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Re: Failures of Global Capitalism
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John Perkins
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Sep 15, 2003 20:01 PDT
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| | The nearly six-decade-record of the International Monetary Fund (IMF)
and World Bank is marked by one colossal failure after another.
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These sentiments merely illustrate a colossal failure to comprehend what
the functions of the IMF and the World Bank are. Such wilful ignorance is
on a par with religious delusion - a blight on the progress of humanity.
The purpose of the IMF is to facilitate financial transactions between
countries that would otherwise be unable to trade. The purpose of the World
Bank is to provide finance for development projects that are too risky for
any commercial bank to undertake. These are beneficial functions. Without
them, developing countries would unambiguously be worse off.
With no IMF, many countries would be forced to cease trading causing gross
hardship to them. With no World Bank, developing countries may be deprived
from all hope of economic improvement.
Economic failure in developing countries is not caused by the IMF or the
WB. It is caused by corruption, incompetence, ignorance and lack of
opportunity.
The latter is in large part due to the trade restrictions on agricultural
goods imposed by developed countries, which cost poor countries $US 300
billion annually, which is six times the global aid budget. The repeated
failure at WTO meetings to end this immoral and venal extortion is for some
reason celebrated by middle class rich country anti-capitalists as a
victory. They are like ignorant medieval peasants celebrating the burning
of witches.
John
| | At 12:00 15/09/03 +1000, you wrote:
Relayed by Doug Everingham
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Attachment Converted: "c:\eudora\attach\image7.tif"
Economic Reform Australia
ERA Information Network
Relayed by: Robert Weissman <ro-@essential.org>
Subject: Empty Promises - new booklet from 50 Years is Enough
Source: STOP-IMF network <stop-im-@lists.essential.org>
Date: Wednesday, 03 September, 2003
Below is a review of a new booklet published by the 50 Years Is Enough
Network. To order copies of the booklet, go to:
http://www.50years.org/promises.htm.
Empty Promises: The IMF, World Bank,
and Planned Failures of Global Capitalism
by Robert Weissman, Essential Action
50 Years Is Enough Network Newsletter
The nearly six-decade-record of the International Monetary Fund (IMF)
and World Bank is marked by one colossal failure after another.
Over the last three decades, the institutions have exerted decisive
influence over the shape of economic policy-making in most of the Global
South. And with greater power has come even greater failure.
Following the directives of the IMF and World Bank, country after
country in the Global South has seen economic growth rates slowed, or
even reversed, unemployment skyrocket, inequality rise, rural economies
collapse and urban slums mushroom. Governments have cut spending on
education and health care. Service delivery has worsened. Control of the
commanding heights of Global South economies has transferred from public
hands to foreign multinationals or narrow bands of domestic elites, with
corrupt deals often facilitating the giveaway of public property to
private hands.
What can possibly account for this stunning record of repeat failure?
Why don't the powers to which the IMF and World Bank are ultimately
accountable -- the rich countries, and most importantly the United
States-- demand improved performance, or simply replace the institutions
with more effective alternatives?
Empty Promises: The IMF, the World Bank, and the Planned Failures of
Global Capitalism, a new booklet published by the 50 Years is Enough
Network in conjunction with a dozen or so colleague organizations,
proposes an answer: "that the institutions are not failing at all --
that they are doing precisely what they are meant to do."
"The claimed missions of the IMF and World Bank are genuinely Empty
Promises," asserts the booklet's introduction. The structural purpose is
to integrate Global South countries into the corporate globalised
economy, paving the way for multinational oil, mining and other
companies to extract their natural resources, foreign investors to
exploit their labor forces, international banks to reap profits from
high-interest loans, and foreign and domestic elites to take control of
once-publicly owned enterprises.
Empty Promises aims to present an accessible overview of the
institutions and how they work. The booklet is structured as a series of
short essays contributed by groups working in different areas. Some
sections explain the different components and programs of the IMF and
World Bank, some outline key programs and policies of the institutions.
Others deal with closely related issues in the corporate globalized
economy, such as the workings of Export Credit Agencies and the proposed
Free Trade Area of the Americas(FTAA).
An essay by a Canadian group, the Halifax Initiative, on the IMF's
proposed Sovereign Debt Restructuring Mechanism -- a method of writing
down borrowing country debts in cases of financial crisis that make
repayment impossible -- explains how the proposal would fail to cancel
debt while requiring countries to adhere to new structural adjustment
requirements. And, as do many of the contributors, the Halifax
Initiative elaborates a viable and desirable alternative to the IMF's
proposal: a Fair and Transparent Arbitration Process. Such a process
"would ensure that creditor interests would be addressed only after the
fundamental human rights of people in debtor nations are ensured" --
meaning meeting human needs would take priority over repaying loans.
Irrespective of their prior knowledge, readers of Empty Promises will
emerge conversant with most of the key policy issues at the World Bank
and the IMF, and will know the global justice movement's critique of the
way those policies are being addressed. They will understand the
avoidable misery and suffering caused throughout the Global South by the
policies imposed by the World Bank and the IMF. And they will see the
wide range of possible alternatives available -- in a world where Global
South economic policy was not decisively influenced by institutions
whose purpose is to serve the global elite rather than the world's majority.
The Empty Promises booklet is co-sponsored by Africa Action, Center for
Economic Justice/World Bank Bonds Boycott, Food First & Land Research
Action Network, Global Exchange, Halifax Initiative, Institute for
Policy Studies/Global Economy Project, Jobs with Justice, Jubilee USA
Network, Maryknoll Office for Global Concerns, and the Sisters of the
Holy Cross.
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