WTO: Don't fix it, ban it
On the eve of the WTO meeting in Seattle, anti-WTO activists face a
major challenge: WTO apologists' potentially effective strategy of "admitting
shortcomings and trumpeting the need for reform". Russell Mokhiber and Robert
Weissman explain here why they think environmentalist and others opposed to the WTO should
settle for nothing less than its complete dismantling.
10 Reasons to Dismantle the WTO
By Russell Mokhiber and Robert Weissman
Add a new constituency to the long list of World Trade Organization (WTO)
critics which already includes consumers, labor, environmentalists, human rights
activists, fair trade groups, AIDS activists, animal protection organizations, those
concerned with Third World development, religious communities, women's organizations. The
latest set of critics includes WTO backers and even the WTO itself.
As the WTO faces crystallized global opposition -- to be manifested in
massive street demonstrations and colorful protests in Seattle, where the WTO will hold
its Third Ministerial meeting from November 30 to December 3 -- the global trade
agency and its strongest proponents veer between a shrill defensiveness and the much more
effective strategy of admitting shortcomings and trumpeting the need for reform.
WTO critics now face a perilous moment. They must not be distracted by
illusory or cosmetic reform proposals, nor by even more substantive proposals for changing
the WTO -- should they ever emerge from the institution or its powerful rich country
members. Instead, they should unite around an uncompromising demand to dismantle the WTO
and its corporate-created rules.
Here are 10 reasons why:
1. The WTO prioritizes trade and commercial considerations over all other
values.
WTO rules generally require domestic laws, rules and regulations designed to
further worker, consumer, environmental, health, safety, human rights, animal protection
or other non-commercial interests to be undertaken in the "least trade
restrictive" fashion possible -- almost never is trade subordinated to these
noncommercial concerns.
2. The WTO undermines democracy.
Its rules drastically shrink the choices available to democratically
controlled governments, with violations potentially punished with harsh penalties. The WTO
actually touts this overriding of domestic decisions about how economies should be
organized and corporations controlled. "Under WTO rules, once a commitment has
been made to liberalize a sector of trade, it is difficult to reverse," the WTO says
in a paper on the benefits of the organization which is published on its web site.
"Quite often, governments use the WTO as a welcome external constraint on their
policies: 'we can't do this because it would violate the WTO agreements.'"
3. The WTO does not just regulate, it actively promotes, global
trade.
Its rules are biased to facilitate global commerce at the expense of
efforts to promote local economic development and policies that move communities,
countries and regions in the direction of greater self-reliance.
4. The WTO hurts the Third World.
WTO rules force Third World countries to open their markets to rich
country multinationals, and abandon efforts to protect infant domestic industries. In
agriculture, the opening to foreign imports, soon to be imposed on developing countries,
will catalyze a massive social dislocation of many millions of rural people.
5. The WTO eviscerates the Precautionary Principle.
WTO rules generally block countries from acting in response to potential
risk -- requiring a probability before governments can move to resolve harms to
human health or the environment.
6. The WTO squashes diversity.
WTO rules establish international health, environmental and other
standards as a global ceiling through a process of "harmonization;" countries or
even states and cities can only exceed them by overcoming high hurdles.
7. The WTO operates in secrecy.
Its tribunals rule on the "legality" of nations' laws, but carry
out their work behind closed doors.
8. The WTO limits governments' ability to use their purchasing
dollar for human rights, environmental, worker rights and other non-commercial purposes.
In general, WTO rules state that governments can make purchases based only
on quality and cost considerations.
9. The WTO disallows bans on imports of goods made with child
labor.
In general, WTO rules do not allow countries to treat products differently
based on how they were produced -- irrespective of whether made with brutalized child
labor, with workers exposed to toxics or with no regard for species protection.
10. The WTO legitimizes life patents.
WTO rules permit and in some cases require patents or similar
exclusive protections for life forms.
Some of these problems, such as the WTO's penchant for secrecy, could
potentially be fixed, but the core problems -- prioritization of commercial over other
values, the constraints on democratic decision-making and the bias against local economies
-- cannot, for they are inherent in the WTO itself. Because of these unfixable
problems, the World Trade Organization should be shut down, sooner rather than
later.
That doesn't mean interim steps shouldn't be taken. It does mean that
beneficial reforms will focus not on adding new areas of competence to the WTO or
enhancing its authority, even if the new areas appear desirable (such as labor rights or
competition). Instead, the reforms to pursue are those that reduce or limit the WTO's
power -- for example, by denying it the authority to invalidate laws passed pursuant
to international environmental agreements, limiting application of WTO agricultural rules
in the Third World, or eliminating certain subject matters (such as essential
medicines or life forms) from coverage under the WTO's intellectual property agreement.
These measures are necessary and desirable in their own right, and they would help
generate momentum to close down the WTO.
Russell Mokhiber is editor of the Washington, D.C.-based Corporate Crime
Reporter. Robert Weissman is editor of the Washington, D.C.-based Multinational Monitor.
They are co-authors of Corporate Predators: The Hunt for MegaProfits and the Attack on
Democracy (Common Courage Press, http://www.corporatepredators.org).
(c) Russell Mokhiber and Robert Weissman
FOR PERSONAL, EDUCATIONAL USE ONLY. NOT TO BE REPRODUCED WITHOUT
PERMISSION FROM THE SOURCE
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