WTO Democracy
By Paul Hunt
ZNet
Aug. 25, 2004
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The World Trade
Organization has emerged as one of the most powerful bureaucracies in the
world. The WTO, through its nefarious treaties and agreements, lays rules
for governments to follow. These rules are set to favor the rich global
powers-that-be and are fundamentally against democratic principles.
Indeed, the WTO was organised for the specific purpose of undermining
democratic principles that challenge the interests of business
corporations.
The WTO is in an
unholy trinity with the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund.
These beasts have become notorious pariahs strutting the global stage
according to a script they call "The Washington Consensus." They set poor
states in tight financial traps, while giving generous lease to giant
corporations to privatise everything from water and seeds to medical and
social services.
John Williamson, who
coined the term "The Washington Consensus", remarks that “Audiences the
world over seem to believe that this signifies a set of neoliberal
policies that have been imposed on hapless countries by the
Washington-based international financial institutions and have led them to
crisis and misery. There are people who cannot utter the term without
foaming at the mouth.”
A former WTO official
was quoted in a 30th April 1998 article entitled 'Network Guerillas' in
the Financial Times explaining the WTO: "This is the place where
governments collude in private against their domestic pressure groups.
Allowing NGOs in could open the doors to European farmers and all kinds of
lobbyists opposed to free trade."
The plethora of
non-governmental organisations which has appeared on the scene in recent
years is testimony to the failure of state governmental bureaucracies to
protect the interests of the general public against corporate excesses. In
fact most people are already aware that state governmental officials have
sold out their public interests to private corporations, and are in
collusion with them. Governments have sold their mandate. Elections in
most so-called democratic states are thus a sham. Many people know this
and thus do not vote. Their voting power has in effect shifted from
sold-out puppet politicians and their parties to the packaged products of
global companies.
According to Lori
Wallach and Michelle Sforza of Public Citizen, "No democratically achieved
environmental, health, food safety or environmental law challenged at the
WTO has ever been upheld. All have been declared barriers to trade." Lori
Wallach and Michelle Sforza are the authors of 'The WTO: Five Years of
Reasons to Resist Corporate Globalization' (New York: Seven Stories Press,
1999). They say:
"Our purpose is to
document an insidious shift in decision-making away from democratic,
accountable fora - where citizens have a chance to fight for the public
interest - to distant, secretive and unaccountable international bodies,
whose rules and operations are dominated by corporate interests.
Ironically, the U.S., with some of the world's most open, accountable
policy-making procedures, is a leader in using the WTO to undercut
democratic institutions and mechanisms around the world." (page 14)
Wallach and Sforza
argue that the world where corporate interests dominate everything, "even
life itself, " is here:
"The WTO's manic tilt
toward commercial values is perhaps best highlighted by its rules seeking
to commodify everything - to turn everything into a form of property - so
that it can be bought and sold. For instance, the new system gives patents
- and thus exclusive marketing rights - for life forms and indigenous
knowledge.
"Consider what has
happened in India, where the indigenous population has used the neem tree
for medicinal purposes for generations. After a U.S. importer discovered
the tree's pharmaceutical properties, multi-national companies from the
U.S. and Japan sought and received numerous patents on products made from
the tree, leaving the indigenous populations unable to profit from
knowledge they have developed over centuries." (page 20)
In neither major U.S.
political party can one find an anti-WTO position represented. The
Republican Party has long been concerned about U.S. national sovereignty,
while the Democratic Party has a tradition of supporting labor and human
rights. They both may reasonably be expected to have a common cause in
fighting the WTO and its regional relative North American Free Trade
Agreements (NAFTA). Why don't they?
Whoever wins the
presidential elections thus matters little at all. As in a casino there is
one winner because the house rules dictate who ultimately wins, no matter
who wins the many rounds. Capital robs the prize by having the laws and
rules written in its favour, while the people and their skew-whiff
democracy take a hit. Though it looks to be down and out for the count
even before counting begins this time around!
Voters could demand
that each candidate state their position on the WTO; Or explain their
relations with, and views of, such entities as dead-giant Enron, hulk
Halliburton or seedy Monsanto. But if voters and candidates alike are
entangled in the entrails, bellies, systems, workings and end products of
such corporate beasts is it not a foregone conclusion who has won already?
Is this the predestination of all nations?
Corporate piracy and
stormy conspiracy theory can be understood as Cargo Cult. It has a strong
hold on this world. It looks like there is choice. But business
corporations, political parties, religious organisations and social groups
are found to be empty containers in the END. Shipments to hell. Unless
they are fully understood by free individuals who are capable of
intelligently reverse-engineering them, and not be ignorantly swallowed up
into the bellies of these beasts.
To retain a vote is
to retain individual freewill. If we give our vote or freewill to another
- a politician, a corporation, a priest or a stranger - we should be
prepared for unknown consequences. What may look like piracy, conspiracy,
or terrorism against us is IN FACT a result of our own actions, which we
are for the most part unaware of! The unaware are those locked in the
cargo holds of they know not what! Their dire situation cries out to them
that something is terribly wrong. But they can't put their finger on it.
It seems to be all around, all-encompassing, like a terror in the night.
The key, the
antidote, the way out, the answer for these lost souls? That is for
another "time." Meanwhile there is a cult prostitute waiting for me... but
no, I don't think I will avail myself of her services this time around.
Bulatlat
Past Alternative Readers
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