"Politics has actually never lost this control. The Washington Consensus is a purely political project.. With the slogan `Another World is Possible', the movement makes a far-reaching claim. It fights for a new social, economic, political and democratic order all over the world.. Alternative aims at changing the system, not at corrections within the system.." Jacques Nikonoff works with Attac France.
ALTERNATIVES INSTEAD OF CORRECTIONS
The Movement of Globalization Critics Gains Momentum
By Jacques Nikonoff
[This article originally published in: Le Monde diplomatique May 14, 2004 is translated from the German on the World Wide Web,
http://www.taz.de/pt/2004/05/14.nf/mondeText.artikel,a0073.idx,17. Jacques Nikonoff is chairperson of Attac France.]
Neoliberal globalization neither appeared from nowhere nor is a necessary step in the development of the economy and technology. Rather neoliberal globalization is the consequence of political decisions and therefore can be cancelled or changed. The movement for another globalization that struggles for a new social, economic and political order can tackle neoliberalism on different planes, international, national and individual. Another world is possible.
More has happened in the last years than many think. The system of neoliberal globalization grinds at all corners. This does not mean that a collapse is immediately imminent. A gigantic movement for another globalization arising all over the world gains more and more importance. How can this movement gain critical mass to realize changes? The signs multiply that this goal is within reach. Fewer and fewer people are ready to accept the injustices and absurdities of this world. In their search for alternatives, many of them turn to the critics of liberal globalization.
One historical achievement of globalization critics should be underscored. After considerable efforts, globalization critics have unmasked and deconstructed the neoliberal ideology. Many alternative approaches and initiatives have developed in the debates of the World Social Forum. Liberal globalization is a political process countered by another political process, the global justice movement or the movement of globalization critics. Since the veil around globalization is lifted, its essential aspects have come to light. Globalization is a system of subjugation of the South by the North, the rule of Anglo-Saxon capitalism over other forms of capitalism, the exploitation of the poor by the rich. Present-day globalization loyally implements the neoliberal ideology.
Globalization neither appears from nowhere nor is a necessary step in the natural development of the economy or technology. Globalization is the direct consequence of many political decisions. Globalization belongs to a strategy that reacted to the social developments of the late 1960s. Globalization’s goal is to bring wage earners into line with the help of unemployment in the industrialized West and through the debt trap in poor countries.
Capitalism with its dynamic has contributed greatly to the development of new technologies and to the current dominance of the financial markets. The supporters of the conservative revolution – by Margaret Thatcher and Ronald Reagan, also used these forces at the beginning of the 1980s above all – for their political goals. Neoliberal globalization is the direct result of a policy that governments, international organizations, powerful sponsors and multinational corporations have carried out.
Multinational corporations have drawn many advantages from the worldwide upheaval of working conditions. In western industrial countries, these corporations have weakened unions and other social countervailing forces through the downsizing or shifting of factories and have profited from the competition of regions for jobs. They forced down the wages of the working masses and increased their profits by tax gifts or generous relief from social security contributions, to say nothing to moving company headquarters to tax havens. Finally, corporations give the impression of contributing to the economic development of the South by transferring their production sites.
By the middle of the 1970s, capitalism had lost a part of its dominance. This was true for those countries that sought a middle position between the fronts of the Cold War in the movement of block-free states and for some companies supporting the common heritage of the student movement. Profits and productivity fell while wages rose. Anti-capitalist convictions spread above all among the young in all population sectors. In this situation, entrepreneur circles and conservatives retained the upper hand ideologically and practically in factories, media, international organizations, political parties and state institutions.
Whoever analyzes neoliberal globalization carefully loses any belief in a supposed “powerlessness of the political”. Urging again and again that politics “bring the economy under its control” is meaningless. Politics has actually never lost this control. The Washington Consensus is a purely political project. Its cornerstones – liberalization, deregulation, privatization, budgetary discipline and tax cuts – are converted gradually and systematically.
The phenomenon of globalization must be understood accurately so it can be countered with realistic strategies. The criticism of globalization must become a political and cultural process of emancipation of all people…
In appealing to the general sympathy, we remain fixated on the present without any historical perspective. With the slogan “Another world is possible”, the movement makes a far-reaching claim. It fights for a new social, economic, political and democratic order all over the world. Means and possibilities for this new order must be developed.
Emphasizing the term “alternative” is helpful. On first view, political party programs and union demands seem rehashed under the new term. Alternative aims at changing the system, not corrections within the system. Alternative understands itself as global and anti-liberal. At the World Social Forum, alternative from the beginning referred back to the worldwide plane. The goal of the movement for another globalization opposes the neoliberal ideology in the whole world on all planes: on the plane of individual conduct, corporations and their markets up to the policies of international organizations.
Neoliberal globalization can be understood as a systemic matrix with different power centers. Influencing all the political measures growing within this matrix, gradually eliminating its neoliberal logic and replacing this logic with alternative approaches are important. The abolition of tax shelters is vital on six different planes: international, continental, national, regional, personal and in the corporation itself.
Intervention on the international plane is not free from contradictions and therefore not inevitably of advantage. This intervention recognizes that essential decisions today are made on the global plane and that states and their governments can only do detailed work. However the people only have trifling active possibilities on the international plane. Representative democracy and the universal right to vote (that proved very effective in the 2004 French regional elections) are not effective here.
This creates ideal conditions for owners. Owners can make political decisions as they see fit on a plane inaccessible to the population. Nevertheless the pressure on international institutions and the governments represented in them must be maintained so the demands and alternative proposals of globalization critics are heard. To return to the example of tax shelters, the United Nations, the World Trade Organization (WTO), the International Monetary Fund (IMF), the World Bank and the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) could all support their abolition.
Bilateral agreements between states have a bad reputation because an enormous power differential exists between the larger, more powerful and the smaller, weaker states in this form of diplomacy. Multilateral institutions in which every country has a seat and voice seem to be a better solution. Only an approximate balance of power exists in the WTO, IMF and World Bank. Thus reviving bilateralism according to the principles of globalization critics represents a serious perspective. Two countries have the chance of liberating themselves from the embrace of neoliberal dogmas.
The problems on the continental plane can be shown exemplarily with the help of European unification. The neoliberal directives of the European Union were worked into the national laws of the states and enforced through the national judiciaries. Is this an economic, technological or technical financial process? Hardly. This process is exclusively political. What originated on a political path can be cancelled or changed politically…Let us return to our example; the EU has the possibility of prohibiting tax havens in its territory.
On the national plane, the problem today is that important decisions are made globally according to dominant opinion and states have fewer and fewer possibilities. Thus giving candidates the commission to realize an alternative policy would be pointless for citizens. If the neoliberal globalization were actually a binding framework for all political actions so that elected politicians pursue the same policy with trifling deviations, we would not live in a democracy any more.
These mental prohibitions are deeply anchored in politics and must be questioned. With every individual theme, the actual possibilities of a government that seeks to free itself from the neoliberal corset must be pragmatically identified. The French government – and every other government – could take measures against the tax havens. For example, governments could exclude a business from public contracts if tax evasion can be proven.
Neoliberal policy has led to local bodies competing with each other as economic locations and becoming increasingly impoverished. This has happened within individual states and on territorial-, district- and community planes. Many local politicians have resigned to this logic and only manage these conditions instead of expanding democracy. On the other hand, resistance is becoming stronger. The example of the communal budgets in France and Germany and the protests against the GATS service agreement and against genetic manipulation show that alternatives exist. Local political authorities can act effectively even in areas where they don’t have any direct political power. Communities and districts could break off relations to banks that operate their businesses with tax shelters. Citizens could follow their example.
On the plane of individual conduct, many critics of globalization call us to better harmonization f our conduct with our convictions. A host of initiatives seek to change consumer conduct and encourage responsible relations with so-called free software and private investments.
A critical potential has emerged from these initiatives that is more than the sum of their individual parts. These initiatives should avoid a preaching attitude toward citizens and clearly distinguish between apportioning blame and encouraging personal responsibility. Concentrating on individual conduct so much that the global strategies of neoliberalism are ignored is wrong. Nevertheless a concerted boycott of banks that claim tax havens could accelerate the abolition of these shelters.
On the plane of businesses, representatives of the French metal industry have recently shown some far-sightedness. A report of the organization says “the protest movement against globalization finds an increasing echo in the population and develops new forms of action outside the businesses that will have negative consequences in the long-term for these businesses.” The global justice or anti-globalization movement, it says, “should be taken seriously. However businesses do not seem ready for this.”
In this connection, the increasing participation of unions in the social forums and in resistance against globalization is a great advance. The movement for another globalization obviously cannot claim to reinvent the wheel. This movement must consider the experiences of the unions and can learn much from their two hundred year history. Conversely the working class movement can also gain ideas from the new alternatives. A labor dispute of wage earners and their unions against businesses that use tax havens is a very realistic goal.
A constructive dialogue between critics of globalization and elected office-holders is urgently necessary. Not all office-holders are henchmen or accomplices of neoliberalism. Many are rather perplexed. They wait for concrete proposals that can be realized immediately. On top of that, the movement for another globalization, like the working class movement, can learn much from politicians today. These politicians are very familiar with the working methods of institutions and know the real everyday life of institutions from close range.
While dialogue and cooperation are necessary on one side, conflict can prove useful on the other side. To modify Raymond Aron’s old formula for describing the Cold War: “War is impossible; peace is improbable.”
The Movement of Globalization Critics Gains Momentum
By Jacques Nikonoff
[This article originally published in: Le Monde diplomatique May 14, 2004 is translated from the German on the World Wide Web,
http://www.taz.de/pt/2004/05/14.nf/mondeText.artikel,a0073.idx,17. Jacques Nikonoff is chairperson of Attac France.] Neoliberal globalization neither appeared from nowhere nor is a necessary step in the development of the economy and technology. Rather neoliberal globalization is the consequence of political decisions and therefore can be cancelled or changed. The movement for another globalization that struggles for a new social, economic and political order can tackle neoliberalism on different planes, international, national and individual. Another world is possible.
More has happened in the last years than many think. The system of neoliberal globalization grinds at all corners. This does not mean that a collapse is immediately imminent. A gigantic movement for another globalization arising all over the world gains more and more importance. How can this movement gain critical mass to realize changes? The signs multiply that this goal is within reach. Fewer and fewer people are ready to accept the injustices and absurdities of this world. In their search for alternatives, many of them turn to the critics of liberal globalization.
One historical achievement of globalization critics should be underscored. After considerable efforts, globalization critics have unmasked and deconstructed the neoliberal ideology. Many alternative approaches and initiatives have developed in the debates of the World Social Forum. Liberal globalization is a political process countered by another political process, the global justice movement or the movement of globalization critics. Since the veil around globalization is lifted, its essential aspects have come to light. Globalization is a system of subjugation of the South by the North, the rule of Anglo-Saxon capitalism over other forms of capitalism, the exploitation of the poor by the rich. Present-day globalization loyally implements the neoliberal ideology.
Globalization neither appears from nowhere nor is a necessary step in the natural development of the economy or technology. Globalization is the direct consequence of many political decisions. Globalization belongs to a strategy that reacted to the social developments of the late 1960s. Globalization’s goal is to bring wage earners into line with the help of unemployment in the industrialized West and through the debt trap in poor countries.
Capitalism with its dynamic has contributed greatly to the development of new technologies and to the current dominance of the financial markets. The supporters of the conservative revolution – by Margaret Thatcher and Ronald Reagan, also used these forces at the beginning of the 1980s above all – for their political goals. Neoliberal globalization is the direct result of a policy that governments, international organizations, powerful sponsors and multinational corporations have carried out.
Multinational corporations have drawn many advantages from the worldwide upheaval of working conditions. In western industrial countries, these corporations have weakened unions and other social countervailing forces through the downsizing or shifting of factories and have profited from the competition of regions for jobs. They forced down the wages of the working masses and increased their profits by tax gifts or generous relief from social security contributions, to say nothing to moving company headquarters to tax havens. Finally, corporations give the impression of contributing to the economic development of the South by transferring their production sites.
By the middle of the 1970s, capitalism had lost a part of its dominance. This was true for those countries that sought a middle position between the fronts of the Cold War in the movement of block-free states and for some companies supporting the common heritage of the student movement. Profits and productivity fell while wages rose. Anti-capitalist convictions spread above all among the young in all population sectors. In this situation, entrepreneur circles and conservatives retained the upper hand ideologically and practically in factories, media, international organizations, political parties and state institutions.
Whoever analyzes neoliberal globalization carefully loses any belief in a supposed “powerlessness of the political”. Urging again and again that politics “bring the economy under its control” is meaningless. Politics has actually never lost this control. The Washington Consensus is a purely political project. Its cornerstones – liberalization, deregulation, privatization, budgetary discipline and tax cuts – are converted gradually and systematically.
The phenomenon of globalization must be understood accurately so it can be countered with realistic strategies. The criticism of globalization must become a political and cultural process of emancipation of all people…
In appealing to the general sympathy, we remain fixated on the present without any historical perspective. With the slogan “Another world is possible”, the movement makes a far-reaching claim. It fights for a new social, economic, political and democratic order all over the world. Means and possibilities for this new order must be developed.
Emphasizing the term “alternative” is helpful. On first view, political party programs and union demands seem rehashed under the new term. Alternative aims at changing the system, not corrections within the system. Alternative understands itself as global and anti-liberal. At the World Social Forum, alternative from the beginning referred back to the worldwide plane. The goal of the movement for another globalization opposes the neoliberal ideology in the whole world on all planes: on the plane of individual conduct, corporations and their markets up to the policies of international organizations.
Neoliberal globalization can be understood as a systemic matrix with different power centers. Influencing all the political measures growing within this matrix, gradually eliminating its neoliberal logic and replacing this logic with alternative approaches are important. The abolition of tax shelters is vital on six different planes: international, continental, national, regional, personal and in the corporation itself.
Intervention on the international plane is not free from contradictions and therefore not inevitably of advantage. This intervention recognizes that essential decisions today are made on the global plane and that states and their governments can only do detailed work. However the people only have trifling active possibilities on the international plane. Representative democracy and the universal right to vote (that proved very effective in the 2004 French regional elections) are not effective here.
This creates ideal conditions for owners. Owners can make political decisions as they see fit on a plane inaccessible to the population. Nevertheless the pressure on international institutions and the governments represented in them must be maintained so the demands and alternative proposals of globalization critics are heard. To return to the example of tax shelters, the United Nations, the World Trade Organization (WTO), the International Monetary Fund (IMF), the World Bank and the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) could all support their abolition.
Bilateral agreements between states have a bad reputation because an enormous power differential exists between the larger, more powerful and the smaller, weaker states in this form of diplomacy. Multilateral institutions in which every country has a seat and voice seem to be a better solution. Only an approximate balance of power exists in the WTO, IMF and World Bank. Thus reviving bilateralism according to the principles of globalization critics represents a serious perspective. Two countries have the chance of liberating themselves from the embrace of neoliberal dogmas.
The problems on the continental plane can be shown exemplarily with the help of European unification. The neoliberal directives of the European Union were worked into the national laws of the states and enforced through the national judiciaries. Is this an economic, technological or technical financial process? Hardly. This process is exclusively political. What originated on a political path can be cancelled or changed politically…Let us return to our example; the EU has the possibility of prohibiting tax havens in its territory.
On the national plane, the problem today is that important decisions are made globally according to dominant opinion and states have fewer and fewer possibilities. Thus giving candidates the commission to realize an alternative policy would be pointless for citizens. If the neoliberal globalization were actually a binding framework for all political actions so that elected politicians pursue the same policy with trifling deviations, we would not live in a democracy any more.
These mental prohibitions are deeply anchored in politics and must be questioned. With every individual theme, the actual possibilities of a government that seeks to free itself from the neoliberal corset must be pragmatically identified. The French government – and every other government – could take measures against the tax havens. For example, governments could exclude a business from public contracts if tax evasion can be proven.
Neoliberal policy has led to local bodies competing with each other as economic locations and becoming increasingly impoverished. This has happened within individual states and on territorial-, district- and community planes. Many local politicians have resigned to this logic and only manage these conditions instead of expanding democracy. On the other hand, resistance is becoming stronger. The example of the communal budgets in France and Germany and the protests against the GATS service agreement and against genetic manipulation show that alternatives exist. Local political authorities can act effectively even in areas where they don’t have any direct political power. Communities and districts could break off relations to banks that operate their businesses with tax shelters. Citizens could follow their example.
On the plane of individual conduct, many critics of globalization call us to better harmonization f our conduct with our convictions. A host of initiatives seek to change consumer conduct and encourage responsible relations with so-called free software and private investments.
A critical potential has emerged from these initiatives that is more than the sum of their individual parts. These initiatives should avoid a preaching attitude toward citizens and clearly distinguish between apportioning blame and encouraging personal responsibility. Concentrating on individual conduct so much that the global strategies of neoliberalism are ignored is wrong. Nevertheless a concerted boycott of banks that claim tax havens could accelerate the abolition of these shelters.
On the plane of businesses, representatives of the French metal industry have recently shown some far-sightedness. A report of the organization says “the protest movement against globalization finds an increasing echo in the population and develops new forms of action outside the businesses that will have negative consequences in the long-term for these businesses.” The global justice or anti-globalization movement, it says, “should be taken seriously. However businesses do not seem ready for this.”
In this connection, the increasing participation of unions in the social forums and in resistance against globalization is a great advance. The movement for another globalization obviously cannot claim to reinvent the wheel. This movement must consider the experiences of the unions and can learn much from their two hundred year history. Conversely the working class movement can also gain ideas from the new alternatives. A labor dispute of wage earners and their unions against businesses that use tax havens is a very realistic goal.
A constructive dialogue between critics of globalization and elected office-holders is urgently necessary. Not all office-holders are henchmen or accomplices of neoliberalism. Many are rather perplexed. They wait for concrete proposals that can be realized immediately. On top of that, the movement for another globalization, like the working class movement, can learn much from politicians today. These politicians are very familiar with the working methods of institutions and know the real everyday life of institutions from close range.
While dialogue and cooperation are necessary on one side, conflict can prove useful on the other side. To modify Raymond Aron’s old formula for describing the Cold War: “War is impossible; peace is improbable.”
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