber- like procedures offend American sensibilities of justice and due process. Ultimately, responsibility for making the WTO meet its promise resides with its champions. If they fail, U.S. withdrawal from this experiment in international regulation is inevitable.
Pat Choate is a Washington-based economist, author and talk-show host, and a contributing editor to IntellectualCapital.com. In 1996 he was the Reform Party's vice-presidential candidate. His e-mail address is [EMAIL PROTECTED]
{{<End>}}
From
Institute for Public Accuracy
915 National Press Building, Washington, D.C. 20045
(202) 347-0020 * http://www.accuracy.org * [EMAIL PROTECTED]
___________________________________________________
PM Monday, December 6, 1999
BEYOND SEATTLE: NOW WHAT?
The following analysts were in Seattle last week for the World Trade
Organization meeting and are available for interviews:
ROBERT WEISSMAN, [EMAIL PROTECTED], http://www.essential.org/monitor,
http://www.corporatepredators.org Editor of Multinational Monitor and
co-author of "Corporate Predators: The Hunt for Mega-Profits and the
Attack on Democracy," Weissman said: "The protests in Seattle contributed
significantly to the failure of the WTO negotiations, dealing a major blow
to the ambitious corporate agenda of expanding the trade agency's reach.
The challenge before public interest activists now is to develop
institutions, mechanisms and rules to rein in the corporate activity that
has been plundering the planet under the banner of economic globalization.
The delegates from the poorer countries were emboldened by the protesters
and for virtually the first time resisted the arm-twisting by the
industrialized nations."
NORMAN SOLOMON, [EMAIL PROTECTED], http://www.accuracy.org
Executive director of the Institute for Public Accuracy and author of
"False Hope: The Politics of Illusion in the Clinton Era," Solomon said:
"What has emerged is a pro-democracy movement. And it's global. The
vibrant social forces that converged on Seattle -- and proceeded to
deflate the WTO summit -- are complex, diverse and sometimes
contradictory. Yet the threads of their demands form a distinct weave: We
want full democratic rights for all people."
MEDEA BENJAMIN, [EMAIL PROTECTED], http://www.globalexchange.org
Executive director of Global Exchange, Benjamin said: "We have to blast
through the myth that workers in developing countries don't want their
labor rights protected. It's U.S. corporations that benefit from
violations of labor rights and pit workers in different countries against
each other. There's a recognition that we need to bring the bottom up --
and who at the bottom would not want to come up? We need to push this mass
movement into the political scene -- there is no politician on the
national stage representing it. We're sophisticated enough not to be
mollified by rhetoric, like Clinton's johnny-come-lately talk about
openness in the WTO."
DAVID BACON, [EMAIL PROTECTED], http://www.igc.org/dbacon
An independent labor analyst and writer, Bacon said: "We need rules for
international trade, but enforcement can't be in the hands of the WTO. The
whole purpose of the WTO is to increase the power of the transnational
corporations; so giving it more authority over labor standards is like
putting the fox in charge of the henhouse. Rules should be based on
democratic processes through organizations that respect workers. The U.S.
continues to refuse to sign international labor rights treaties, so
Clinton's professed concern about labor standards is a sham. Our basic
problem is the global economic inequality between the haves and the
have-nots."
For more information, contact at the Institute for Public Accuracy:
Sam Husseini, (202) 347-0020
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