The world crisis of capitalism in which we are currently living is interpreted by many as the crisis of a system already in the throes of death and that is headed to another world economic system.  Nonetheless, we postulate that this crisis not so much of the system but of the current model, neoliberalism, to the corporation-national model that will be the latest step for capitalism.  In this way, if the liberal model of the economy travels from the model of the welfare state with the strengthening of the nation-states after World War II, which endured for 30 years, and from there the neoliberal model for another 30 years, we are currently seeing the imposition of the nation-corporation model for which the neoliberal model created optimal conditions.  This model is not the fruit of a sudden mutation, but is part of a process.  Following these tendencies, its dominion and duration could last until 2030 before we find other alternatives.

The model of the welfare state postulated that there was a state responsible for generating the welfare of the population.  Import substitutions when faced with the debacle of the world economy.  Every country should pull itself up by its bootstraps.  Its ideological support was the Universal Declaration of Human Rights where governments committed to guaranteeing the health, education, secure and dignified jobs, housing, the right to free association and religion, among others.  Under the Keynes premise emerges the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank to strengthen the role of the state in national economies.  Once the state apparatus was constructed and under pressure of external debt of the poor and developing countries generated by the multilateral banks, the great transnational capital launches like a bird of prey over the pie that it took years to construct.  The mercantilization of all that exists in the planet under private property and the consequent monopolization of the world now pushes us towards the nation-corporation model.  Now the IMF and the World Bank demand of the governments a role contrary to their origins: the reduction or disappearance of the state.

Neoliberalism has been the model of transition towards the corporation-nation model and not a “curtain of ideological smoke to hide the criticism of economic policies that provoke colossal inequities in the world economy” as economist Theotonio Dos Santos suggests.  Neoliberalism has done precisely that: an economic policy to favor the endogenous accumulation of capitalism that, obviously, provokes the great inequities: the poor become poorer and the few rich become richer.  In this way, we can observe how the process of accumulation of riches has been oriented toward the mega-transnational corporations and banks; and including not only its extraction but through the appropriation of riches in territories beyond their borders.

And if it is absurd to utilize macroeconomic indexes of development taken from books of classical economics and with a never-ending flow of economists who use them without common sense, now less than ever can we utilize them.  We are referring to the indexes that supposedly track economic growth like Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) whose recipe is, “more FDI, more jobs.”  What we have observed is that the concept of “investment” has amplified to the buying or even fusion of businesses with monopolistic tendencies, control of markets and even the termination of up to 30% of employees.  Nor can we utilize “per capita income” as if the profits of corporations were distributed amongst the poorest of the poor.  The Gross Domestic Product (GDP) of a country comprises less and less of the Gross National Product (GNP) now that the national productive chain has collapsed.  Much less the “balance of trade” when companies obtain profits and provoke a capital flight without leaving any benefits to the population.

The United States, Europe and Japan have not assumed neoliberal measures that they have imposed via the International Financial Institutions (IFIs) and their free trade agreements on other countries.  The neoliberal policies have not been applied in a global fashion.  The countries least globalized are now the richest.  Nonetheless, little by little in some rich countries, including the United States, a process is beginning to eliminate the social cost that is felt amongst the population and in increasing poverty.  The impoverished South now is not only in the South, the South is now global.

NATION-CORPORATION MODEL

Beginning in the 21^st century the nation-corporation model is becoming cohesive.  The tendencies of large transnationals are the acquisition and fusion amongst themselves not only within an economic sector but amongst various sectors.  The large monopolies are conforming and imposing world trade rules.  These mega-corporations are razing everything in their path.  They have their own labor, wage and health policies that can function in any part of the world over national governments.  They maintain diplomatic relationships with diverse governments.  They develop their own values, identity and culture; the workers have their uniform that identifies them and transmits their ways of thinking and living, with even hymns that the workers should sing and clubs and family associations of the companies to reproduce these values and company identity.  They can move their capital and even technicians and specialists across any border.  They create trade rules in free trade agreements and create their own international tribunals to defend their interests over the interests of nations.  They have plagiarized the language of human rights by other governments to incorporate it in defense of their own interests.  They call government control of markets discrimination; they call subsidies unfair competition although the rich countries help their own; they call impediments to ecologically harmful investments an impediment to the freedom of investment; and they call opening the borders of poor countries the right to equity.

The large corporations have larger budgets than any nation on the planet.  They have their own security and private police; their own infrastructure and controlled territory.  They also have secure access to public services and even the plants that generate electric energy.  They are becoming the owners of national strategic resources like petroleum, water, gas, biodiversity, air, sea and land.  In the nation-corporation model, transnationals are above national governments and their policies cannot be against their interests.  For this, they are successfully making national governments modify their constitutions and internal laws adjust to the world economic structure that they designed.  So, governments will only watch over interest of the free and agile movement of capital without any restriction, human rights or environmental commitment, just the accumulation of wealth.  Not only have companies taken the power of the state directly (as presidents) but their personnel have now also won seats like secretaries and other dependencies with the goal of watching over their interests from distinct places in the state structure.  In the case of the United States, transnationals exercise a powerful control over the direction, policies and personnel in the State and government.

It has already been pointed out many times that of the 100 largest economies in the world, 51 are corporations and 49 are countries.  Transnational corporations control 70% of world trade.  Among the eight largest transnationals are General Motors, Wal-Mart, Ford, Chrysler, Mitsui, Mitsubishi, General Electric and Shell.  If Wal-Mart were an independent country, it would be China’s eighth largest trading partner.  Its influence on countries is as great as it can politically and economically affect them.  Wal-Mart occupies the 19^th place of the 100 largest economies on the planet, surpassing Sweden, Norway, and Saudi Arabia.  It is the largest company of direct consumer sales in the United States, Canada and Mexico.  Wal-Mart occupies the fourth place in Latin America and the Caribbean with sales that arrive at 10,676 million dollars after the Spanish Telefónica, the American General Motors (whose capital is larger than the GDP of Australia), and Delphi, an auto parts producer.  According to the Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean, after Wal-Mart are the German motor companies Volkswagen and DaimlerChrysler; then the American Ford, the Spanish petroleum company Repsol YPF, the Korean Samsung and the Japanese Nissan.  Jointly, according to the Commission’s information, the ten largest transnationals that operate in Latin America generate annual sales of $115,805 million dollars that are equivalent to 18% of Mexico’s Gross Domestic Product (GDP).  In Latin America, the Mexican Carlos Slim Helu is the fourth richest person in the world.  His fortune grows annually by 70%.

According to the Financial Times report from one year ago, the United Status continues to be the dominant power in terms of the largest number and percentage of transnationals among the 500 largest, with 227 (45%), followed by western Europe with 141 (28%), and Asia with 92 (18%) although China and Japan have a growing corporative presence.  These three economic blocks control 91% of the largest transnationals.  For its part, Latin America, the Middle East, and the Africa have a total of 11 of the 500 largest transnationals.  In Latin America, only Brazil and Mexico have a world-class transnational corporation, Africa has none and Saudi Arabia controls four of the six in the Middle East.  Russia has seven.  The few large multinationals in Russia and Latin America are for the most part privatized state companies.  In the case of Mexico, we can point to Teléfonos de México (Telmex) and Maseca.

Among the 10 largest, 80% are from the United States and 20% are European.  Among the largest 20%, 75% are from the United States, 20% are European and 5% are Japanese.  Among the 50 largest, 60% are American, 32% are European, 6% are Japanese, and 5% are from other regions.  The United States has the largest transnationals in industry (General Electric), petroleum and gas (Exxon-Mobil, Chevron, Texaco), software and computer services (Microsoft), insurance (American International Group), and information technology hardware (Intel).  The capital of these mega-corporations surpasses 979 billion dollars.  These earnings are thanks to the subsidies that they have gotten from their respective governments, sucking public resources away, the cancellation of the payment of trade tariffs with other countries, the exploitation of cheap labor that is called “labor flexibility,” to the exemption of payment of certain taxes that is called financial incentives, to the exploitation of resources and raw goods, to the technologies and the robbery of knowledge, to speculation and fraud, to monopolizing worker funds, among other sources.

U.S. transnationals dominate 80% of the 10 principal firms of retail commerce; 80% of the ten biggest in information technology, and 80% of mass media and entertainment (11 of 14) winning the breaking of the radio, television, movies, and music businesses, magazines and local newspapers.  As far as the military industry, of the 11 largest firms (of the 500 largest), nine are from the U.S. and two are European.  As for software and computer services, six of the ten are located in the United States, whereas Japan and Europe share the other four.  The United States also controls 60% of the ten largest world banks, followed by Europe (30%) and Japan (10%).  Citicorp, Santander, BBVA, HSBC, among other banks control 100% of the banking system and much of the economies in Latin America.  The debt generated by these banks with credit destined for Latin America, Asia and Africa, has accelerated the neoliberal policies of privatization and deregulation of financial markets and at the same time have succeeded, through imposition of national laws, in monopolizing workers’ money with supposed retirement funds and pensions.

Europe is the leader in telecommunications, with 40% of the ten largest transnationals, followed by the United States and Asia, with 30.  The Europeans also have 50% of the principal insurance consortiums, followed by the United States with 40% and Japan with 10%.  In gas and petroleum, the United States and Europe have four each of the 10 largest, followed by Russia and Brazil with one each.  In the pharmaceutical industry, the United States and Europe dominate the ten largest.  In electronics and electric equipment, the Japanese in particular and Asians in general control 70% of the ten largest producers; Europe 20% and the United States has only one of ten.  Among the largest firms of light manufacturing, the United States represents 44%, the Europeans 48%, and the Japanese 8%.  In heavy manufacturing, of the 100 largest, 32% are American, 30% European, 22% Japanese, 7% other Asian countries, and the others among five countries.  In the “personal care and cosmetics” sector, in which the United States and Europe each have 33% of the largest transnationals, followed by Japan with 11%.

There are various theories about the evolution of the three regional powers.  The Wolfowitz-Perle theory suggests that Europe will continue forming a regional power even though its transnationals haven’t varied much in the list of the 500 largest.  Other theories see more possibilities of this development in the region of Asia, especially in China and with the Japanese transnationals that already between 2003-2004 some 14 transnationals in the region joined the list of the 500 largest in the world.  Others note that that United States empire is declining, by noting that the United States is graduating losing power, because already in 2004 around 30 of its transnationals lost their place on the list of the 500 largest and at the same time only 16 were added to the list, with a net loss of 14 or 15%.

Europe and the United States generate 2.5 billion dollars in total commercial sales and employ 12 million workers on both sides, according to the Financial Times in mid-2004.  In 2003, the U.S. transnationals invested 87 million dollars in Europe, 31% more than in 2002, while Europe invested 37 million dollars in the United States, which is equivalent to 42% more than in 2002.

ALTERNATIVES

The global south is debating amongst various strategies and trench warfare.  While for social movements, peasants and indigenous peoples of Ecuador and other countries the alternative is in taking presidential power and the structures of the state; for other sectors like the United States and other European countries the struggle centers around protest and blocks of the scenes where the corporations and their allies (the governments) negotiate trade deals and impose agreements with the goal of impeding their advances, like in the case of the World Trade Organization (WTO), the G-8 and other “summits” where precisely only a few can arrive and fit at the summit.  But other sectors are centered on the boycott against the global instruments that are the International Financial Institutions (IFIs) and the external debt they generate, or against the same emergent subject of this new model: the transnational mega-corporations where their counterpart, the consumer, is empowered.  Nonetheless, since the state is being left aside as the transnationals have total control of the economy, we can observe a landslide of confrontations.  Now it is no longer between society and government, but between society and transnationals.  This has brought about other sectors burning Monsanto plants or stoning McDonald’s establishments.  The conflict now manifests itself against the transnationals that intend to or have achieved control over petroleum, gas, electric energy, seeds and food, land, transport, telecommunications, water and other resources.  The conflicts in Bolivia, Ecuador, Argentina, Mexico, Guatemala, Haiti, El Salvador, Chile or the Dominican Republic among others throughout Latin America and the Caribbean, but also in Europe and even in the United States itself, reflects the call of the demand of the role of the state to regulate the ambition of the corporate transnationals.  These social explosions and their resolution question the weakness of the governments and of multilateralism against the corporation-nation model that is being imposed where companies rule, and governments keep silent.  The peace agenda should be centered today on attention to the strengthening of democracy and of the nation-states in cultural plurality, base to construct peace; as well as how to attend to the new subject of peace: the poor and society as a whole seek to halt ambitions and the accumulation of riches, source of violence conflicts that are occurring at the present time.

Influence on public policies is important, if it is not everything.  It “influences” but does not modify relationships.  Certain achievements are made, if they achieve and if the actors who promote it get along well in the subtle enchantment of power making the game of masking the effects of neoliberal policies.  In any form, the central danger is absolutizing this path as the only and the most viable, casting aside other forms of struggle and ways of generating change.  Absolutizing influence in public policies is showing that the current economic model is the good and only lacks “humanizing,” which is not human in itself and not “humanizable”: the predatory competition of capitalism.  Fukuyama is not right, history is not over.  The Third Way does not place in question the free market neoliberal style nor is it a distinct thing from capitalism and socialism.

The great social, indigenous, and peasant movements that occur all over the planet pose in the background the difficulty of the adequate speaker to make their demands heard.  But to want to be heard is not to establish yourself as an actor or a subject of change.  From there, the other way that is being constructed is the indigenous autonomy in Chiapas where they are seeking the alternative.  They look looking and they find through traveling.  The Zapatistas are not positing a new national project because the process of dialogue has not ended and the negotiations truncated by the government and its army.  What they posited then was the path to construct it: dialogue.

In recent decades we have seen impressive social movements in many countries, which has not been sufficient to put into motion the nation in favor of the impoverished majority.  We have also seen new governments that have intended to confront imperial and corporative power and have fallen the majority of times into the hand of their interests.  In this case, what is missing is a new community and a new government that, simultaneously and in alliances with other communities and governments, tenaciously confronting the mega-corporations and imperial powers.  In Latin America, there are indications in Venezuela, Argentina, Brazil or Uruguay with more or less success for some or others.  Mexico will now debate, faced with the presidential election in 2006, in this disjuncture of accelerating the corporation-nation model or a new alternate national project.

For more information: Centro Latino Americano de Ecología Social (Latin American Center for Social Ecology) at www.economiasur.com; James Petras, “La base económica del podel imperial,” Mexico, DF, 8/21/2004; Financial Times Special Report “FT Global 500” 5/27/2004; Financial Times, 6/9/2004; Theotonio Dos Santos, Professor at Universidad Federal Fluminense and Coordinating Chair, UNESCO.

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