Globalization continues its swift, relentless onward march.  Recent events regarding globalization have led activists and organizations from citizens’ movement on the global economy to restate their positions.

In keeping with the strategy to create one market within the American hemisphere under the tutelage of the United States (known as the FTAA—Free Trade Area of the Americas), in January, 2002 president George W. Bush declared before the Organization of American States his intention of taking a further step in his “march towards the south” by negotiating a free trade agreement with the Central American countries (known as CAFTA—Central American Free Trade Agreement).  In Central America this announcement led to intense debate among civil society organizations (CSOs) regarding what stance to take regarding the upcoming negotiations with the US.  Some opinions could not be reconciled and the debate concluded in the break up of several CSOs.

During June 27-28, 2002 in Mérida, Yucatán, Mexico, the presidents of Mesoamerica (Mexico and Central America) met to breathe new life into the Plan Puebla Panama (PPP).  A letter sent to the presidents in Mérida, signed by “representatives of the indigenous peoples” of seven Central American countries declared “our firm will to cooperate” with an integral PPP strategy, as long as it respects the rights of indigenous peoples.  The indigenous leaders from Central America called for the creation of “technical, economic, and political conditions that will make it possible to include an indigenous program within the PPP”, and they demanded that an Indigenous Commissioner be able to “participate with all rights in the diverse bodies of the Plan Puebla Panama”.

This letter was discussed in Mexico, particularly in the recent National Encounter on the PPP in Xalapa, Veracruz (June 28-29).  The final declaration from Xalapa diplomatically toned down the resentment that the document generated during the plenary by avoiding direct reference and simply denouncing “the campaign of co-optation and divisions that the Inter-American Development Bank and the World Bank are carrying out to buy off producer organizations and NGOs with credits, in order to legitimize the imposition of megaprojects and the PPP”.

In the area of international aid, the Oxfam family of agencies published an in-depth study in April called “Rigged Rules and Double Standards: Trade, Globalisation, and the Fight against Poverty”.  The study also provoked intense debate, particularly among “reformists” (who see possibilities of “rescuing” the multilateral organizations that control international trade), and the “abolitionists” (who state that the disappearance of such organizations would be an enormous benefit to humanity). (1)

These examples of recent debates have to do with the world economic order being built under the guidance of the United States government, the “triumvirate” of the WB-IMF-WTO (World Bank, International Monetary Fund, World Trade Organization), and, to a lesser degree, the governments of other wealthy nations, particularly the European Union and Canada.

One way to understand the debate is through the lens of international trade.  The role of trade in poor countries is especially polemical.  What role does international trade play in the generation of wealth, who wins, who loses, and who makes the decisions?

One of the viewpoints, widely known and which we shall not delve into here, is the “triumvirate’s” unflinching belief that trade benefits “everyone”, rich and poor.

Another position, diametrically opposed, comes from observing the real world, where “free” trade in poor countries has contributed to deepening injustices and poverty.  Neoliberalism, on which “free” trade rests, has failed as an economic model.

In the group opposing the prevailing economic order there is a “quilt of many textures” (2).  One analyst, Tom Barry, distinguishes the following categories: localists, anarchists, socialists, social democrats, protectionists, critics of corporate rule, developmentalists, social clause advocates, democracy advocates, and “deep ecologists”.  Barry comments that many groups coincide in important ways on objectives and thus “overlap”, and members in some groups include both reformists and abolitionists. (2)

The recent study by the Oxfam consortium “Rigged Rules and Double Standards” has provoked intense debate.  The study is unabashedly reformist, causing irritation among some sectors.  The study’s basic premise, that trade, “under certain conditions” can help millions of people escape from poverty, is anathema to the more radical sectors.  The key to understanding Oxfam’s affirmation is obviously in the “conditions” that would need to exist for international trade to “work” for the poor.

It’s worthwhile to examine for a moment what the study says, because by so doing we will better understand the discussion within the movement in opposition to the neoliberal model.

“Rigged Rules” is an in-depth study of trade as it exists today among nations, with its crude reality of injustices that are created and imposed by the wealthy nations and multinational corporations, through the WB, IMF and the WTO, organizations which the wealthy nations themselves created.  It is a detailed diagnostic of how trade and markets work, where the greatest injustices exists, and how they are created and perpetuated.  It also examines how injustice can be eliminated, or at least reduced.

The study is undoubtedly polemical.  It has been attacked from both left and right.  But it is not an apology for free trade, globalization, neoliberalism, nor obviously unbridled capitalism.  It does advocate the integration of trade policies within a strategy that benefits human development.  The study’s call is simple: international trade can benefit the world’s poor.  But justice must reign.  If within countries there is economic, political and social injustice, then the rich will reap the benefits of trade, and the poor will be even worse off.  If there is no justice, foreign trade will only deepen existing injustices.

Oxfam also identifies those who create the absurd and unjust rules of the international economic game.  The culprits are the large multinational corporations, the wealthy countries (particularly the United States and the European Union), and the agents of the latter that create and implement the rules, i.e., the triumvirate of the WB-IMF-WTO.

The injustices in world trade border on the cynical.  While wealthy countries demand that poor countries open their borders to let in products, capital and companies from the North, poor countries face enormous barriers when they attempt to export to the rich ones.  In fact a poor country faces on average four times as many trade barriers on its exports to wealthy countries than vice-versa.

One of the more surprising conclusions of the study is that the European Union is even more unjust than the United States in letting in products from poor countries.  But both commit another great injustice by granting multimillion dollar subsidies to large food producers, while at the same time bringing relentless pressure on the poor countries to dismantle all subsidies to their peasants.  The result...we in Mexico have been affected.  United States and Canada are dumping subsidized corn in our country (in other words, selling it below real production costs), while our peasants face increasing misery and hunger in the countryside, due to the fact that they cannot cover their production costs as prices bottom out.  To make matters worse, US corn is genetically modified.

Summing up, the present rules of international trade are incredibly abusive and immoral, and together with the structural iniquity within most countries, are producing greater misery.  Oxfam advocates far-reaching reform, not only in international trade rules but also structural reform within poor countries.

What type of reforms?  Nothing less than an agrarian reform (land distribution), distributive policies, social policies to shore up education, health, sanitation and housing, and other “pro-poor” measures that would strengthen their participation in the economy and allow their participation in the political, economic, social and cultural life of the country.

The study responds to a call made from academic circles, also reformist, to build a “more intellectually consistent agenda.  It must have an internationalist game plan characterized not by backlash rhetoric and populist strategies but rather by its analytical depth and political maturity—and it clear commitment to the principles of multilateralism.” (2)

But due precisely to its commitment to multilateralism, in other words, it explicit call for a profound reformation of the WB-IMF-WTO triumvirate, the study will not be accepted by the more radical voices of the movement, who, in their more strident expressions, accuse Oxfam of undermining “the very social movements in the developing world that Oxfam claims to support” (Anuradha Mittal of Food First)

There are other weaknesses.  It caricature and reductionist portrait of the economic justice movement as a bunch of “globaphobes” is regrettable.  And a topic of tremendous importance which was left out is migration.  The study points to the “striking” disparity between the development of extremely mobile world financial markets and the immobile labor markets.  Yet it makes no call, nor does it propose any measure to eliminate this “striking” situation, nor does the study ask about the right of workers to not migrate and to be able to work with dignity in their country of origin. 

Certainly in the face of a devastating diagnosis of so much structural injustice, Oxfam’s call to reform multilateral organizations and existing power relationships would seem to be tepid.

A possible interpretation of the reasons behind the reformist stance in the study might have to do with tactics.  By not making trade itself the culprit of prevailing injustice, Oxfam reckons that it can take its arguments to the heart of three audiences.  One of them is the “hard line” of the WB-IMF-WTO.  Another is the political actors of the European Union and the US, and other developed countries and, finally, also the general public of the countries of the North.  This latter audience is a potential ally of tremendous importance that must be educated.

How then to touch the hearts and minds of this audience?  The Oxfam report bets on its approach based on ethical values: the present rules are unjust and millions are suffering poverty because of them.  As the Oxfam report’s principal author says, “I believe that if most Europeans knew what their governments were negotiating in their names, they would be outraged, and I think this is also true of most Americans.”

But the report’s interesting tactics don’t solve its strategic weaknesses.

The study’s lack of clear strategy is what noted abolitionist Waldon Bello most questions.

“It is likely that at the heart of our debate with Oxfam are [...] divergent postures on strategic issues like what priorities the movement should have at this point and how it should go about achieving them.  Strategy must respond to the needs of the moment in the struggle against corporate-driven globalization.  This can only be derived by identifying the strategic objective, accurately assessing the global context or conjuncture, and elaborating an effective strategy and tactical repertoire that responds to the particularities of the conjuncture.”

For Bello, the strategic objective centers on halting and reversing trade liberalization and in trade-related areas being promoted by the WTO.  This objective must be the priority, Bello says, at the WTO’s Fifth Ministerial Meeting to be held in September 2003 in Cancún, Mexico.

For Bello the movement’s efforts cannot be centered on “useless” reforms, but in deepening the crisis of legitimacy of the system.  Bello goes even further: the multinational corporation must be eliminated, not transformed, not reformed, not regulated.  Recent examples (Enron, WorldCom, Disney, Arthur Andersen, etc.) of the prevailing putrefaction within the multinational corporations are not exceptions, Bello says, but the standard of corporate behavior.

For Bello the multinational corporation has become obsolete:

“It is the corporation that serves as a fetter to humanity’s movement to new and necessary social arrangements to achieve the most quintessentially human values of justice, equity, democracy, and to achieve a new equilibrium between our species and the rest of the planet.  Disabling, disempowering, or dismantling the transnational corporation should be high on our agenda as a strategic end”.

What Bello does not clarify, at least in his debate with Oxfam, is how this strategic objective will be achieved in Cancún.  Undoubtedly, at least some of the tactics behind Bello’s strategy will rest on a worldwide information campaign regarding the injustices of present-day structures and institutions.  And without a doubt the Oxfam report will be used as an input in the world information campaign, thanks to its profuse documentation on how the present system works.

These musings on strategy are also valid when we contemplate the upcoming negotiations on “free” trade with the United States, as the US pushes forward its FTAA agenda.  Several advocacy and lobbying groups in Central America have placed their bets on achieving “just and sustainable” trade accords with the United States.  There is talk of negotiating “parallel accords” on labor, environmental, migratory and human-rights matters.  Likewise some sources have commented on the possibility of bringing pressure to bear in order to remove the agricultural sector from the trade agreements, given the disparities between agriculture in the US and Latin America.

In light of the above, it would seem reasonable to ask about a long-range strategic vision.  Certainly a campaign of incidence as such would seem to be disconnected from longer-range objectives, and de-linked from the more pressing demands from social organizations.  It runs the risk of heading into a blind alley, if lobbying efforts don’t bear fruit at the negotiating table.  And by involving civil society in the campaign, another risk of this approach is that it could legitimize not only the negotiations but also trade relationships, that are subordinate to a totally iniquitous and immoral regulatory framework, designed by governments of the North, the multinational corporations and by the WB-IMF-WTO triumvirate, and which, under no circumstance, will be on the FTAA negotiating table.

The debate will doubtlessly continue this week in Managua, Nicaragua, when civil society meets at the III Mesoamerican Forum on the Plan Puebla Panama.

Miguel Pickard

(1)   The study “Rigged Rules and Double Standards” in several languages, as well as the debate it has generated, can be found at www.maketradefair.com.

(2)   Taken from “Global Economic Governance: Strategic Crossroads”, by Tom Barry, Foreign Policy in Focus, Discussion Paper, September 2001, www.fpif.org

Other sources:

·         Some criticism of the Oxfam study can also be consulted at www.foodfirst.org

·         Walden Bello’s opinions can be found at www.focusweb.org

For an interesting classification of some of the principal tendencies of the debate here reviewed, from the left to the far right, and the futility of making alliances outside the left, see the article by Patrick Bond, “Strategy and Self-activity in the Global Justice Movement”, in Foreign Policy in Focus, September, 2001, www.fpif.org

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