STWR - Share The World's Resources

That the world is sick is beyond doubt. But how sick is it? Moderately sick, as the champions of the Neo-Liberal Globalisation (NLG) proclaim? Or incurably, terminally, sick, as some extreme critics maintain? Or very sick, but probably not beyond saving, as I believe, based on the work that I have done in the last three years or so on this subject. So, in other words, that Human ‘Civilisation’ faces the most serious crisis in its ten to twelve thousand years History (since the invention of agriculture in the Fertile Crescent of Mesopotamia) is beyond doubt.

16th Oct 07 - Dr Zeki Ergas ~ STWR

The risk that It could be destroyed, in large part or even completely, is quite substantial; moreover, the Planet on which It sits could suffer catastrophic damage that may take several centuries (if not millennia) to repair. Therefore, assuming (a fair assumption) that we are at a critical stage of our History, and that the appropriate question to ask is no longer ‘If’ disastrous events will occur, but ‘When’, Humanity’s most urgent task appears to be what to do to ‘deal with’ these inevitable disastrous events. Most experts agree that it is not too late to significantly diminish, if not entirely eliminate, the terrible consequences of these catastrophic events. They may be wrong. But we must hope – even if sometimes against hope -- that they are right, and roll up our sleeves, and put up the best fight we can to build a better and sustainable world.

What Can Be Done? -- What Should Be Done? I have come to believe, based on the work that I have done (and trusting my intuitive intelligence)[1] that a Dialectical Approach is the best one. Thus, the Thesis, Antithesis, and Synthesis that follow this Introduction. In the Thesis, I will be presenting the arguments of the proponents of the Reformist ‘Solution’; in the Antithesis, those of the Radical (or Revolutionary) ‘Solution’; and in the Synthesis, my final thoughts and opinions.

The proponents of the Reformist ‘Solution’ believe that Globalisation is basically Good, and that whatever problems it may have, can be ‘fixed’ or corrected. The advocates of the Radical ‘Solution’ try to demonstrate that NLG is basically Bad, because its problems are of a structural and institutional nature and cannot be ‘fixed’, or corrected; which means that NLG must be scrapped, and replaced. I will try to show that the correct solution, inevitably, must incorporate aspects of both. Moreover, we need a pragmatic solution which makes it necessary for the two sides to make concessions and compromises. That said, I must also underline that I believe the correct solution is much closer to the Radical one, than it is to the Reformist one.

Globally speaking, there are four Major Players: the Governments of the Rich and Powerful Countries (GRPCs);[2] the Large Multinational Corporations (LMNCs); the International Organisations (IOs); and the Civil Society Organisations (CSOs). The GRPCs and LMNCs are the proponents of the Reformist Solution; the CSOs, of the Radical Solution; and the IOs have positioned themselves between the two, trying to find constructive solutions and thus bring them together. The main difference, I believe, between the IOs and my solutions, is that the IOs’ solutions have a bigger Technocratic content, whereas I think that the Spiritual Dimension is essential.

The main problems are (not necessarily in that order; the following order reflects my personal sensibilities): the Persistence of Extreme Poverty; the (rapidly growing) Wealth and Power Gap between the rich and the poor; Global Warming and its catastrophic consequences, due to unlimited economic growth and unbelievable waste (especially in the United States); the sizeable risk of a Third (or fourth) World War, owing to the competition for scarce resources getting out hand; Nuclear Proliferation; International Terrorism; and Human Migration out of control.            

THE THESIS

The proponents of the Reformist Solution, the LMNCs and their – natural? -- allies, the GRPCs, believe that, in the last quarter century or so (since the early 1980s), Globalization has done a lot of Good around the world, thanks primarily to Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) in the Poor and Developing Countries (PDCs) and in the Emerging Great Powers (EGP). FDI has brought, they argue:  Modernization (technology, innovation, training, education); massive Export Earnings (China now has the largest foreign exchange reserves in the world); and a large number of jobs (hundreds of millions of people were lifted out of poverty, some 300 million in China and India alone).

The Social Dimension: Globalization has been marked by imbalances and social injustice, and a large number of Reforms are necessary to make it Socially and Ecologically sustainable. A Human Rights (HR) approach is being developed, particularly by the UN, whose specialized agencies deal with the problems of Poverty, Inequality, Development and the Environment. One major problem concerning these Reforms has been so far the Huge Gap between what is on Paper, and the Realities on the ground. For example, the  programs and projects to Help Small Farmers in the PDCs have been largely emptied of their content by the Production and Export Subsidies (in the hundreds of billions of dollars) paid by the governments of the RDCs (the US and the EU) to large agro-business companies, which were then in a position to ‘Dump’ their Surpluses in the PDCs. As a result, Poor Farmers lost their, vital for them, local markets. PDCs must therefore stop these selfish and counterproductive practices before anything worthwhile can be accomplished in the PDCs. A related problem is that of the Genetically Modified Organisms (GMOs, including Seeds) whose use is promoted by these same agro-business companies in the RDC. The (UN) Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) affirms that in the PDCs: all the natural biological organisms of should be protected; and that farmers should be able to retain the right to re-use their seeds, exchange them for non-commercial purposes, and improve them through breeding.

Two representative examples of the Reforms that are being developed are: the UNDP’s Millennium Project (MP) – which was launched in 2000, and has eight Millennium Development Goals (MDGs); and the Global Marshall Plan (GMP) initiated by an important German NGO, some three years ago. Recent evaluations of the MP, undertaken half way through its first phase (2000-2015), indicate that, in some sub-Saharan African countries at least, several of the MDGs are now in trouble. As for the GMP, its success or failure will depend on the level of commitment that the European Union (EU) will exhibit in the following years.

The World Trade Organization (WTO) is a major actor of the Social Dimension. There is a lot that can be reformed in the way it operates. Here too, two examples will suffice to show it. They concern the General Agreement on Trade in Services (GATS), and the Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS). The former, too rigid, should include greater flexibility in its modus operandi: PDCs should be allowed to decide which services they want to open to free trade, and which they wish, temporarily or permanently, to exclude; as a matter of principle, and generally speaking, education, health and cultural services should be excluded from GATS. As for the TRIPS, again owing to their rigidity, many existing vital drugs are unaffordable for seriously sick people in the PDCs. By means of a price system that is variable, sick people in the PDCs should have equal access to the medicines they need.

The Debt question remains high on the ‘Agenda’. The cancellation of the debts of the Highly Indebted Poor Countries (HIPCs) should continue. The issue of the Legitimacy of Debt is very important, and needs to be carefully re-examined. Many PDCs are saddled with Debts that are probably Illegitimate because the banks and the Bilateral and Multilateral Aid Agencies that have granted the loans knew that, for various reasons, these loans were NOT going to promote development in the PDCs. Even for the Legitimate loans, the PDCs Capacity to meet its debt service must be taken into account, and a moratorium of at least ten years declared to give them breathing space.

Corruption is one of the most serious Obstacles to development. It undermines democracy and the rule of law, and distorts trade. The work of  Transparency International (TI) must be supported. That means that: public biddings for contracts should be transparent, and exclude companies convicted for corruption; and that whistle-blowers should be protected. But, unless Banking Secrecy Laws and Offshore Banking that allow tax evasion in the hundreds of billions of dollars every year  are abolished, the work of the TI will be of a secondary (if not marginal) importance. The Naked Truth is that the Grand Corruption could not exist without the covert, or tacit, collaboration of the financial and legal institutions of the RDCs.

The Digital Divide, which deprives a majority of the world population from useful and relevant information and communication technologies, should be narrowed by means of massive programs.

The Ecological Dimension. Perhaps the Heart of the Matter. Three reports exploded in the face of the world in 2006 and 2007, shattering the prevailing complacency: two were by the UN-supported International Panel on Climate Change (IPCC),[3] and the third by the British government’s Stern Commission. They show convincingly that Global Warming has become a very serious Planetary problem, but that the PDCs would -- through flooding, droughts, hurricanes, deforestation, desertification, and rising sea levels – suffer the most.

Here is a brief summary of the Situation. In the last couple of centuries, the concentration of Greenhouse Gases in the atmosphere – mainly Carbon Dioxide, or CO2, but also Methane and other gases -- has increased from 280 ppm (parts per million) of Carbon Dioxide Equivalent (CO2-e) to 380 ppm. As a result, the world’s climate has already warmed up significantly. The ice cap in the Arctic Circle has begun to melt, and most glaciers on the top of the mountains have retreated considerably. Currently, greenhouse gases are growing at 2 ppm of CO2-e  a year. That growth can no longer be stopped in the next several decades, but it can be Slowed Down. Most scientists agree that, to prevent severe damage to ecosystems, and to enable food production and economic development to continue in a sustainable manner, the CO2-e level in the atmosphere should be stabilized at between 450 ppm and 550 ppm. That means, that, to be able to achieve that target, total greenhouse gas emissions would have to be reduced by at least 50 per cent from the 1990 levels, by 2050. Experts propose a Cap-and-Trade System -- based on Contraction and Convergence -- to realize that goal. According to that System, Emission levels, based on per capita income differentials, will be unequal at the beginning, allowing higher levels for the PDCs, which would gradually be reduced over the years to equal those of the RDCs.

There are two Opposing Camps at the present time: those who want Binding Limits, and those who would rather have Voluntary Limits. The former are supported (mainly) by the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) and the European Union (EU); the latter (mainly), by the US and  Australia. There are four major areas of research and discussion: Mitigation, Adaptation, Technology and Financing. Mitigation is favored by those who want Binding Limits; Adaptation by those who insist on Voluntary Limits. Technology and Financing can be said to be neutral. A UN High Level Event on Climate Change was held in New York September 2007. A UNEP Global Environmental Report will be presented in London at the end of October 2007. But the next Big Meeting will be held in Bali, Indonesia, in December 2007, to prepare a new Convention that will replace the Kyoto Protocol which ends in 2012. Meanwhile, the CSOs have not remained idle, of course. Twenty years ago, in 1987, was published the Bruntland Report called Our Common Future – which was, at least in part, the inspiration of the Rio Conference on the Environment that was held five years later, in 1992. The Heinrich Böll Foundation, to protect the interests of the PDCs,  has come up with the concept of Greenhouse Development Rights (GDR).[4] 

The Financial Dimension: How much for a Global Deal? The Stern Review estimated that $400 billion a year would be needed in the next three or four decades to deal with Global Warming. That is close one per cent of the world’s Gross Domestic Product (GDP), which was close to $ 49 trillion ($ 49,000 billion) in 2006. An additional $ 100 billion, to double the present official multilateral and bilateral aid (ODA), would bring the overall total to $ 500 billion a year. A huge sum, to be sure, but not impossible to raise. As a matter of comparison, and to put things in the right perspective: $ 500 billion represents about 40 per cent of the military budgets in the world, which totaled $  1.2 trillion in 2006; it is a little more than half of the increase of the assets of the world’s billionaires – which have grown by $ 900 billion in 2006.

How could $ 500 billion a year be raised? There are a large number of possibilities, including: a Currency Transaction Tax (CTT) that could raise, depending on the tax rate adopted (from a minuscule 0.01 per cent to 0.1 per cent), from about $ 20 billion to $ 200 billion a year. That would be a small price to pay to add an ethical dimension to the extremely speculative Financial Capitalism that has gripped the world presently. A global tax on international trade (called Terra Tax), based on a small surcharge of perhaps 0.5 per cent, could raise $ 100 billion a year. Many other possibilities exist, such as small taxes on airline tickets.

The proponents of the Radical Solution, CSOs and Alter-Mondialists (mainly) believe that the main problems of the NLG are Structural and Institutional and, therefore, cannot be solved by reforms. NLG is essentially Profit-Oriented, they argue, when what we need is a People-Oriented system. That is undeniably true. And Walden Bello’s (basically Marxist interpretation) that NLG is ‘… a desperate and unsuccessful attempt to overcome crises of over-accumulation, over-production, and stagnation’ is basically correct -- except for his assessment that NLG is ‘desperate and unsuccessful’.[5] On the contrary, we must recognize that NLG has been highly successful, especially for those who have benefited from it. LMNCs, in search of profits, have expanded all over the world, creating, in the process, a large number of billionaires and millionaires, while the workers in the PDCs have been paid peanuts, and extreme poverty persists in the PDCs. Also, the LMNCs have not respected internationally-accepted environmental standards in the PDCs – for example, Shell in the Niger Delta -- and, as a result, large areas of land and coastal waters  were polluted, destroying the livelihoods of local farmers and fishermen; and the indigenous populations were uprooted from their lands and communities invaded by the mining companies.

A development that is people-oriented means Populism and Socialism. Participative Democracy is the key. And that is bottom-up, and not top-down. Politically, there would be peoples’ committees at every level and, economically, workers would participate in the management of the companies in which they work, and cooperatives would be a favored method of agricultural production and in distribution. There would be social programs to insure that everyone has enough resources to have a decent standard of living. Other socialist principles include: subsidiarity, solidarity, food security, ecological sustainability, cultural and biological diversity and parallelism.

Subsidiarity means that whenever a viable local alternatives exists, they should be preferred to FDI, or LMNC, investment. That also means that, whenever possible, labor-intensive technologies should selected over the capital-intensive ones. Solidarity means that International Exchange cannot be determined only by profit considerations: countries that are rich in natural and energetic resources should share them with countries that are less lucky in that respect – in Latin America, that principle is put into practice by socially progressive countries such as Venezuela (rich in oil), Cuba (rich in doctors), Bolivia (rich in gas), Ecuador, Nicaragua, and even Brazil (a great regional power, and a leading industrial power).

Food security means that food production should be favored over export crops, until such time that the food needs of the indigenous populations are met. Ecological sustainability means that LMNCs should not be allowed to destroy the environment (like Shell in the Niger Delta) in their search for profit. Cultural Diversity mean that local cultures, that are a common heritage of humanity, should be protected from Cultural Imperialism. Biological Diversity, that the activities of the agro-business LMNCs (Cargill, Monsanto, etc.) should be carefully monitored, especially concerning the Genetically Modified Organisms (GMOs). Parallelism means that, for the sake of Democracy, the Transition to a socialist system should be gradual, and that the private sector should be left alone during that time – and not harassed or nationalized.

Are the Reformist and the Radical approaches, or solutions, incompatible or mutually exclusive? Not necessarily, and not entirely, it seems to me. Certain options or preferences are incompatible, but not all. Besides, we must face the Reality that Globalisation, or NLG, is not going to disappear, as if by a stroke of a magic wand. The world needs Democracy, a (qualitatively) Productive Economy, a Healthy Planet and a Culture of Peace. The Correct Solution must include important Ethical and (even more so) Spiritual Dimensions: Human beings will have to change, if Humanity is to survive. They will have to become more Frugal, less selfish and more generous; be prepared to share the wealth and resources of this world to a much larger extent that they have been able or willing to do until now.

I do not think that I need here to review in detail what in the Reformist and Radical Approaches is Good, and needs to be kept, and what is Bad, and must be rejected. I believe that the Truth is largely in the Radical camp, but that does not mean that there is no Good in the Reformist camp. We should not throw the baby with the bathwater. And more importantly, the Solution will have to be Pragmatic, and not ideological. That means that it will be determined by Dialogue and Negotiation.

The task is to build a better and sustainable world. I believe that it can be done. That, in other words, mankind has enough wisdom to do it. I hope I am not mistaken.    

NOTES:

1 I think the following Nietzsche aphorism has a lot of truth in it: Life at bottom is Intuition / Drive and folly / and Lack of reason. We must rely on Reason to deal of the problems of world. But what really counts is Intuition. Love of Humanity is not based on Reason – there are many … reasons to hate human beings – but on Intuition.

2 Including the ‘Emerging Great Powers’ (often referred to as the CRIB countries because they are made up by China, Russia, India and Brazil).

3 As I write these lines, the news broke that Al Gore and the IPCC have won the Peace Nobel Prize for 2007. I consider that good news that could put pressure on the US to change their ways concerning Global Warming. See also, in the National Geographic, The Carbon Crisis (October 2007)

4 Eco-Equity, the Stockholm Development Institute and Christian Aid are also involved.

5 Walden Bello, a member of the Transnational Institute, and Director of the Global South, has published an essay entitled, The Post-Washington Dissensus. It can be read on the www.stwr.org

Dr Zeki Ergas is a scholar, writer and social activist. He is presently finishing a book based on seventeen essays he recently published on the websites of important Civil Society Organisations, including: www.stwr.org, www.globalmarshallplan.org, www.oneworld.net, www.globalpolicy.org and www.mediaforfreedom.com

Copyright 2007 Share The World's Resources (www.stwr.org)

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