| slaskrad |
2001/04/18
Dorval Brunelle; Chasing the holy grail of free trade, Le Monde diplomatique April 2001 At the heart of the free-trade doctrine lies the conviction that exports drive growth. If every country, or group of countries, were to act in accordance with this belief, the contest would in theory become a zero-sum game as long as the players had comparable levels of development. But it is quite another thing when development levels are unequal. Removing trade barriers means that the strong get stronger, and drives weaker countries further into dependence, preventing them from fashioning policies to meet the needs of their populations, especially in agricultural matters. 2001/04/04
Chris Lehmann on the CIA's predictions for our global future; Outlook Not So Good, FEED 22.12.00 Global Trends 2015, a product of the CIA's designated think tank, was presented last Monday with great fanfare as "a dialogue about the future with nongovernment experts," and garnered a good deal of media attention for its made-to-order alarmist predictions of population explosion, rampant urbanization, and resource depletion in the developing world. Lest the affluent West think it was getting off easy, the report also teems with dark forebodings of new global terrorism and cybercrime, fueled by renewed resentments of what the report terms, in unexplained scare quotes, American "hegemony." The report at CIA's site: Global Trends 2015: A Dialogue About the Future With Nongovernment Experts.
Latin America struggles to bridge 'digital apartheid', Reuters 26.03.01 For Ednilson Beserra, the Internet was a ticket out of the Rio de Janeiro slum where he grew up. For Peru's Ashaninka Indians, it is a showcase to sell organic bananas and pineapples to families hundreds of miles away without setting foot out of their jungle village. In both cases, the Internet has worked as a kind of economic equalizer in Latin America, a region known for its vast social inequalities. Unfortunately for the 520 million people living there, they are the exceptions and not the rule. Without help from governments, social movements and even some corporations, the Internet is as likely to deepen the gulf between rich and poor as to bridge it, experts say.
Bruk for en global New Deal, Morgenbladet 12.01.01 - NGO'ernes indflydelse er voksende, og internettet er et meget effektivt middel til at sikre hurtig og umiddelbar kommunikation. Information er magt. Sådan siger den 49-årige direktør for Third World Network, Martin Khor, i telefonen fra Malaysia. Han repræsenterer en af de omkring 30.000 NGO'er, som der i stigende omfang sætter dagsordenen, når de transnationale institutioner som Verdensbanken, Valutafonden og WTO mødes. Under sidste års Seattle topmøde i verdenshandelsorganisationen WTO var der mere end 700 NGO'ere til stede - de fleste fra den nordlige halvkugle - men Martin Khors Third World Network kunne mobilisere endnu flere. Via internettet. Mens verdens tv-kameraer zoomede ind på de 50 000 demonstranter i Seattles gader, og mens ministre fra over 130 regeringer sad og svedede på WTO-topmødet, satte Third World Network's folk sig til tasterne. Og der gik ikke lang tid, før mere end 1700 NGO'ere fra den tredie verden havde mailet kommentarer ind. Det var en ny måde at drive global politik på. NGO'erne har fundet ud af, at effektiv kommunikation via internettet og mobiltelefoner kan øge deres indflydelse. Aktivisterne globaliserer sig hurtigere end de virksomheder, som de angriber, hvad Debra Spar fra Harvard Business School har påpeget. De omrejsende NGO'ere er på en måde blevet en del af den globale elite.
Peter Rosset; Tides Shift on Agrarian Reform: New Movements Show the Way, Food First/Backgrounder, Volume 7, Number 1, Winter 2001 From Killing Fields to Fields of Dreams? Only rarely are we privileged to bear personal witness at historical turning points that symbolize and crystallize a changing of the tides. For decades the very phrase "Central America" conjured up images of poverty, destitution, and the most hideous military repression; of dirty wars, the CIA, genocide, torture, and growing landlessness in dirt poor rural areas. The end of the armed struggles of the 1980s meant an end to war, but also, ironically, to short-term prospects of installing radical pro-poor governments-the end of a certain kind of hope. Yet in Central America at the dawn of the new millennium, and indeed across most of the Third World, we are seeing the emergence of a new source of hope, of new dreams-those of the largely non-violent poor people's movements who sidestep government inaction and take matters firmly into their own hands. In Honduras, home to many dynamic organizations of landless peasants struggling for land, I witnessed a moment that signifies a turning of the tides of landlessness. 2001/04/02
IT-ansatte løper til LO - Vil sikre seg i trange tider, IT-avisen 26.03.01 Knut A.G. Hauge og Audun Aagre; It-folk søker til fagforeningene, Computerworld 28.03.01 New economy? Same shit, new wrapping!
Jim Lobe; U.S. Support For Latin American Armed Forces Soaring, Third World Network Features, March 2001 At a time when still-fragile civilian governments are trying to consolidate their hold in Latin America, the United States is pouring unprecedented amounts of aid and other forms of support to the region's armed forces, according to a new report released here in January. In the year 2000, Washington provided well over $1 billion worth of training, equipment, weapons and other kinds of support to Latin American military and police - almost twice as much as it provided the region in bilateral development aid. Also see this article, commenting on the article above: Janet Eaton; Hidden Fist of Globalization & FTAA Implications, WTO Activist mailing list 17.03.01 This is of great concern at time when grass roots democratic movements are struggling all over the southern american hemisphere to achieve a new level of political and economic rights and it raises imperative questions in regard to current FTAA negotiations. Escalating global insecurity and violence is not attributable to `overpopulation'. While population growth is an exacerbating factor, the global security crisis must be seen in relation to the deepening contradictions of capitalism, and militarism and violent forms of repression and resistance engendered by those forces. - Prof. Asoka Bandarage, 1997 [Women, Population and Global Crisis: A Political -Economic Analysis. ZED Books, London]
Jonah Peretti; My Nike Media Adventure, The Nation 09.04.01 Nike's website allows visitors to create custom shoes bearing a word or slogan--a service Nike trumpets as being about freedom to choose and freedom to express who you are. Confronted with Nike's celebration of freedom and their statement that if you want it done right, build it yourself, I could not help but think of the people in crowded factories in Asia and South America who actually build Nike shoes. As a challenge to Nike, I ordered a pair of shoes customized with the word "sweatshop." Nike rejected my request, marking the beginning of a correspondence between me and the company. None of Nike's messages addressed the company's legendary labor abuses, and their avoidance of the issue created an impression even worse than an admission of guilt. In mid-January I forwarded the whole e-mail correspondence to a dozen friends, and since that time it has raced around the Internet, reaching millions of people, even though I did not participate at all in its further proliferation. The e-mail began to spread widely thanks to a collection of strangers, scattered around the world, who took up my battle with Nike. Nike's adversary was an amorphous group of disgruntled consumers connected by a decentralized network of e-mail addresses. Although the press has presented my battle with Nike as a David versus Goliath parable, the real story is the battle between a company like Nike, with access to the mass media, and a network of citizens on the Internet who have only micromedia at their disposal.
Ole Mathismoen; Frihandel er hellig, selv om kuene er syke, Aftenposten 29.03.01 Friest mulig handel med varer har vært drivkraften i EU i årtier. Både middelet og målet for unionens vekst. Handelshindringer er dødssynd og straffes beinhardt. Derfor er grensestenger Bjarne Håkon Hanssen nervøs. I dag skal landbruksminister Hanssen avgjøre om forbudet mot import av kjøtt og meieriprodukter fra EU skal oppheves ved midnatt, eller om det skal fortsette noen uker til. Avgjørelsen kan bli skjebnesvanger. Opphever han forbudet og en norsk ku får munn- og klovsyke neste uke, vil Hanssen få alvorlig trøbbel med den politiske opposisjonen i Norge. Kanskje må han finne en ny jobb. Det kan bli mye urent politisk trav. Det er valgår, og mange politikere vil gjøre alt for å sko seg på at klov-viruset har passert Svinesund. Men dersom Hanssen ikke opphever importforbudet, vil han temmelig raskt få trøbbel med EU. Der i gården har man ingen forståelse for at Norge har stengt grensene. At mange andre land har gjort det samme, er en litt annen skål. Hverken USA, Russland eller Kina er med i EUs indre marked, slik Norge er. Og ingen av dem ble forrige helg Schengen-land med fri flyt av folk. |
