Week of November 26, 2009, Issue #736
FRONT
Ten years after Seattle
The spirit of '99: Global movement that started with the 'Battle in Seattle' continues 10 years later in Geneva and Copenhagen
Maude Barlow / canadians.org
For many people, the mass demonstrations 10 years ago in Seattle against the World Trade Organization (WTO) appeared spontaneous. In fact, while authorities and police were caught off -guard, the massive civil society convergence and protests were the result of an unprecedented solidarity among disparate groups convinced that corporate globalization was failing the world, worsening environmental damage and creating—not solving—global poverty.
Ten years later, the converging crises of environmental degradation, food and water shortages, financial meltdown and widening disparities between the rich and poor have only worsened. Instead of acknowledging that globalized industrial capitalism is, if not the root cause, a major irritant to all these problems, the WTO and G20 nations are using this critical moment to push for even more deregulated trade.
Cynically, but also perhaps to desperately try to kick-start stalled Doha "development" round negotiations, the WTO chose to hold its 2009 ministerial meeting as close to the Copenhagen climate talks as possible. WTO Director General Pascal Lamy was in Canada earlier this month, selling his line that the best complement to stricter carbon emissions rules would be a more binding international trade regime.
But up for discussion in Geneva for the seventh ministerial are the same old policies that would reduce effective government action to curb greenhouse gas emissions, encourage sustainable and equitable economic development at home and abroad or cool down financial instability.
As explained in the final Stiglitz report to the United Nations on reforms to the international financial and monetary systems, the framework for financial market liberalization in the Financial Services Agreement of the General Agreement on Trade in Services (GATS) under the WTO, "may restrict the ability of governments to change the regulatory structure in ways which support financial stability, economic growth, and the welfare of vulnerable consumers and investors."
Similarly, GATS discussion on environmental services aim to deregulate the oil exploration, oil drilling, pipeline construction, garbage incineration and other carbon-heavy sectors that will contradict global efforts to reduce emissions.
This is, of course, the bad news. It should make us angry. But it's equally important to reflect on our many trade victories, especially in Canada, since those fateful few days in November and December of 1999, and to draw on them to strengthen the current fight against new trade threats.
In 2004, we celebrated the demise of the Free Trade Area of the Americas, an effort to expand the failed NAFTA model into Latin American. This was only a few years after defeating the Multilateral Agreement on Investment (MAI), a proposed global corporate bill of rights that would have made most local, provincial and national regulations affecting business vulnerable to international lawsuits.
In 2007, though British Colombia and Alberta signed a mini-MAI between the provinces—the Trade, Investment and Labour Mobility Agreement (TILMA)—a series of provincial and national grassroots campaigns made sure that no other province would join them. Finally, we learned in August this year that the Security and Prosperity Partnership of North America, a NAFTA-plus "deep integration" plan for the continent, had been abandoned by the US government due to popular resistance.
People came together in 1999 and continue to come together to oppose the free trade model because it has clearly pushed human and ecological limits to the breaking point. Then, as now, these disparate groups and communities believe that another world is not only possible, but absolutely necessary if we are going to come out of these crises with a world worth living in.
I have been personally involved, as an activist and UN senior advisor on water, in the international struggle for a right to water. Embedded in this right is the notion of water as a public good and part of the Commons. The concept goes much further and offers us a powerful new way of thinking about our local, national and global economies.
The Commons is the antithesis of the neoliberal project which seeks to shrink democratic control over markets and marketize even our most basic needs. What is needed is a "counter narrative," protected by a legal framework of its own, that would allow us to manage our collective resources for the common good.
This is not an esoteric concept. It's what most people are hoping will come out of the Copenhagen climate talks in December, though the Canadian government and others are working hard to undermine this vision. If we fail to create a new way of thinking about the planet and our role in it, we may not survive.
This week in Geneva, and later in Copenhagen, the Council of Canadians will once again join with thousands of farmers, fishers, civil society groups, environmentalists, social justice activists and leaders from the Global South to demand climate justice and a reversal on global trade talks.
I can't think of a better way to celebrate the "Battle in Seattle"—can you? V
Maude Barlow is the national chairperson of the Council of Canadians.
An event celebrating the 10-year anniversary of the Battle of Seattle, featuring a screening of This is What Democracy Looks Like, will be held in Edmonton on Monday, November 30 starting at 7:30 pm in the Underdog of the Black Dog Freehouse (10425 - 82 Ave).
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