Covert Ops
Cracks in the New World Order
By Trevor Paglen
The weekend of July 19 saw massive protests in Genoa, Italy, where thousands gathered to protest the G8 trade summit. By the end of the weekend, an estimated 300,000 people had taken to the streets, one person was dead, over 300 were injured, and dozens had been tortured by a brutal police response. Why would hundreds of thousands protest a routine trade summit between the world's eight wealthiest nations?
The demonstrations in Genoa were the largest actions in a growing movement protesting global, capital and economic neo-liberalism, which is the belief that a "free" market is synonymous with human freedom and democracy. Since its inception at the 1999 WTO meeting in Seattle the vaguely described antiglobalization movement has had a growing presence at every summit where international neo-liberal economic policies are set.
The name "antiglobalization movement" is a bit of a misnomer. Globalization itself is a multifaceted phenomenon, encompassing issues of immigration, cultural diversity, and a cross-cultural exchange of ideas, lifestyles, and tastes. Contrary to the simplistic and deliberately distorting statements by that-guy-in-the-white-house and American mainstream press, the antiglobalization movement does not have economic and cultural isolationism on its agenda. The ongoing antiglobalization protests revolve around a critique of what could be called "top-down," or "elite globalization," which is facilitated by international trade groups including the World Bank, the International Monetary Fund (IMF), and the World Trade Organization (WTO).
The origins of contemporary top-down globalization are found in the General Agreement on Trade and Tariffs (GATT), begun in 1946, which created the World Trade Organization at its Uruguay round in 1994. The WTO acts as a type of meta-government for multinational corporations, establishing a set of trade rules that all member countries must adhere to. The WTO allows corporations to sue governments that impede access to their markets or resources, for example by having environmental laws above what is considered "fair" by the WTO. WTO lawsuits have already invalidated American laws requiring tuna to be dolphin-safe, shrimp to be sea-turtle safe, and has forced the U.S. to abandon sections of the endangered species act. More recently, the WTO has taken steps to remove European bans on genetically modified foodstuffs. The ability of the WTO to outlaw the policies of its member countries is antidemocratic and undermines the sovereignty of popularly elected governments by making those governments accountable to higher, corporate-controlled interests.
Top-down globalization can be described as the deregulation of global trade and elimination of tariffs in the economic interests of multinational corporations. Through agreements made by non-elected representatives of the member countries, multinational corporations are given maximum access to the resources of each participating country. Within this model, Third World countries tend to offer controlled labor and lax environmental laws, while first world nations tend to provide markets for goods and services, as well the financial infrastructures for global investment. For example, China is able to provide a pool of cheap labor that cannot unionize, and therefore can be kept in line by coercive measures, while the U.S. can provide a financial infrastructure to global traders and markets for goods produced in the Third World (i.e., coffee and Nikes).
This already loaded situation is exacerbated by the crushing debts owed to the World Bank/IMF by second and Third World nations. Initially used as a way to finance the reconstruction of Europe after the Second World War, the World Bank/IMF began to loan large amounts of money to third world nations, in order to jump-start their entry into the newly formed global economy. While the experience of each country is different, the majority of Third World countries are in a situation where paying interest on their World Bank/IMF loans has become a large chunk of the nations' budget. Third World nations find themselves in a situation where they are forced to borrow more money in order to meet their interest payments.
When debts become too crushing, the IMF institutes a "structural adjustment" program on the economy of the indebted country. IMF structural adjustment policies privatize nationally-owned industries, reduce taxes and tariffs on multinational corporations and eliminate social services. The effect of these structural adjustment policies has been to drive the indebted countries further into debt by removing their sources of national income (in the form of tariffs, taxes on corporations, and nationally owned businesses), while hurting the people of the indebted country by shifting production away from self-sufficient models (towards a focus on exportable goods), and by removing the social services on which the poor depend. The reduction of government budgets also weakens the indebted government's ability to enforce labor and environmental laws, further plunging the general populations towards financial and environmental destitution. In addition to calls for debt relief at the demonstrations in Genoa, this summer saw massive protests in Columbia and Argentina against IMF-imposed structural adjustments.
In response to international criticism of their handling of the protest situation, Italy has lobbied to move several upcoming international meetings to Africa. While French president Jacques Chirac publicly suggested that the G8 leaders might listen more carefully to the protestors' suggestions, our own president bizarrely dismissed the international group of protestors as "isolationists." It is somewhat ironic that the infrastructure created by top-down globalization, in the form of international relationships, has to an extent, created the means for the formation of the antiglobalization movement.
From 50,000 at the Seattle World Trade protest in 1999, to the estimated 250,000 strong protest in Genoa, the antiglobalization movement is growing, and the power elite responsible for top-down globalization seem to be retreating (spatially if not ideologically) from massive public opposition. The WTO elected to schedule their next meeting in Qatar (an independent emirate north of Saudi Arabia ruled by an oil monarchy), rather than face the reality of mass opposition to the policies that it is trying to implement. The World Bank, guided by a similar out-of-sight, out-of-mind logic, opted to cancel their scheduled June meeting in Barcelona and retreat into the anonymity of cyberspace by holding the meeting online. The G8 members, following the protest in Italy, have decided to hold their next meeting in an isolated location in the Canadian Rocky Mountains.
Protests are currently being planned for the World Bank/IMF meeting in Washington, D.C. on the last weekend in September. For more information, check www.indymedia.org.
Trevor Paglen can be reached at www.paglen.com
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