Backlash against globalisation

By C. Rammanohar Reddy

AS THE photographs of policemen clubbing protestors in Washington during the recent IMF-World Bank meetings fade from memory, one could be forgiven for believing that the globalisation juggernaut is moving on unperturbed. But it would be a mistake to think so. True, neither trade nor investment flows across the globe are likely to slow just because 15,000 to 20,000 protestors closed much of central Washington for a couple of days. However, one cannot blind to the phenomenon in the developed countries of a disparate but growing number of civil society groups manning the barricades against many aspects of globalisation. Too many of them are gathering at too many events and at too frequent intervals for anyone to dismiss the protests as the outpourings of fringe elements.

The protests in the North against globalisation are inchoate, often they are not cogently argued and at times they are contradictory. The campaigners themselves are a motley lot: union activists mix with greens (less so in Washington than in Seattle last year), human rights workers with gay and lesbian activists, church groups with anarchists; there are many more such strange alliances. The only co-ordination seems to be to protest effectively. There is no concrete agenda of what must follow nor is there any programme of action other than to protest. Some of the protestors may appear to be Luddites, few of them may know much about the intricacies of international finance and a number of them may appear to be just young men and women taking a break from college. There is an element of truth in each of these descriptions (accusations). But the whole is not the sum of the parts.

The fact that just about anyone with a cause is willing to take to the streets against globalisation must tell us that this anger against the workings of international capital is what binds the many disparate groups. Their views may be incoherent, they may have little concrete idea of the kind of economy they want and they may be largely ignorant of the lives of the people in the developing countries on whose behalf they claim to speak. But the mistake is to search among the protests for a cohesive and well- argued case against globalisation and what is to replace it. Yet, the people and groups in the developed countries who are campaigning against the international economy and its Government- peopled institutions such as the IMF, the World Bank and the WTO express a moral outrage against injustice; voice a fury against the uncertainty caused by globalisation and give vent to a bitterness about the pursuit of private profit above everything else. This is a deadly cocktail of public sentiment that the people's representatives and global capital ignore at their peril.

Where do these protests stand in relation to the interests of the people of the developing countries (as distinct from the interests of their Governments)? Most criticisms of the anti- globalisation protests in the North posit a contradiction between the Northern groups and the people of the South (other than in the non-controversial campaigns such as those for debt write-off in the world's poorest countries). One strand of analysis argues that after having benefited from globalisation - in the form of a greater variety of goods from world trade, cheaper prices from the location of transnational firms in Third World countries and a better quality of life from technological change driven by globalisation - a number of groups in the North deliberately (the unions) or unintentionally (well-meaning NGOs) now deny the South the opportunity to participate in the same global economy when they raise the banner of workers' rights or protection of the environment. Put this way, the defence has little to say for itself. But when the argument instead is about the fundamental nature of a global economy that can deliver benefits only when children weave carpets in India or natural resources are scooped out of Brazil, a different answer may suggest itself - that there must be other ways than this globalisation to raise incomes in the poor countries.

This leads to the second set of criticisms of the Northern backlash against globalisation. That the protestors are working against the interests of the developing countries when they oppose more and freer world trade because the past half century has incontrovertibly shown that markets and world trade provide the best antidote to poverty. However, there is still the dispute about the extent to which the market by itself contributed to the transformation in these countries. There is also the point of view that while 50 years is a long period, they do not by themselves give lessons for all time to come.

There is then the third argument that if the NGOs in the North are so concerned about the baleful effects of markets and globalisation why don't they begin by first more actively campaigning against certain features of their own economies. A good example is the emission of greenhouse gases which has so much to do with personal transport and with economies (the U.S.) that are built around the automobile. There is a lot to be said for more action to press the recalcitrant Governments in the developed countries to ratify and implement the United Nations Kyoto Protocol on climate change. But there are groups working on this and if the larger movement is to sustain itself it must inevitably take up such issues as well. Yet, even if that has not happened so far it does not question the legitimacy of the issues now being raised about the power of international finance, the insensitivity of international organisations and the lack of transparency in decision-making.

A fourth criticism is about the absence of developing country groups in the protests in Seattle last year and now in Washington. But obviously it is only the groups with the funds or those who have been adopted by their counterparts in the North who can travel to Seattle or Washington and protest over there. So these protests will naturally be peopled mainly by citizens of the developed countries. In any case there are so many groups and sections in the South which are already agitating about the effects of globalisation - on the prices of medicines, on local cultures, on domestic industry, etc. - that they do not need to travel to the U.S. to voice these protests. (Sadly, those who do travel from the South to the North at times play to the gallery with ludicrous stories of domination by global organisations - accounts which only discredit the local protest movements. Ms. Vandana Shiva, an Indian eco-activist, for instance, gave an interview in Washington during the recent protests where she said ``In 1984, we had a drought, India needed a little bit of money to deepen our wells for drinking water. The World Bank said they would only give the money if it was conditional to turning the entire State into a cash crop State to grow sugarcane, creating a recipe for water famine within 5 years and forcing the country into debt... The World Bank is forcing India to privatise water resources. There have been situations, for example, a lake in Mahahrash (sic), built by the tribals, taken over by Coca-Cola, which is preventing the tribals who built it from having access to drinking water.'' )

In the larger sense if the vision is of a world where the faceless forces of globalisation cannot run uncontrolled wherever they wish to, then there is no conflict between protestors in the North and the South. The real danger is that the small but growing and vocal backlash against globalisation that is taking place in the North will be appropriated by the forces of protectionism whose only objective is to keep Third World exports out at all costs. For now, the heterogenous groups rallying against globalisation in the North are causing little more than pinpricks to their Governments. But looking back over the past few years they have emerged from nowhere and established their presence. Their greatest impact has been on the streets. But as the resentment against the uncertainty that globalisation brings about grows, this will change. So far Governments and policy- makers have got away with a response that does not go beyond arrests or a disparaging dismissal of these protests.

The anti-globalisation forces in the North will sooner or later have to be heard in national parliaments and in global meets. The irony is that the first effective opposition to globalisation is not coming from the developing countries but from an alliance of disparate groups in the developed countries.

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