Friends of the Earth
Action Briefing April /May 1999
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Birmingham Friends of the Earth Action Briefing April /May 1999 |
Guest feature: A book review by Michael Gale
Big business - hero or villain? This is a book about globalisation, the process - largely driven by big business - by which barriers of all kinds are rapidly being dismantled to allow the free movement of goods, services and capital around the world. Some argue that globalisation is a good thing. As an engine of economic growth, they say, it helps to create the wealth which eventually trickles down to all levels and benefits everyone. Others argue that it benefits the rich at the expense of the poor, and has profoundly destructive social and environmental consequences. New Labour has wholeheartedly embraced the concept of globalisation in the cause of their aim - set out in a recent White Paper - of eliminating world poverty. But this book by American economist, David Korten, argues the opposite case. Described by Desmond Tutu as a must-read book, it exposes some of the myths which surround globalisation, and argues that what is really happening is a struggle for sovereignty between the corporate interest - that of big business - and the interests of ordinary people. Moreover, Korten argues, globalisation is not inevitable. There is an alternative.
In Part 1 the author presents evidence of the threefold global crisis which is at the heart of his case against globalisation: environmental destruction, social breakdown, and deepening poverty. One of the problems of a globalised economy, he argues, is that it enables the rich to pass on environmental and social burdens to the poor, and thus to be blind to the consequences. He also exposes the myth that economic growth is necessarily a good thing, since it takes no account of associated social and environmental costs.
Part 2 charts the rise of corporate power in America, and exposes some of the ideological myths which underpin it. The author looks in particular at the economic theories of Adam Smith, which are often used to support globalisation, and shows how in fact modern global capitalism violates many of Smith's basic principles for the effective operation of the free market. He also argues that the relative prosperity of the West in the postwar period was a consequence, not of rejecting `the state', but of finding a balance between the forces of government, the market, and civil society. A dominant corporate sector, he says, is as bad as a dominant state sector. Calls for evermore deregulation miss the point.
In Part 3 the author counters the view that globalisation is inevitable. In fact, he argues, it is an agenda that is being actively promoted behind the scenes. The means include networking in high places; the use of front groups which operate under the guise of independence; aggressive marketing worldwide; and the policies of the World Bank, the IMF and the World Trade Organisation, which all act as agents of the new economic imperialism.
Part 4 examines the world's financial system, which the author argues is dangerously out of control. Speculators profit from market volatility, but such a system undermines responsible businesses, which become vulnerable to takeover and asset-stripping. Increased global competition, he argues, is a myth, as the big corporations enter into alliances with each other (through mergers and acquisitions) to secure a monopoly.
In Part 5 the author concludes that in a global economy, as wages and social conditions tend to fall to the level of the most desperate, it is ordinary people who are the losers. What is needed, he argues, is an alternative de-linked from the global economy.
In Part 6 he outlines his alternative vision, which he describes as an ecological revolution. Localised economies are the key to this revolution, but he also calls for an holistic approach which takes account of more than just economic values, and for the mobilisation of ordinary people to say no to the forces of global capitalism. This final section includes a range of specific policy measures for reclaiming our economic and political spaces.
It is tempting to be cynical, to feel powerless in the face of forces which have already achieved such dominance. So perhaps the most encouraging aspect of this book was the author's account of how citizen networks and popular social movements are already mobilising. Witness, for example, the People's Summit and the Jubilee 2000 human chain here in Birmingham last May. The opposition to globalisation and corporate power may be more advanced than we in the West dare to hope.
When Corporations Rule The World by David C. Korten (London: Earthscan, 1995, £12.99) is available through your local public library.