Which was not a controlled and regulated protest. It became a riot.

And it did not accomplish anything but causing a lot of money to be lost, and protest controls to become tighter.

According to the police who were beating the protestors. Aside from a few isolated incidents, it was a peaceful, mass protest coordinated among many religious, activist and other groups against corporate globalization.

You admit that a lot of money was lost. What impact do you think that had? Oh, the corporations and governments are just going to ignore it? Of course not.

With the new anti-globalization literature and mainstream economists like Joseph Stiglitz and George Soros now critiquing globalization, I'd say a profound impact was made by the WTO protests and the anti-globalization sentiment it spawned. Those protests told the IMF, World Bank and "democratic" governments that the people will respond, they will not allow the rights of humanity to be trampled on.

US: Seattle WTO Protests Mark New Activist Age

by Luis Cabrera, Associated Press
November 25th, 2000

SEATTLE -- The protests that all but shut down last year's World Trade Organization meeting may have been a surprise, but they were no fluke, organizers and observers say.

Instead, they marked the emergence of a worldwide movement against corporate globalization growing since at least the early 1990s.

And the movement, which already has sparked a resurgence in activism not seen since the Vietnam War, may just now be picking up steam.

"The coalition is intact and empowered, and actions are springing up all over the place," said Mike Dolan of Global Trade Watch, a charter organizer of the anti-WTO protests.

"What's exciting is that nobody's been turned off as of yet," said John Sellers of Berkeley, Calif.-based The Ruckus Society, which trained activists for WTO and more recent events nationwide. "We're building on a very powerful confluence that came together in Seattle, and we still have this relationship between labor and environmental and other activism that's building."

Some 50,000 activists gathered in Seattle on Nov. 30 last year to protest the meeting of the organization that sets the terms of global trade. Demonstrators blocked streets, provoked mass arrests and exulted when WTO delegates left town after failing to open a new round of trade talks.

Since WTO, a series of massive, colorful and confrontational protests have been staged in Washington D.C., Philadelphia, Los Angeles and other cities hosting trade meetings, political conventions and other events.

"This is a global phenomenon," said David Olson, political science professor at the University of Washington, who traces the movement's origin to a worldwide spread of capitalism occurring at the same time as an expansion of democracy.

"The resistance to global capitalism comes from democratic participants, not surprisingly those who are odd fellows out of the global capital regime," he said. "So you get labor, you get environmentalists, you get human rights activists challenging global capitalism in the form of the WTO."

Ace Saturay, an organizer of upcoming Seattle demonstrations to commemorate the one-year anniversary of WTO, said he was helping stage anti-globalization protests as early as 1992, when the Asian-Pacific Economic Conference met in the Philippines.

"But during WTO, people became more aware," he said. "They saw that Seattle moved the mountain. People are starting to mobilize again."

"This is a movement that didn't start in Seattle, and it's not going to stop any time soon," said Patrick Reinsborough of the Rainforest Action Network. "Its growing and growing, and were seeing it expressed in communities across the country and all across the world."

The Canadian Security Intelligence Service, in a public report widely circulated among activists, agrees that a fuse has been lit.

"Seattle and Washington reflect how large the antagonistic audience has become, and the lengths to which participants will go in their desire to shut down or impede the spread of globalization," the service said of WTO and later World Bank protests.

And, the "wide variety of parading malcontents" first seen in Seattle are far more savvy than their activist parents were in protest tactics and technology, the report says.

"The Internet has had a profound impact, in part by enabling organizers to quickly and easily arranging demonstrations and protests, worldwide if necessary. Individuals and groups now are able to establish dates, share experiences and initiate a myriad of other taskings that would have been impossible to manage readily and rapidly in the past."

Sellers, who was arrested in Philadelphia and held on $1 million bail as an alleged ringleader of the most disruptive activists, contends that law enforcement has purposely begun to oversell any threat to public safety.

"The scarier they can make us look, and the more sinister and more advanced, the more they can get free rein to go crazy in the streets and buy their non-lethal arms," he said.

Olson said the most remarkable thing about the anti-globalization movement since Seattle has been its ability to keep historic enemies like labor and environmentalists -- the "Turtles and Teamsters" contingents -- working together.

"For the coalitions to have endured over the 12-month time period is striking," he said, noting that similarly broad protest movements of the last 50 years tended to fly apart fairly rapidly.

For Dolan, the WTO protests were most important for how they changed the public conversation about global capitalism.

"Really, what we're engaged in is a battle for the hearts and minds of opinion leaders, the political leaders and policy makers in the middle," he said.

"Can we wean them from their slavish devotion to the transnational corporate-trade agenda? The answer is, we have done that. Seattle was a very effective wake-up call for these political leaders. When Congress reconvenes, the debate has fundamentally changed."

A sampling of post-Seattle demonstrations in the anti-globalization movement:

WASHINGTON: More than 1,300 activists, many of them veterans of Seattle WTO, were arrested at the April meeting of the World Bank and International Monetary Fund, as police cracked down early.

CHIANG MAI, Thailand: More than 2,000 demonstrators dumped crowd-control barriers and confronted police at the meeting of the Asian Development Bank in May. They demanded the bank stop making loans that they say disrupt the lives of small farmers and the poor.

PHILADELPHIA: Some 400 protesters were arrested and a dozen police officers injured during the July 31-Aug. 1 Republican National Convention. Ruckus Society head John Sellers, a key organizer for Seattle WTO and alleged ringleader of the most disruptive RNC protesters, initially was held on $1 million bail. All charges against him were dropped earlier this month.

PRAGUE, Czech Republic: Some 5,000 protesters descended on the meeting of the International Monetary Fund and World Bank in September, throwing firebombs, sticks and rocks at police. More than 70 people were reported injured -- 55 of them police.

MELBOURNE, Australia: Thousands of demonstrators surrounded the hotel where the Asia-Pacific Economic Summit was being held in September, some slashing tires and jumping on the cars carrying delegates.

VICTORIA, British Columbia: Citing Seattle protests, organizers last month scrapped a planned NATO conference here over cost and security concerns. Thousands of anti-globalization protesters also descended on the Democratic convention in Los Angeles, a meeting of the Organization of American States in Windsor, Ontario, and the ``G-20'' meeting of industrialized and developing nations in Montreal, as well as smaller trade events in Cincinnati, Calgary and elsewhere.

Link.

Saying the WTO protests changed nothing is like saying civil rights protests, sit-ins and other demonstrations had nothing to do with ending Jim Crow.

You only say that because you only see one side. You only see what they tell you on ABC or CNN. How about this, go to an independent news media site and find out what peoples' stances are on various issues. The anti-war protest movement has alot of different types of people with different views that are not just summed up with, "Yeah, we all want this and this." That's the beauty of it; there is no single conformist view. Talk to people who support these anti-war protests and ask them what they think should happen if you're tired of just hearing what they're against. I already provided you with some main ideas guiding a better course of action some anti-war protestors want to take.

Exactly. The Bush administration f**ked up. Staying there's not going to solve anything, sorry to say. The insurgency will either continue to grow or more sectarian tensions will be sparked. The fact is, Hussein was to Iraq what Tito was to Yugoslavia. He forced the groups to stay together (while giving power to his own minority). When he fell, it all fell. The Kurds want their own country, the Shias want "federalism" and the Sunnis are pissed. The US went in and stirred up the hornet's nest and let me tell you, the longer we stick around, the more people are going to be killed and the more the US government's reputation will be dragged through the mud.

What do you think will happen if we stay there? The political process will quit stagnating, suddenly move much faster and all the groups will get along and live in la-la land? No. There are few options left for Iraq now. It's definitely not going to be a shining "democracy" as Bush and his corporate pals had wished. It's going to be either dictatorship, Islamic "democracy" or three separate nation-states.

Accept the fact.

The basis for this war was bullshit. WMD? No. Read the Downing Street memos. Terrorist training camps? Oh the irony, because we invaded, Iraq's now a perfect spot for radical Islamists to set up shop, get recruits and fight. Saddam Hussein's a bad man? Uh huh, that's why we armed him. Save the Iraqi people? Yeah, that's why we imposed sanctions that killed nearly 500,000 children. And now put them in this hellish war.

Are there any other reasons you can give that still make this war legitimate? Let me predict the answer, whether you admit it or not: No.

The US government messed up. And we messed up for realizing it too late and speaking out too late. Well, now it's time to end this madness. Just like in Viet Nam, it's time to realize what deep shit we're in and get out before it gets worse. And this time we should actually LEARN FROM OUR MISTAKES. DON'T GO BOMBING INNOCENT CIVILIANS AND SCREWING UP COUNTRIES BECAUSE YOU'RE ON SOME SELF-RIGHTEOUS MISSION. There will always be war if you keep fulfilling your own prophecies by invading other countries.

Yeah, whenever anyone f**ks up, why call them out? Why, it's just so counter-productive. Let's just all shut up and follow whatever our leader says. That way we can learn from our mistakes and change our direction.

Er.

It was not "a few isolated incidents". Police were blocked from entering the area when things started getting out of hand, business establishments were attacked, and it took a massive assault to restore order. Oh, sure, most people weren't involved in the more violent parts of the events, but there was a general effort to block out law enforcement.

Oh I'm sure insurance companies raised their premiums for those affected businesses. Beyond that, yes, they have ignored it, in terms of the relevant policy.

Globalization continues. Accelerates, in fact. It's futile to stop the markets; because there are far more people and more resources driving them than those opposed.

Come back when globalization has "ended". :rolleyes:

Which is why protestors continue to show up at every single major event involving multinational corporations and governments. But that doesn't mean the protestors have failed. That just means the heat's being put on.

If you believe the WTO protests accomplished nothing in the way of impacting the WTO, IMF and World Bank agendas, then maybe you'd like to explain how they could ignore the protestors when they had to cancel their meetings? And how could they ignore the thousands gathering outside all their meetings? You probably think that the government granted minorities civil rights not because of public pressure and protest, but because it was feeling generous.

"There is no alternative!" "Damn the torpedoes!"

Here, I'll throw in another; "f**k THE PEOPLE! IT'S TOO LATE!"

You have no imagination. You have no faith. I can't empirically prove you wrong. But I will say I think you're dead wrong.

In 1968, there were plenty of people with your mentality on Viet Nam; "It's too late, we're already there and we will drive back the communist hordes!" Conventional wisdom's generally turned on it's head when enough people form groups and fight back.

"Resistance is futile!"

That's non-responsive. I'm not denying that police abuses happened or happen.

What heat? Those corporations don't care about the protesters, except as a nuisance. They are a minority with little impact on their bottom line.

If you want to influence a corporation's actions, buy its stock.

I'm not saying the protesters are ignored. Far from it. I'm saying the protesters aren't accomplishing their goals. They're just driving their opposition to become more effective at being able to reduce the nuisance the protesters present to them.

Why don't you ask Paul Wolfowitz how the World Bank isn't changing its policies because of the protesters?

Because they certainly aren't.

I don't think you realize just how small the pressure to end globalization is compared to pressure to globalize more. It's a grain of sand dropped in the ocean.

And is it any wonder that I won't believe you?

I'm not of the impression that "it's too late". That would imply that I think globalization is bad. It isn't.

Yes, yes it is.

You stated this:

The report is a good response to alot of this. "Restore law and order"?

-CS tear gas was sprayed into the faces of protesters who had chained themselves to objects or were cornered, and thus could not leave the area as ordered.

-police indiscriminately shot rubber pellets, bullets, or other projectiles into crowds.

Police blocked from entering areas?

-police tactics to disperse protests in areas of Seattle outside the "no demonstration" zone were overly-aggressive. In particular, police actions on the evening of December 1 in the Capitol Hill area require investigation. Protesters and residents report that police used tear gas, concussion bombs, and shot rubber pellets into crowds, without warning, at a protest unrelated to the WTO conference. The encounter reportedly began when a police car drove into a group of protesters.

I suggest you read the report.

Wrong, global activism can make an impact.

Hey, the Civil Rights protestors didn't own stock in the "Whites-only" companies, care to explain how segregation was ended?

The government intervened. Why did the government intervene? Public pressure. Corporations are separate entities, and they do hold tremendous sway in our government; does that mean the government doesn't have to act when there are massive demonstrations? Let's rethink this over.

Besides, consumer boycotts are another route. Let me give you the example of Monsanto in Britain...

After a disastrous month of internecine power struggles, a collapsed merger with American Home Products, PR (public relations) snafus, and continuing "glitches" in its genetically engineered products, Monsanto's stock has plummeted 30%. Despite millions of acres of its GE (genetically engineered) crops under cultivation across the world, the Behemoth of Biotech no longer seems quite so invincible. In the last few months, the St. Louis-based multinational has suffered a number of reverses, including the following:

A failed $35 billion merger with American Home Products (AHP). Monsanto, heavily in debt, has literally run out of cash. The company desperately needs the kind of capital and sales force which a pharmaceutical giant like AHP has in order to finance their recent multi-billion dollar acquisitions of seed and research companies and to market the numerous genetically engineered products in their pipeline. Without a massive influx of capital, an over-extended Monsanto now will have no choice but to slow down its manic rush to bio-colonize the world. In the wake of the AHP fiasco, Citibank has agreed to front Monsanto several billion dollars in cash, and the company announced plans to sell four billion dollars in new stocks, but financial analysts predict that Monsanto may now be ripe for an unfriendly takeover by one of the other larger "life science" transnationals such as Dow, Dupont, or Novartis.

Continuing public relations and marketing problems in Europe and around the world. Although calls for a three to five year moratorium on planting GE crops in Britain and across Europe apparently have been shelved, at least for the moment, the fact that mounting public pressure has forced the European Parliament and European Commission officials to even discuss such a GE moratorium has Monsanto and the entire biotech industry spooked. Across Europe genetically engineered field crops continue to be uprooted by protestors, more and more supermarket chains are attempting to source non-GE products, while activist organizations like Greenpeace, Friends of the Earth, Global 2000, European Farmers Coordination (CPE), and the Genetic Engineering Network generate steady media coverage and publicity.

In late-September in the U.K., a special issue of The Ecologist magazine on Monsanto was pulled off the presses and destroyed by its printer. After finding another printer brave enough to publish the magazine, The Ecologist then learned from leading U.K. newsstands that they would not distribute the issue. Although Monsanto claims they haven't threatened printers or magazine vendors, almost no one seems to believe them. As Zac Goldsmith, The Ecologist's co-editor, stated, "Through reputation alone Monsanto has been able, time and time again, to bring about what is in effect defacto censorship. Their size and history of aggression has repeatedly brought an end to what is undeniably a legitimate and very important debate. They believe in information, but only that which ensures a favorable public response to their often dangerous products."

In the United States Monsanto has begun receiving adverse publicity for prosecuting farmers for saving Monsanto's patented herbicide-resistant "Roundup Ready" soybean seeds. According to press reports Monsanto has hired Pinkerton detectives to harass more than 1800 farmers and seed dealers across the country, with 475 potential criminal "seed piracy" cases already under investigation. A group of seed-saving farmers in Kentucky, Iowa, and Illinois have already been forced to pay fines to Monsanto of up to $35,000 each. Besides the cost of the seed, a $6.50 technology fee is charged by Monsanto for each 50 pound bag of Roundup Ready seed. As Monsanto told the Associated Press October 27, "We say they can pay (either of) two royalties --$6.50 at the store or $600 in court,'' said Scott Baucum, Monsanto manager for intellectual property protection.

According to the Daily Mail (Oct 25, 1998) in the U.K., the British government is considering charging Monsanto with violating environmental pollution laws for a Roundup-resistant rapeseed (canola) farm test site in Lincolnshire, where GE rapeseed plants contaminated an adjoining non-GE rapeseed plot.

Following in the wake of mounting worldwide criticism of Monsanto's "Terminator Technology," the CGIAR organization, the world's largest international agricultural research network, announced that they would boycott all Terminator Technology seeds. According to RAFI (Rural Advancement Foundation International) Director Pat Mooney, a leading critic of the Terminator Technology, "It's (CGIAR's) the right decision and it is also a courageous decision," "Since the (Terminator) patent was granted in the United States last March, it has attracted unprecedented opposition from farmers' organizations, environmentalists, and agricultural scientists. More than 1,850 individuals from 54 countries have written personal protests to the U.S. Secretary of Agriculture demanding that the technology be banned.

In Brazil a judge at least temporarily blocked Monsanto's efforts to get approval for farmers to plant Roundup Ready Soybeans. According to a September 20 story by Bill Lambrecht in the St. Louis Post Dispatch, "Monsanto discovered an unsettling reality last week: Anti-biotechnology sentiments that are widespread in Europe are sprouting in South America. Hours before a government agency met to approve Monsanto's request to plant gene-altered soybeans, a Brazilian federal judge granted an injunction blocking the application. For St. Louis-based Monsanto, the ruling is a setback that would be a real defeat if the company misses the Brazilian planting season in October and November. Brazil is a potential market worth tens of millions in profits. With 165 million people and a thriving economy, Brazil is a vital cog in the drive by Monsanto and its rivals to change the genetic codes of crops -- and food -- around the world."

In Canada, the controversy surrounding Monsanto's strong-arm tactics to get government regulators to approve their controversial recombinant Bovine Growth Hormone (rBGH or rBST) has reached new levels of intensity. Recent revelations that Monsanto apparently concealed troubling rBGH safety tests on rats (rats fed high levels of rBGH showed damage to thyroid and prostate tissues--potential danger signals for cancer) from government regulators in the U.S. and Canada have led to renewed calls by farmer and consumer organizations in North America to have rBGH pulled from the market. In the October 6 Rutland Herald newspaper in Vermont spokespersons for the U.S. Food and Drug Administration and Monsanto flatly contradicted one another -- with Monsanto claiming they gave the controversial rat studies to the FDA prior to rBGH approval in 1993, while the FDA stated "We do not have the data from that study."

In San Francisco on October 27, Monsanto CEO Robert Shapiro was confronted by anti-GE protestors who smashed a tofu vegan cream pie in his face. According to a press release by the "Anti-Genetix" splinter faction of the Biotic Baking Brigade (BBB) issued on October 27 "The chief executive of one of the world's biggest corporations was struck in the face with a tofu creme pie on Tuesday night at the 'State of the World Forum' conference in the Fairmont Hotel. The incident occurred after Shapiro gave a keynote address on the brave new world of genetic engineering." According to "Agent Apple" of the pie-throwers:

"Monsanto has engaged in ruthless intimidation of critics; embarked upon an aggressive global takeover of seed, chemical, and pharmaceutical companies, with an aim to control world food distribution; and is conducting an intensive PR "Greenwash" campaign in order to promote itself as an eco-friendly corporation. We will not be fooled, and we will wage our gastronomical struggle with epicurean passion" said Agent Apple. "Monsanto and its subsidiaries have spread chemical death across every continent through products such as PCBs, Agent Orange, Bovine Growth Hormone, Nutrasweet, Equal, and Roundup (the world's biggest selling herbicide). The corporation's toxic Superfund sites poison workers and community members, and its dioxins will continue to cause birth defects and major health problems for generations to come." The EPA has designated Monsanto as a "potentially responsible party" at 93 Superfund sites.

Link.

Hey LP, heard of something called PUBLIC RELATIONS?

Which is why protests continue and expand. Uh, wait.

You can't stop protestors, they're always going to be there. And if there are enough of them, they'll be heard. Don't be naive enough to think otherwise.

You can't empirically prove, however, that they aren't changing their policies. See, the pressure groups in this country are mainly dominated by corporations. If those corporations start to suffer, however, as a result of bad PR (sweatshops, anyone?) and the politicians start getting heat, let me assure you World Bank policy will change. Of course, the goal of protestors and even mainstream economists today is to get rid of the WTO, IMF and World Bank and replace them with more democratic and just institutions.

"Why don't you ask George Wallace how the state of Alabama isn't changing its policies because of protesters?

Because they certainly aren't."

There's globalization, and then there's corporate globalization. Let me assure you that even a small group of people fighting for change can make an impact; whether that means government regulation or corporations shaping up to get better PR and end boycotts.

Then go to the maquilladoras in Mexico and tell the people that.

No.

Yes, there were riots going on in the city that the police could not reach to stop because they were being blocked by protesters. I'm not saying the police brutality was a good thing, but that's a completely different issue.

Once again, they not the same. Segregation was not being driven by private capital interests, but rather an outdated adherence to an old and illogical social hierarchy. Globalization is a different animal.

Once again, you must realize, the people against globalization are a minority interest in the government, and among the constituents. Too many people make too much money off of international ventures for it to be stopped.

Once again, you've given me an irrelevant example. How about you try to arrange a consumer boycott that brings down the Wal-Mart corporation?

But they are controlled. They don't interfere with anyone's ability to do anything, and are thus, irrelevant.

Heard and ignored.

By the virtue of the fact that they haven't changed, I can.

It's not a decision made at the polls, it's made by the masses with their checkbooks. People buy the cheap goods, the cheap goods are made by companies with the best global investment strategies.

Oh, PR campaigns change, but that's not anything substantive. You won't stop globalization

All right, tell me the sob story of the area.

We did not deny Iraq food, Saddam Hussein denied those basic services to millions of his own citizens, you will not put this on the united states.

Nor will you change that subject, we've been over the justifications for the war in other threads.

It was a bunch of anarchists that started vandalizing stores inside the protest zones. Police were blocked from stopping them by protesters who had taken control of intersections blocking both WTO delegates and law enforcement officers.

You cannot make comparisons here. Globalization is trade, it is economic interaction between people, and a process that has been on the rise since the birth of the species. You won't stop it.

The problem with this is that there is a group of thoughtful, committed citizens pushing globalization. A group that is neither small, nor lacking in power and resources far beyond its own intelligence.

Basically, yes. The protesters scream at people from behind barricades, those people continue on with their lives.

Not controlled and not against hopelessly more powerful movement.

There you are wrong. Predictions are something I can give you. I can look at trendlines, I can tell you that international trade has continued to accelerate since the inception of the anti-globalization movement, rather than slowed down. I can tell you what forces are driving globalization, and why the anti-globalization protest cannot hope to challenge it.

Except that from the abolition-movement on forward one could see the foundations of slavery and later segregation eroding, there were small successes that began snowballing before finally rolling over the opposition in the mid-20th century.

There has been no such success in the anti-globalization movement. Globalization is on the rise, not a decline.

You are blind to history if you think you can stop market forces, especially ones on this scale. Nations that try to oppose them get stomped on, do you need me to start rattling off historical examples?

If you want to talk criminal practices, we can do that. Corporate crime happens, and it's shitty. But all too often people try to solve it by abolishing corporatism, and the result is that they get left in the economic dust of the rest of the world. You want to help people survive the woes of the globalization process, you're first going to have to recognize that you can't stop that process.

Here I'm alligned with LP. Globalization is a natural phenomenon that co-occurs with free markets and advanced technology. I understand and sympathize that there are extremely unfortunate effects that come with globalization, and I think that it is important to mitigate those effects. But I do not think it is possible to STOP globalization. Better to work with it.

Firstly, let's try and keep things civil y'all.

Secondly I had a conversation with my superviser back at my old job about gentrification. He felt that our organization, as well as a bunch of other housing organizations could not stop gentrification. He felt it would happen whether we fought it or not, no matter how many people we got behind us to tell their stories and speak truth to power with love because ultimately, money was more powerful. I thought about this and then asked him, why do you fight it?

He replied that while he felt it could not be stopped or turned back it could be controlled. Essentially if enough people come together they can put a leash on it and create something they find acceptable and at the end of the day they can live with. They might even be able to scrape some low-income housing out of it. And at the end of the day, that was really all he could ask.

Essentially I agree with Psych and LP we aren't going to stop globalization, but that doesn't mean it's side affects shouldn't be fought, and mitigated.

Okay,

I think I got all the globalization posts. If someone remembers a post from the previous discussion taht didn't make the transition feel free to move it yourself. Or poke me to do it.

I will put this on the US because the US blocked medical shipments and food aid. And I will say that although Saddam Hussein was an awful tyrant, that doesn't relieve the US of it's guilt in particpating in the murder of innocent Iraqis.

And I will damn well do as I please; we're talking about Iraq and you started off talking about Saddam's abuses, in what seemed to be a move to justify the war. So I will tell you what the US did that was completely wrong in advancing the plight of the Iraqi people.

As I said again:

Evidence?

Oh yes, police blocked from stopping those "nasty protestors"? Read the HRW report. Again.

There is a difference between trade and exploitation. We will stop exploitation.

The problem is that this group you speak of is motivated by greed. When people, however, are educated on the exploitation, more will speak out. Time is not on the side of those going after profits.

"Those damn negroes can scream all they want, we're keeping segregation."

Sorry, exploitation can never be kept up for long before the people realize it and revolt.

The Civil Rights protests were coordinated. Just about every single major protest is and was coordinated. The point is, it doesn't matter how powerful the enemy, exploitation cannot continue forever. Corporate globalization can continue for years, that doesn't mean people won't keep protesting; and eventually, when enough people come to realize what's going on, they'll revolt and overthrow the existing order. Our job is to educate the people and speak out while the old guard sits on its laurels and believes this "globalization" is a historic mission that will be completed.

International trade v. international exploitation. No doubt international trade will always be around.

Exploitation of sweatshop workers, environments and entire peoples?

Don't count on it.

During the nadir of race relations during 1890-1920, there were no successes. Period. It was hopeless. Or so it seemed.

The fact is, while international trade is expanding, people will fight back against global capitalism should it continue to exploit humanity. As governments are pressured into regulating corporations, and as consumer boycotts and bad PR for companies that exploit labor expand, so shall corporate globalization meet its demise.

Those were tinpot dictatorships, not the people. People can stop market forces that exploit. First there was slavery. Now there are sweatshops. Don't be stupid enough to think people won't fight back...and win.

Corporate globalization is not inevitable. A democratic and just order built upon international solidarity can be built. Corporate regulation can take effect. And pork-barrel politics can lose it's influence. Look at Sweden, Canada, Norway and so on. They've built fairer orders for there people. America may seem to have alot of money, but that's a worthless assumption when we come to realize we're ranked among the lowest among developed countries on the Human Development Index.

You think money's everything. It isn't.

Lack of access to medical care was a result of misuse of Iraqi funds, diverted away from humanitarian and development programs, and into military and related investments. Huge amounts of aid that did get through to Iraq were never distributed.

Frankly, if Iraq hadn't been controlled by the tyrant, but an actual benevolent government, it would not have had those problems; US sanctions or not (and there wouldn't have been sanctions if not for the tyrant).

Simplest source is wikipedia:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WTO_meeting_of_1999

"Several hundred activists arrived in the deserted streets near the convention center and began to take control of key intersections. Over the next few hours, a number of marches began to converge on the area from different directions... Meanwhile, a number of activists still controlled the intersections using lockdown formations."

"It also had the effect of cutting the police forces in two: the police who had formed a cordon around the convention center were completely cut off from the rest of the city. The police outside of the area eventually decided to attempt to break through the protestors' lines in the south."

"The situation was complicated around noon, when perhaps a few dozen black-clad anarchists (in a formation known as a black bloc) -- many of them likely from Eugene, as discussed above -- began smashing windows and vandalizing corporate storefronts."

"The police were eventually totally overwhelmed by the mass of protestors downtown, including many who had chained themselves together and were blocking intersections. Meanwhile, the late-morning labor-organized rally and march drew tens of thousands; though the intended march route had them turning back before they reached the convention center, most ignored the marshals and joined what had become a street-carnival-like scene downtown."


Tell me if you want to be an stickler about that one and I might scour the net for specific news sources.

Trade is mutual exploitation.

When it goes one way, it's called "slavery", and globalization is not (and yes, I can predict your reaction, why don't you save time and not make it?) slavery.

Just like every other corporation on the planet. Just like 99.9% of the Earth's population.

About to change a few hundred millennia of human history, eh?

I still hold out hope that you will eventually recognize my statement that there are different factors pushing Globalization than there were behind segregation, and that it produces a fundamental difference in the sustainability of both phenomena.

Talking about government control. That movement was a very effective civil disobedience campaign, the anti-globalization effort, no matter how much it would like to be, is not.

Thank you, Marx. Is it really necessary to continue discrediting theories made in the 19th century?

No difference between the two elements you're contrasting.

How about I try this approach:

The forces which ensured the victory of the civil rights movement are the same forces driving globalization. Racial discrimination is a hindrance to market efficiency.

Tell it to the Soviet Union.

Market forces are people, blizzard. There is no "invisible hand", it's people, just ordinary people, buying and selling stuff. It's not some malevolent external force that you can "fight", it's humanity itself.

Against... themselves?

Not as long as you're trying to destroy corporations.

They've built economies straining near to the breaking point (esp. Norway and Sweden) by an enormous social net and aging population.

You're putting words in my mouth. I have never made such a ridiculous claim.

(Lorpius Prime)

More bullshit.

Have you ever heard of the UN 661 Sanctions Committee?

Saddam Hussein was not free to buy Iraq's non-military needs on the world market. Anything that the Iraqi people needed first had to be submitted to Sanctions Committee and, often after bureaucratic delay, a judgement was handed down on what Iraq could and could not buy. The rulings of the Committee were ridiculous. "Dual use" was the most common reason to refuse a purchase, meaning the item requested could be put to military use.

According to the Committee, Saddam Hussein could in fact be helped to wage war with "beef extract powder and broth."

Dr Jawad al-Ali, the director of Oncology at the Basra Teaching Hospital, trained in the UK and a member of the Royal College of Physicians, once applied in vain for life-saving machinery, such as deep X-ray equipment, blood component separators and needles for biopsies.

Children of under the age of five, five for f**ks sake, could only be left to die of leukaemia that would be easily treated in the West.

Iraqi pupils were not even allowed to have pencils, because the graphite in them "could be put to military use."

It was the US and UK, through the Sanctions Committee, that blocked Iraqi attempts to import necessities such as IV fluids, insulin and vitamins, things that patients in UK hospitals would take for granted.

Funnily enough, even bull's semen was on the "forbidden list" of the US and UK.

However, what wasn't funny was the occasion when the Americans blocked an application by Bulgaria, to ship baby food to Iraq, on the grounds that it could be "eaten by adults." At the time of this barbaric decision, Iraqi children were dying at a rate of one every six minutes of every day and night, as a result of the embargo.

This suffering of the Iraqi people was reiterated by UNICEF, Harvard medical school academics and by the Lancet (a magazine that was banned in Iraq, along with all trade, educational and scientific journals, under the embargo).

The politicians of the UK and US kept arguing that they had "no quarrel with the Iraqi people", while making their lives a misery and killing them in genocidal numbers. Even after death, the US would not stop the torment. An application to export shroud materials - so that a Muslim can be buried decently - was vetoed by the Americans. The would-be exporter appealed to the British Trade and Industry Department, but to no avail.

The British Civil Servant, Peter Mayne, said:

I refer to your application to export shroud cloth to Iraq. The application has been considered... I have to inform you that a license has not been granted under the current climate. The US representative on the UN Sanctions Committee are [sic] currently blocking the export of cloth to Iraq.

The Iraqis couldn't even dress their dead.

Well, even if your claim was true, which I doubt, the aid from the Oil for Food programme amounted to less than $0.60 per Iraqi per day. There simply wasn't enough aid to go around.

Moreover, the UN sanctions were levied against Iraq in August 1990 and the Oil for Food program began in December 1996. It is therefore impossible to attribute the suffering of the Iraqi people to the obstruction of a programme, which did not exist until six years after the sanctions were imposed.

As Denis Halliday (who resigned from his post in September 1998 in protest of the sanctions against Iraq, after working for the UN for 34 years) explained:

The OFF program as conceived is completely inadequate. It was designed in fact not to resolve the situation, but to prevent further deterioration of both mortality rates and malnutrition. It has failed to do that; at best it has just about sustained the situation. It's grossly under-funded, and it has not even begun to address the needs, the dietary needs of the Iraqi people... And on top of that you have a medical sector which gobbles up the rest of the money to a great extent, so again we have not managed to provide the basic needs of the Iraqi people

Please, stop trying to make excuses for the mass murder of hundreds of thousands of innocent Iraqis, and accept the fact that the US has caused enormous and unquantifiable suffering for the people of Iraq.

Yeah, Saddam Hussein being a tyrant and all didn't seem to matter when he gave him chemical weapons. Oh yeah, US sanctions did severely impact the Iraqi people (regardless of Saddam being a tyrant) but Intifada should've cleared that up for you.

Yes, that Wikipedia excerpt truly proves there was mass looting and rioting.

:rolleyes:

The protestors blocked intersections, no doubt. But rioting? No. Anyways, the police were to blame for much of the violent action.

Corporate globalization exploits labor in developing countries by either manipulating corrupt governments (read: Sani Abacha and Shell Oil during the '90s) or by getting the IMF and World Bank to demand strict "austerity measures" for loans and the like; which end up deepening a country's debt while scaling back social services. In the end, people have few options left but to find work in sweatshops. I'd call that slavery.

Why do sweatshops exist?

No Corporate Accountability -- Brand-Name Companies Ignore Sweatshop Conditions

The garment industry is based on a subcontracting system where retailers - companies that sell clothing like Wal-Mart - sit at the top of the subcontracting chain. They place orders with manufacturers - brand-name labels like Tommy Hilfiger - who design clothing. The manufacturers then hire contractors, who sometimes hire subcontractors, to assemble the clothing. Contractors and subcontractors recruit, hire, and pay the garment workers who cut, sew, and package clothing. Garment workers lie at the bottom of the chain, yet are the base and strength of the industry. Fierce competition puts most contractors, or factories, in a "take it or leave it" position, where they must accept whatever low price is given to them by manufacturers or see the work placed in another factory. Contract prices are driven down so low that factories are unable to pay legal wages or comply with safety laws. The industry structure forces most contractors to "sweat" profits out of the workers, cut corners and operate unsafe workplaces. Within this system, retailers and manufacturers claim they do not directly employ garment workers and are not responsible for workers' wages and working conditions. But retailers and manufacturers exercise tremendous control over the garment production chain and have the power to ensure fair working conditions. In fact, a California law passed in 1999 (Assembly Bill 633) holds garment manufacturers and retailers responsible for workers' wages.

Free Trade Puts Profits Before Workers

The garment industry is part of the global economy, which is ruled by a free trade system. In this system, a powerful country such as the U.S., negotiates trade agreements with poorer developing countries (also called the Global South). Free trade agreements promise more market access to all countries involved by lowering or eliminating trade barriers such as taxes or tariffs. In this way, goods and services are sold or traded between the countries. Unfortunately, these trade agreements include very weak social clauses - provisions that set labor, social, and environmental standards - which do not adequately address worker protections or environmental concerns.

Also, most countries in the Global South have relied on loans from the International Monetary Fund (IMF) or the World Bank to fund their economic development. These loans come with conditions that require them to make drastic changes to their economy and social programs that impact their most vulnerable populations. These factors make it very attractive for a transnational corporation (TNC) to distribute their production across the globe, making their clothing in countries with the lowest labor costs and weakest regulations.

How does this affect garment workers?

• Workers lose their jobs when factories move to other countries in search of lower labor costs or weaker regulations.
• Wages and working conditions are driven down all around the world because of the competition in the global economy. This system pits countries against each other as they compete to make clothes for U.S. consumers.
• Workers' rights to speak up and resist exploitation or organize a union are weakened because clothing companies can easily close shop and move elsewhere to avoid workers' demands.

The bottom line: Clothing companies benefit from free trade through BIG profits, and garment workers lose out.

Workers Struggle with Fear and Intimidation

When workers demand their rights:
• They are often fired, suspended, or verbally abused by their bosses.
• In the U.S., employers often threaten that they will call the immigration authorities to report undocumented workers. Workers, who need their jobs to support themselves and their families, are often scared and silenced by such threats.
• Around the world, workers have been met with violent repression of their attempts to form unions.

Laws Are Poorly Enforced

In the U.S.:
• Workers, especially immigrant workers with limited English proficiency, have to overcome a very bureaucratic system that is not sensitive to their needs.
• Workers often wait months or even up to a year to have their cases resolved because the state is so backlogged and understaffed.
• California has so few labor inspectors that the state's 5,000 garment factories have only a 1 in 4 chance of being inspected. (California Division of Labor Standards Enforcement, Enforcement Activity in Garment Manufacturing, Targeted Industries Partnership Program, 1999.)

Internationally:
• Labor standards established by the International Labor Organization (ILO) are not legally enforceable.
• Nations often weaken labor and environmental laws to attract foreign investors and corporations.
• Corporations who have Codes of Conduct for the factories that make their goods often do not properly adhere to their Codes. Most corporations hire internal or private monitors who do a poor job of investigating factories for labor standards compliance.

Link - Sweatshop Watch

Yeah, there's nothing we can do the change these conditions. Because you know, no one pays attention to protestors and activists. Right?

Due to the exposure of sweatshop conditions in developing countries, the revelation of widespread sweatshops in the U.S. and the discovery of Thai slave labor in an El Monte, California garment factory, the use of sweatshop labor became a major issue in the U.S. For example, Guess, Inc. and sixteen sewing contractors were charged with violating minimum wage and overtime regulations in a lawsuit. In June, in response to these concerns, Rep. George Miller, a member of Congress, called on retailers and manufacturers to voluntarily use labels on their goods stating that they had not used sweatshop labor and that they do permit independent monitoring of subcontractor plants. Following this initiative, on July 15-16, 1996, the U.S. Department of Labor hosted a “Fashion Industry Forum,” which was billed as an educational forum (largely for the industry) on the so-called No Sweat initiative. No Sweat was launched as an effort to label garments No Sweat to show they were not made in sweatshops. It was modeled after the “Dolphin Safe” tuna label and the Rugmark label. However, as of mid-November, three months later, there had been no follow-through.

On August 2, President Clinton launched another initiative: the Fair Labor Coalition. In a photo-perfect Rose Garden ceremony, the President brought together at the White House the television personality and clothing entrepreneur Kathie Lee Gifford, Nike Chair Philip Knight, and representatives of apparel corporations L.L. Bean, Liz Claiborne, Phillips Van-Heusen, Tweeds, Patagonia, Nicole Miller, Karen Kane, Warnaco, as well as the most important U.S. garment trade union, Unite, the National Consumer League, and the Interfaith Center on Corporate Responsibility, an important and activist shareholder group. Knight presented a vision of his objectives:

“For the past twenty-five years, Nike has provided good jobs, improved labor practices and raised standards of living wherever we operate, including here in the U.S. What we’ve come to realize is that we need to do a better job of publicly describing the actions we’ve taken to promote fair labor practices in newly emerging market societies, including the development of a code of conduct, internal monitoring and external audits.”

The results of the coalition’s work were scheduled to be known after six months, when its members would provide nonbinding recommendations to the president.

Link - Human Rights Watch

Does that mean people go out and kill each other for money? Oh wait, sadly they do. Fortunately, we can change these conditions. Cutting back social services and abusing workers, however, are not the ways to solve these problems. There is greed. No doubt, many, if not all of us, are motivated by self-interest. But corporations are taking greed to new extremes. Do you respect gunrunners? Why, they're motivated by greed, just like everyone else. Right?

Let me rephrase that: "Time is not on the side of those going after profits who are willing to kill and thoroughly exploit others." Yes, eventually many are brought to justice. Already corporations are getting slapped with lawsuits and facing horrible press. The more time we have, the more people get educated and tired of this exploitation, and the sooner they respond.

Heard of the Zapatistas? Read up on their history, and then translate this for me:

"YA BASTA!"

That's how people react, it's how they've reacted throughout history.

First of all, you can't prove that, second of all, I've already posted a good number of articles which you've yet to read which explain how massive and coordinated the anti-corporate globalization effort is. I'm sorry if you can't read. Well, I'll give you another article to struggle with:

As the World Bank and International Monetary Fund prepare for their annual meetings in Prague in September, a growing anti-globalization movement is also mobilizing. The more formal civil society campaigns aimed at World Bank and IMF policies are rallying around groups such as the East European Bank Watch, Friends of the Earth International and Jubilee 2000 Czech.

The anarchists, who tend to garner the most media attention at such conferences, are led by the Prague-based International Campaign Against Globalization, as the countdown to Sept. 26 -- the day of protest in Prague -- gathers momentum in more than 30 countries.

From Sept. 19 to 28, the World Bank Group and the IMF will hold their annual general meetings in the Czech capital. At their Spring meetings in April, more than 6,000 protesters in Washington DC demanded the shutting down of the institutions and attempted to disrupt activities. "They know it will not be business as usual and that paying lip service to the world's problems will no longer work," says Njogi Njoroge Njehu, director of the 50 Years is Enough campaign in Washington DC. "More and more ordinary people are becoming educated about the issues."

The 50 Years is Enough campaign was launched in 1994 on the 50th anniversary of the IMF and World Bank by progressive international development organizations and social movements to reform these institutions. Now, even more radical proposals such as de-funding these international financial institutions are on the agenda. Forces opposed to the IMF and World Bank are finding support among conservative U.S. politicians whose hostility to the Bretton Woods institutions and growing xenophobia make de-funding a real possibility.

Prague will bring forces hostile to the Bank and IMF together again. This is the first time a prestigious event of the global economic elite will descend on Eastern Europe, but it will not be the first time that the international financial institutions have been hounded by protestors.

The demonstrations at the World Trade Organization (WTO) conference in Seattle late last year and at the Bank and IMF Spring meetings in Washington DC showed the power of popular resistance against global capital. Teach-ins and workshops, electronic mail discussion forums and live concerts will support street protests in Prague as ordinary people take it upon themselves to monitor globalization, the dramatic international expansion of trade, investment and financial relationships, and demand accountability from its agents such as the Bretton Woods twins.

The Initiative Against Economic Globalization -- Prague 2000 will be "a counter summit where the specific harmful aspects of globalization will be discussed and alternatives proposed," notes a statement by a loose coalition of various Czech environmental, human rights and anarchist groups spearheading the campaign.

If the plans of the anti-globalization movement succeed, Sept. 26 will see mass action of non-violent civil disobedience aiming to enter and stop the conference. Activities are being organized in more than 30 different countries including Austria, Bangladesh, Bolivia, Brazil, Italy, India, Sri Lanka and Zimbabwe.

"The challenge to the workers' movement is to shut down that summit with the biggest international demo Europe has ever seen," notes a protest Internet portal titled Destroyimf. As in the other big anti-globalization showdowns, the Internet is playing a crucial mobilization role.

The anti-globalization movement is a broad grouping of ideas and ideologies from right-wing anarchists, socialists, workers movements, church groups, students and alternative thinkers. Some want a slowdown in neo-liberal policies such as trade liberalization, privatization of state assets, shrinking government spending, export-led industrial policy, lifting of tariffs, deregulation of business and cost recovery on social services.

They say that due to major internal contradictions, the free market orthodoxy is crumbling. Global financial crises such as the Mexico meltdown of 1994-95, the Asian crisis of 1997 and subsequent smaller crashes have brought new counter-challenges to the free reign of the markets.

In September, protestors will be saying the Bank and IMF do not listen to developing countries. They will also say the Bretton Woods institutions are unaccountable and undemocratic and they need to undergo more rapid reform or be scrapped.

"Again and again, in Southern Africa and across the Third World, the IMF's free-market economic advice and conditions on loans have been disastrous," says George Dor of the Campaign Against Neoliberalism in South Africa. "These disasters have led to a profound crisis of legitimacy for the Washington institutions."

The anti-IMF and Bank movement derives ammunition from ex-employees like former World Bank chief economist Joseph Stiglitz, who has noted that the IMF is populated by "third-rate economists" and that some of the advice they have given developing countries only deepened their crises.

Minor battles have been won. The Bank now says it includes gender sensitivity in more than a quarter of all its projects. The Bank recently stopped funding the Narmada and Arun Dams in India and Nepal and pulled out of the China Western Poverty Reduction Project, after environmental and human rights activists blasted the projects. It also continues to talk of greater public access to information.

One aspect of the IMF's "illegitimacy" that is set to be a rallying point for protestors in September is the massive control exercised by the U.S. government. The United States has 18 percent of the IMF vote compared to Africa's five percent
Link - Global Policy

Wow, I could've sworn this movement was really disorganized and weak!

Acknowledgement of ad hominem attack and dismissal as rank ignorance.

Forces which ensured the victory of the civil rights movement are the same forces driving the anti-corporate globalization movement. Both movements are for ending the exploitation of peoples lacking basic social services as a result of neoliberal and xenophobic policies. Racial discrimination is a hindrance to market efficiency; maybe that's true. Or maybe it's better to give those "spics" the crappier jobs and force their country to accept loans based on IMF "structural adjustment" policies that eliminate social services and cut off options for the poor. Look at who's deciding IMF and World Bank policy. Yes, really a diverse crew, eh? :rolleyes:

Oh really, so the corporations are just ordinary people buying and selling stuff? They can't be fought, and you actually believe they're representing humanity? You want to know who's actually representing humanity? The people who are calling an end to sweatshop labor, environmental degradation, xenophobia, and racist IMF and World Bank policies. That's a fight against a negative force if I ever saw one.

Don't confuse corporations that exploit with "humanity".

Corporations do not equal the exploited labor of the world, or the people losing their jobs and suffering as a result of neoliberal fundamentalist "free trade" bullshit. Corporations do not equal the fourteen-year old kids forced into garment factories in Bangladesh. So no, the anti-corporate globalization isn't fighting against itself; it's fighting against the exploiter. If you can't tell the difference between capital that exploits and the people, and you consider it all to be the same; then you're making some of the stupidest generalizations I've ever read.

Destroy corporations versus building an order based on solidarity, democracy and equality. These corporations can't continue exploiting people while giving us their commercialized bullshit. People will fight back against them.

Which is why they're ranked higher than us on the HDI and don't have nearly as much debt.

Wait...

The way you're defending corporations, I'd say I'm not putting words in your mouth. You keep stammering on about the glories of the free market and people going after profits, and I'm telling you people don't just focus on their own gains all the time. They form movements and speak out when they start to see true exploitation.

I have one quick question:

What's wrong with globalization?

A quick answer:

Read my posts for the skim on the surface.

You continue to attribute statements to me which I never made. No, the riots were not massive, but they were exasperated by the fact that the police were unable to reach and stop them because they were being blocked by protesters.

Still totally irrelevant to anything, I have never denied the occurence of police brutality.

Slavery is, by definition, unpaid. I'd say you're belittling the plight of slaves (which sadly are still too commonly found) with the comment.

You're not going to solve the problems of human working conditions by attempting to end globalization. That's a goal impossible to achieve. The government has yet to be invented which can destroy the market, just like drugs are still a huge business despite strict legal controls, so will cheap labor always be a huge business.

All industrializing countries have times and sectors where working conditions are far from ideal, and even downright atrocious. It's a stage of economic development, and it's essentially inevitable if a country is going to industrialize.

The reason you find lots of people willing (yes, willing) to work in these factories is that they are the best option available to them. Farmers in Mexico found life increasingly difficult as trade opened up with the United States, because US agribusiness is the most advanced farming sector in the world. This displaced many Mexican agricultural workers, those people end up in factories or even working in agriculture in the US, because they can get paid more by doing that.

What people fail to realize is that this stage of development is not permanent, markets stabilize and workers and their families become more competitive, able to demand higher wages and seek better jobs. Factories become more efficient, are able to pay better wages, and start replacing labor-intensive work with capital-intensive work.

Duh.

And if the US didn't negotiate those free trade agreements, then those countries... would still not have those protections, and many more people would be out of work.

It's not pretty, blizzard, but such labor protections are the result of more developed and affluent economies, that can afford to place more restrictions on employment conditions. Right now, most countries can't afford to do that, because business would immediately vacate, and seek the cheaper markets.

Asking countries and workforces to be uncompetitive is screwing them much more than sweatshops.

The factories should stay in those countries where they lose more money to their input resources, and be cut out of their own market by the companies smart enough to move, because it's more important to be "nice".

Of course, moving also means employment for other people, but somehow they're less important?

Bingo. This is why the world economy is so efficient. Let it run its course, and we all end up better off. For using about 25% of the world's resources, the US makes about 36% of all the world's goods; it's the result of our devotion to the efficiency of a market-based economy, and the same kind of efficiency is possible for the rest of the world if we let free trade happen.

Right, unionization is pretty much impossible for such people, their labor isn't a scarce enough resource. Once the economy grows and workers start developing more valuable skills, then collective bargaining becomes possible.

Wrong. You can't say they're "losing out" when this is the best possible deal for them. Might as well say Americans are "losing out" because it doesn't rain gold coins every thursday.

When did it become a "right" of workers to be paid more than they're worth?

Immigration laws are stupid, I can agree with you there. This is a distortion of market principles, not adherence to them.

The solution isn't to oppose globalization, because then "workers" would be met with starvation. The solution is to help stabilize governments and pressure them into actually supporting a free market, rather than allowing such violence, which is indicative of a lack of free trade laws.

Agreed. Many of the laws, however, shouldn't be enforced, since they're stupid, and we make things worse with our partial-efforts.

Globalization marches on...

That should tell you something, you're not changing any actual economic policies, just PR strategies.

Globalization is part of that process. Corporations don't like to invest in countries with such horrid laws or policies that business ventures are held hostage by the threat of violence.

Here's what you're failing to understand, globalization isn't "cutting back" anything, there are no advanced worker-protection laws in these countries, because they are impossible under the present conditions. Globalization is part of the process of enriching those nations' economies to the point where such protections are possible.

No they aren't. There is nothing new about any of this.

In the same way I respect drug-smugglers. I don't like people breaking the law, but our laws aren't doing a thing to stop them. People follow the profit.

Kill, no. Exploit, yes. Mutual exploitation is what trade's all about, my friend.

That the anti-globalization movement is not a well organized civil disobedience campaign? Sure I can. Such a thing is impossible, anyway. What are you going to do? Refuse to work in a sweatshop for the offered wages? It's been established why that doesn't work.

The civil rights movement was about breaking laws which institutionalized oppression, globalization is a different animal, there's no way to really "disobey" a company outsourcing program.

I've read every single one of your articles thus far. You've yet to prove that the anti-globalization movement and the civil rights movement are the least bit similar in what they are fighting or their effectiveness.

Nor the first time that shouting at the World Bank and IMF from behind a police barricade had 0 effect on those organizations' policies.

Fallacy: there is no "power" because nothing has been accomplished. A protest should be a means to an end, not an end unto itself. All they've accomplished is more protesting.

Victory for globalization, not anti-globalization.

You didn't answer my question. Am I really going to have to tell you why communist revolutions don't work?

The anti-globalization movement has more in common with Xenophobes than the forces driving it (globalization is a process involving the opening of trade and movement barriers, xenophobes tend to be protectionist of domestic enonomies and population homogenity).

Segregation and discrimination laws were distortions of the free market, globalization is about the expansion of that market.

"Crappier jobs" by our standards, not theirs. I hope you will eventually realize that the alternative for those people are jobs with much smaller payoffs.

Yes.

Part of it. The other part are their customers.

Nope, minority radicals. If they weren't, they'd actually be succeeding in closing down free trade.

Oh, but they do, blizzard. They're called "employees", and they are an essential part of every corporation.

You really think even a majority of the anti-globalization minority group has stopped making economic decisions about how it spends its money? You are part of the market as long as you receive money and spend it, and yes, you are battling the market with this movement.

Again, I will remind you of the failed attempts of the Soviet Union, among others, to accomplish this same goal. The market is better able to efficiently provide for the desires of people than any other form of economic organization.

You're being willfully ignorant of the economic principles here. Programs which support a non-working population by the work of others will see that non-working population begin to burgeon and sometimes even outgrow the workers, placing greater and greater strain on those being sapped for the support, and meaning they are less able to use the fruits of their own labor for themselves. This does lead to an eventual collapse of the system, as the USSR saw, and which other countries (including the US) are now facing.

Debt and HDI bear little relevence to the issue.

Sure, but those movements either:

a) don't work because it's obvious there's no benefit to them (anti-globalization).

or

B) succeed, and then cause greater havoc down the road, because, while it may not have been obvious, there still wasn't any benefit to them (Russian revolution).

How many of you were there at WTO? I was.

Yes, there was violence and agression. Because that's what happens when people get pissed off about something like globalization. I wouldn't want it any other way.

Giant "peace marches" and candlelight vigils to protest something are totally ineffective.

And what of Martin Luther King Jr? What of Gandhi? Are you saying their strategies were completely ineffective?
'Cuz last I checked, they worked.

They were fighting something else.

The last statement was a broad one, Vox never stated he was keeping it only to a gobalization. And Vox, you seem to have a problem with people expressing their ideas. Now, sure, if they just walk around then do nothing afterwards, it isn't any good.

But alot of people don't merely do that, as such, I'm not sure one should automaticly denote it as a "waste of time". Limited mindset/ fakeing total knowledge is what that comes across as.

A problem with people expressing their ideas? Where did you read that?

I'm saying that people gathering in a large group and sitting on their hands singing old Vietnam War protest tunes doesn't achieve anything. What kind of message does it send to the WTO (or any group/government/authority)? "Hey guys, we don't like what you're doing. But we're just going to ask kindly that you stop. If you don't... Then we'll.... Sing 'We Are the World'.."

Civil, peaceful protest is allowed in this country... Because it doesn't actually achieve anything.

Granted at WTO there was some of stupid rich kids looting and stuff, but when a pissed off farm worker throws a brick through the window of a starbucks, that's worth more than 100,000 people standing there with candles and flowers.

Not just here, the general tones of your posts all around the board seemt to hint at that.

And again, I'd have to point to those examples given by Kirtar.

Different situations call for different strategies.

Globalization is not something that can be stopped with a peace march. The front lines in this struggle are in places like Venezuela and Bolivia.

I think social change in the cases of MLK and Gandhi were inevitable. If the black community had not won equal rights (if you can call them that), you can bet there would have been violence. There already was in the case of the Black Panthers. Before his death, MLK was starting to sound almost like a Maoist.

Vox has a point. One might say that Al-Qaeda is in a way "anti-globalization." The rhetoric of Osama Bin Laden hints at American imperialism via globalization as being the primary target of terrorist activity--which is why 9/11 hijackers targeted civilian business entities as opposed to strictly military ones. And in a way, this violence was effective. Bin Laden was able to get his message across loud and clear: "Get your globalization out of the middle east."

The problem however was that the violent action has called for a violent response. In response to violence against globalization, the US not only attacked back (in Afghanistan), but spread the attack to Iraq--hoping to provide two democratic countries that can "stabilize" the middle east. When these countries are "stable" (if they ever are), what else will they be but opportunities for globalization to kick in? If they become as democratic as the US hopes they become, what's to stop them from going down the path of other third world nations that have been democratized, only to suffer the disadvantages (or "growing pains," for LP) of globalization?

Non-violent protests have not done much. They have produced fair trade coffee, I guess. But as little as those gains are, they are something. And unlike violent protests, they will not elicit as harsh of a response.

Let me clarify something, too:

When I say I think peace marches against globalization are ineffective, I don't mean that violent protests are more effective. They send the right message. Basically, you can talk all about fighting globalization while sitting here in the comfy USA, but the real fight is in other areas. You know what I mean? Trying to stop globalization in the first world is an ambitious task, and quite frankly one that's basically impossible.

You have to get into the thick of things, where globalization is trying to take root. Let's look at a different kind of "violent" reaction to globalization: the Chavez regime in Venezuela (and really political currents in South/Central America in general). As a greater response to the globalization movement, regimes like this spring up. They are not supposed to exist in the blueprint for globalization. They are roadbloacks to globalization, and the major globalizers (IMF, World Bank, WTO) would very much like to see them removed.

So I'd consider Chavez a "violent reaction" to globalization who will, as psycholoper mentioned, eventually illicit a "violent response" from the globalizers. Getting regimes like this to propose an alternative to the "globalization economy" is the kind of stuff that stops globalization. That's what needs to be focused on.

Does that come accross better?

The result of this issue becoming one of Corporate Dictatorship vs. Communism.

Globalization can't be stopped, but it can be managed in a way that makes the whole process smoother and less painful for the people on the front lines of the transition. Law-making bodies can't let themselves be dominated by corporate influences, but nor should they attempt to completely block or destroy those coporate interests either; rather managing the growth of the free market within an orderly society is the best course of action for both peace and prosperity.

Really, I disagree.

The push for globalization is coming from the first world. If you control that push, minimize it, limit who it hurts and redirect it and gain control of it so that it actually BENEFITS those that it currently hurts, I think that becomes a good thing. I don't think you can do that from the outside. That's an inside job. You HAVE to be in the first world to control how the first world will respond to outlying situations like Chavez. Popular pressure to TALK to Chavez, to take him seriously and not treat him like a rogue government can bring about a control on the globalization force, and that can only really be done from the 1st world.

The IMF and World Bank are more likely to write off outside protestors (or those in their own countries who are ineffective as you say) and think you have to break a few eggs to make an omelette.

How would you recommend doing this? That is, how can a fledgling capitalist/democratic society learn and effectively implement policies to accomplish adequate growth management?

By learning from those nations which have already gone through it, and (hopefully) with the assistance of those nations.

Right, I think the assistance from other nations part is essential.

Of course, they're the ones with the leverage on corporations.

Your kidding right? Because I know its written into the all the free trade agreements with the US that they supersede all federal, state, & local laws. Its unconstitutional as the declaration of independence and constitution both declare the US to be a free & sovereign nation, but they're doing it anyways. The governments are abdicating power to the global corporate controlled WTO. 51 of the largest 100 economies in the world are corporations. Citizens can hardly influence their governments anymore as they compete against global corporate special interest lobbying. They can't match the financial influence. You think governments can control the WTO? The only information coming out their Doha rounds is from their press releases. No news media is actually allowed to attend any of the meetings. The decisions made there are binding on the governments whether it hurts the citizenry's interest or not. To fight it can bankrupt a nation & many have backed down. That should give you some idea of their global power. Corporations do not recognize individual rights. Its a huge mistake. All nations should withdraw and that organization disbanded. The purpose of government is serve the people within the nation, not its businesses & certainly not global businesses loyal to no nation. They manipulate the world's populations to serve as labor at the lowest subsisting cost to them. The highest in those corporate powers would never allow anyone to rise above them. They become global emperors of global monopolies of the worlds resources.

Democracy doesn't exist anywhere as long as global corporations are allowed to influence elections & government policies. Their influence in any form should be banned to protect the democratic process.

They keep talking about a global free market. But with these Doha rounds all they're forming is a very tightly controlled global market. This isn't in the interest of any capitalistic nation. The UN is substidized as much by these global corporations (directly or indirectly) as from governments. The UN cannot control the WTO.

The rise of global corporate power lies in their arguement that they can be considered persons under the law. As such they have the right to influence laws since they act legally as citizens. This supposedly began under the Supreme Courts ruling in 1886 called Santa Clara County vs the Southern Pacific Railroad. Law schools teach this. But a reexamination of this case by Thom Hartmann shows that judges never used the words person in reference to the corporation. In fact no where in the formal decision of the court is corporate personhood mentioned. The words corporate personhood are only found in a head note written by a court reporter. Its not a product of the court. It has no legal weight. It certainly doesn't establish any precedent.

http://reclaimdemocracy.org/personhood/

http://www.commondreams.org/views02/1226-04.htm

Corporate personhood is a myth. Corporate power in the US is based on a lie.

The other thing that must happen is nations must stop taxing businesses. Taxation without representation is tyranny by definition in the US. It serves no purpose anyway. The cost of all taxes are passed onto the consumer. Its consumers who pay the tax ultimately, not businesses. But its the businesses who are getting the recognition of having paid them. As such they have greater say in government when you look at the amounts paid. I am for switching to the FairTax system.

http://www.fairtax.org/

Under this system anyone who buys a new product would pay tax. It gives power to the consumer. No longer would anyone be able to evade paying taxes. It would be paid at time of purchase. How much you pay in taxes would be dependent on how much you spend. It taxes the underground economy, the drugdealers, the illegal aliens, etc.. Everyone pays. It removes taxes from the cost of making a product. Only the finished new product is taxed. There would be no divisions in the tax rate. Everyone is taxed at the same rate giving them a unified voice of protest if the rate goes up. No longer would it be just this group or that group getting penalized. Governments would have to be more conscientious in their spending. Reaction from the people would be immediate. Special interest groups would lose all influence in government unless they are humanitarian in nature. The IRS which treats everyone as a possible tax evader would be abolished. The government would reimburse businesses for the adminstrative costs of collecting the tax. Under the current system the tax, the tax code is 40 something tomes of volumes, with entire libraries of legal precedents. You should be able to understand how much your actually paying in taxes. It shouldn't be necessary to hire specialists just to pay taxes. Laws are supposed to be reasonable so that everyone can understand them and abide them.

Every tax cheat, every government subsidized business, every special interest group would lose under this system. I doubt if can be passed. But I live ever hopeful. The citizen has much to gain from it.

Wow, and I didn't think there was anyone out there that actually believed in WTO-conspiracy crap. I hate being proven wrong.

Corporations don't have more power than sovereign governments, any sovereign government. Words on treaties are meaningless, the Constitution is the highest law of the land in the US, treaties can be challenged in court and stricken down because they are unconstitutional if they claim to supercede the constitution. Any government that dislikes a treaty enough won't follow it, won't sign it in the first place. Corporations have money, governments have armies. Until corporations start fighting wars themselves, you're not going to make the claim that they're more powerful than a government and be taken seriously except by fools.

Moving on, there's no problem with corporate identity. Limited liability makes it easier for the economy to expand through private investment. I don't give a shit if you find a legal technicality against it, that doesn't change the fact that it's proper policy.

Finally, you've got a seriously warped idea of what "FairTax" would do. Sure, it might be a better system, but it sure as hell wouldn't destroy corporate lobbying, have any bearing on where the government spends its money, or "tax the underground economy". You've either been filled up with propoganda or have some kind of agenda that's causing you to spread it yourself.

Who's arming the armies here since the World Wars? The government doesn't make its own weapons anymore. Corporations do. What's more, global corporations loyal to no nation.

Words on treaties are meaningless? Until you find you have no recourse against the sanctions held against you. WTO treaties get stricken not in government courts but the WTO kangaroo court. Doesn't that make obvious its structure? Nations have backed down from pursuing their cause from the WTO court because of threatened sanctions and penalties. How's that the democratic process? Why aren't there any labor people in the WTO?

Corporations fight bloodless wars of poverty. Not weaponry. Delude yourself that it isn't power over life & death.

You have it reversed. The global corporations influence the government first, then the treaty is signed.

What's wrong with people having the right to disband businesses that have proven harmful to them? Any corporation acting in good faith has nothing to fear from an anti-corporate personhood ordinance. Nothing changes in the way they do business. It just gives the people back powers they used to have that they were stripped of.

I think FAIR TAX would

a) eliminate business taxes which would lower business costs & be good for American businesses & American economy.

B) since everyone pays it makes it harder to raise taxes without accountability since its no longer class & industry divided & hidden taxes become revealed. Consumers form a unified voice.

c) humanitarian lobbying remains while there's little incentive for businesses to lobby as the major incentive is removed.

d) consumers can simply decrease spending if they don't like what the government's doing, decreasing funding of the administration in place. This while increasing savings. A win win.

e) all consumers are taxed. That includes illegal aliens (an estimated 10- 12 million) paying more than they do now. It includes all the current tax evaders. Like drug dealers, people who work off the books, people claiming kids they don't have, etc. People visiting. The guest workers who are here (they pay taxes but not as much as much as citizens as they live here. Everyone who uses the nations infrastructure will be paying taxes.

f) it helps simplify accounting for businesses. They collect the tax at time of purchase and are reimbursed for adminstrative fees by the government to send it to them. How expensive is it to transfer money?

g) its easier to audit inventory than to track down money. Money moves faster than inventories. Inventory is more easily traced to its roots. How expensive is a money transfer?

h) its a more transparent system over all. When you get your phone bill all those hidden little taxes, on the gas bill, all utilities.

i) everyone takes a greater interest in where the government is spending money as everyones paying undivided. This could lead to greater transparency of that process.

When corporations start picking up guns and shooting at us, I'll be more inclined to agree with your point. That being said, I don't entire agree with LP either.

As Keys stated, corporations have the ablity to indirectly affect governments. Sure, it does work the other way around, and in domestic companys I'm sure it balances out, to some extent. However, when enough poltical capital is built up by a single entity, all effects it has are stronger and less detremental to the company itself.

I think I have to agree, again to a certain extent, with LP. They can be meaningless. Look how much Saddam cared about sanctions against his nation. Look at Cuba. Look how many human rights acts the United States has failed to comply with/sign into.

They send a message, which is why we should strengthen them and continue to push for them. We should have some unbais gobal government that international affairs should be meant to answer to, but as of now, that doesn't happen, making such claims of importance false.

Do you think that it doesn't work the other way around? Do you really believe that the government, which in this case is the consumer, has no control over the corperations?

Consumers have vitually no say over any global corporation. Not in quality, fair distribution, or the pollution in the making of.

They can have a direct say in how a corperation runs. With their wallets.

It's difficult to arrange multinational boycotts.