According to the Guardian, "the alternative to a world in which countries trade with each other in a rules-based multilateral system is not the sort of pre-industrial idyll that some of the protesters imagine, but a law of the jungle in which the richest nations use their power to impose their will on the weak and poor."
And yet the Guardian thinks that the multilateral system will not reflect the interests of the richest nations. Will the ruling classes of the US, for example, not seek an agreement that protects and enhances their interests, vetoing any that does not? Which is the failure of the Guardian analysis. Countries are not represented at these meetings. Rather it is those who run them, the capitalist class, state bureaucrats and their hired politicians. The ruling elites of these nations have already used their power to impose their will on the weak and poor at home. Will the bureaucrats and politicians at the talks really be so altruistic as to sign an agreement that harms the position of their ruling class?
Any contract between a stronger and weaker party will benefit the stronger. As Proudhon argued, the "manufacturer says to the labourer, 'You are as free to go elsewhere with your services as I am to receive them. I offer you so much'. . . Who will yield? The weaker." He, like all anarchists, saw that domination, oppression and exploitation flow from inequalities of market/economic power and that the "power of invasion lies in superior strength." Free trade is based precisely this "law of the jungle," by which the stronger party dictates the terms to the weaker party. The experience of NAFTA shows that capital has done far better out of it than labour, as to be expected from simple logic. North American big business was hardly being altruistic when it lobbied for "free trade," as the Guardian seems to be arguing.
Never mind reality, what about the theory?
Unsurprisingly, the Guardian stresses that "the idea that trade is intrinsically bad is economic nonsense, and dangerous nonsense at that."
Economic nonsense? Depends what is meant by "economic." Is it economic theory or economic reality? In theory, of course, economics has argued that free trade benefits all concerned. In reality, of course, it has always benefited the stronger more than the weaker. Little wonder very nation has industrialised behind tariffs and subsidies designed to protect themselves from the destruction of local manufacturing and employment caused by foreign competition.
Let us look at the effects of economic liberalisation in the Americas. It would have been appropriate to note that the expansion of trade in Latin America in the last two decades has not been accompanied by increased economic growth. According to World Bank data, per capita GDP growth in Latin America slowed from an average of 2.8 percent annually in the 1960-1980 period to just 0.3 percent annually in the last twenty years.
Specifically, according to the World Bank's 1999 World Development Report, per capita GDP growth in Brazil from 1990 to 1997 averaged just over 1.0 percent a year. In Mexico, per capita GDP growth was barely positive over this period. By comparison, in the years from 1960 to 1980, annual per capita GDP growth averaged 4.7 percent in Brazil and 3.7 percent in Mexico.
If increased trade is so good, then these figures should be reversed.
Mexican government figures report that between 1993 and 2000 the gap in wages in manufacturing between Mexico and the United States rose from $9.6 to $12.1 per hour. The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) reports that since 1995 real wages in Mexico have declined by 10%. But over this period labour productivity increased by 45%. This is due almost exclusively to the fact that many workers have increased their hours of work from eight to twelve hours per day. The number of Mexicans working more than 48 hours per week rose from 2.3 million in 1988 to 9.3 million in 2000.
In 1980 the average automotive worker in Mexico earned about one-third of the wage of an American automotive worker. By the year 2000 this average worker earned only one-twelfth of his American counterpart.
Again, if free trade is so good, then these figures should be reversed.
All in all, economic reality, fits in well with the anarchist theory that free trade will benefit the stronger of the parties involved. In this case, the capitalist class as the United States workers saw the same kind of benefits as their Mexican fellow workers while inequality and corporate profits in Mexico and the US rose to new heights.
Free Trade, Corporate Rule
The paper argues that the protestors will "help create space for those with constructive ideas on debt relief, the environment, trade and global economic governance, to influence the world for the better." It argues that "the world economy is in a state of flux, with the model of self regulating markets and all-powerful corporations rapidly going out of fashion. . . the idea that interventionism is back in fashion can only be welcomed."
Sadly, NAFTA and the new Free Trade agreement being discussed in Quebec is designed to eliminate such interventionism. The ability of corporations to sue governments was enshrined in chapter 11 of NAFTA.
In a small town in the Mexican state of San Luis Potosi, a California firm - Metalclad - a commercial purveyor of hazardous wastes, bought an abandoned dump site nearby. It proposed to expand on the dumpsite and use it to dump toxic waste material. The people in the neighbourhood of the dump site protested. The municipality, using powers delegated to it by the state, rezoned the site and forbid Metalclad to extend its land holdings. Metalclad, under Chapter 11 of the NAFTA, then sued the Mexican government for damage to its profit margins and balance sheet as a result of being treated unequally by the people of San Luis Potosi. A trade panel, convened in Washington, agreed with the company.
In Canada, the Ethyl corporation sued when the government banned its gasoline additive as a health hazard. The government settled "out of court" to prevent a public spectacle of a corporation overruling the nation's Parliament.
Parliamentary democracy is endangered by NAFTA and other Free Trade agreements. They are designed for corporations and corporate rule, not that you could guess this from the Guardian. Chapter 11 was not enshrined in the NAFTA in order to make a better world for the people of Canada, any more than for the people of San Luis Potosi but, instead, for the capitalist elite.
Governments may be the property owners gendarme, but they can be influenced by their subjects, unlike multinationals. NAFTA was designed to reduce this influence even more. Changes in government policy reflect the changing needs of business, modified, of course, by fear of the working population and its strength. Which explains globalisation -- the need for capital to strengthen its position vis-à-vis labour by pitting one labour force against -- and our next step, namely to strengthen and globalise working class resistance. Only when it is clear that the costs of globalisation -- in terms of strikes, protests, boycotts, occupations and so on -- is higher than potential profits will business turn away from it. Only international working class direct action and solidarity will get results.
Globalising Resistance
The Guardian argues: "The protests in Quebec are not going to halt trade, let alone bring about the demise of global capitalism."
True words, but then again, no anarchist thought they would. Rather they are a sign of our strength and solidarity, a warning to the powers that be that they ignore us at their own risk. As such, as a symbol of grass-roots protest, they are essential. However, as Kropotkin argued in his account of the Great French Revolution, "to make a revolution it is not, however, enough that there should be such risings." Rather, "it is necessary that after the risings there should be something new in the institutions" that make up society "which would permit new forms of life to be elaborated and established." It is this next stage which alone will bring about the demise of global capitalism.
We must turn our attention to where we live and work. Only by organising and resisting there can we create the new institutions which will be the framework of a free society.
A New World in Our Hearts
The Guardian complains that the protestors "are good at highlighting the defects of the global market but less convincing when describing their own vision." Given that this vision has been almost totally excluded from media reporting, only the myopic could blame the rebels. Moreover, anarchists have been quite clear about our vision.
Firstly, we must organise ourselves to defend our interests by direct action and solidarity. This involves, for example, workplace and community organisation linked together in a global federation. In this way, capital cannot move to escape "restrictive" labour or environmental laws or protests. No matter where they go, they must face the local branch of an international movement based on "an injury to one is an injury to all." Organising itself without union bureaucrats and labour politicians to sell us out, it will show its strength by its ability to pit the power of working class resistance against the power of capital. Only by international solidarity and direct action can we tame, and finally destroy, the power of capital and its willing servant the state.
Secondly, we must create a new world. A world without rich and poor, master and servant. Such a society will be decentralised, based on individual, community and workplace self-government. Each workplace will be run by its workers, each community by its inhabitants. Individuals and communities will work together as equals in free federations run from the bottom up. Free individuals associating freely to meet their needs, sharing the world and its resources. A diverse society with organisations that develop individuality rather than crush it beneath hierarchies needed only to defend the power, property, profits and privileges of the few. A society fit for humans, not automations. A society created from below, by the majority, and not imposed by and for elites by tiny minorities hiding from their subjects behind 3 metre high fences.
These two visions are related. By fighting oppression in the here and now we gain the experience, confidence and power required to transform society. By resisting and organising against global capitalism we will be creating the world that will replace it. Our vision is one created from below, by the actions and hopes of those who dare to be free.
On the positive side, the Guardian predicted that "anti-globalisation protesters will win another campaign medal this weekend." Having "won its spurs at Seattle in December 1999, laid siege to Prague last September" the protestors have "now moved on to Quebec, the scene of another battle for global mastery, between the British and the French in 1759."
The battle of 1759 was fought by working people on behalf of their ruling elites. The battle of 2001 was by working people against their ruling elites. Quebec is but one battle in a class war that can only be won once we strike down the sources of elite power -- private property, states and hierarchy. That involves more than just street fighting, it requires organisation in our communities and workplaces so that direct action and solidarity are applied in our everyday lives.
Only by complementing the anti-globalisation protests with grass-roots anti-capitalist organising can we create a new world.