6th December 1999 by Jeremy Lee
THE BATTLE IN SEATTLE: Since our feature on the imminent World Trade Organisation Conference towards the end of November a couple of weeks ago, the full fury of what is now a world-wide coalition has broken with a vengeance on the streets of Seattle. Some of this has featured in television news segments, but the depth and scope of the organised opposition has only appeared in fragments in a large number of reports. A state-of-emergency was declared in Seattle, and the National Guard called in to help over-stretched State authorities.
It is evident that the vast majority of those attending were committed to non-violence, with only a splinter group of anarchists causing damage.
The most distasteful, if not suprising, result was the immediate attempt by President Clinton to identify with the demonstrators. One comment claimed that this was an attempt to boost the presidential hopes of Al Gore, who is wooing the labour movement in the US. Unions were massively represented in Seattle, protesting the loss of jobs and wage levels as a result of free trade.
It is beyond the scope of On Target to provide detailed coverage. The best we can do is give selections from the multitude of reports covering the "battle in Seattle":
" … In full-page advertisements yesterday, sponsored by groups ranging from the Rain-forest Action network to the United Steelworkers of America, the charge was that the WTO is emerging as the world's first global government. Beneath a picture of a faceless man, the text is:
'WTO decisions are made in secret, closed tribunals - like the old star chambers - where unelected, faceless bureaucrats sit in final judgement over the constitutional rights of nations. Their decisions affect your job, human rights, public health, food safety, the environment and democracy'. …. It was clear yesterday the WTO already had lost a public relations battle …." (Cameron Forbes, Seattle, The Australian, December 1, 1999)
"…. Thousands of steelworkers are expected in Seattle, to remind Washington that they would be extremely upset if the world "anti-dumping" appears in the WTO's final communique. And it is not just the workers. Manufacturers are standing alongside their workers, seeking to preserve what they believe is their right to protect their industry …." (Florence Chong, The Australian, 1/12/99)
"….The Clinton Administration yesterday sought to turn wild protests against the World Trade Organisation in Seattle to its advantage and put labour and environmental standards onto the summit agenda.
The WTO summit, which is intended to launch a new round of trade liberalisation talks, was severely disrupted for a second day as thousands of protesters clashed with heavily armed riot police in the city centre.
Some trade delegates were virtually imprisoned inside their hotels and the start of the talks was delayed for hours. Police fired tear gas canisters and pepper spray to break up the largely non-violent, mostly young, white demonstrators …." (Joanne Gray, Seattle, Australian Financial Review, 2/12/99)
"….With organisers numbering in the hundreds, the network co-ordinated the myriad small groups and individuals. A sub-group called the Ruckus Society has been training demonstrators in non-violent protest since mid year.
The American Federation of Labour-Congress of Industrial Organisations is the largest US labour federation. It made its point yesterday with between 25,000 and 30,000 workers taking to the streets
US labour federations want a place at the WTO table. They say they are losing their jobs to low-wage labour in developing nations, and are asking for the right to organise worldwide. They also want international agreements against child labour and sweatshops …..Steelworkers Union members have been locked out of their jobs at five Kaiser Aluminium plants in the US after going on strike a year ago. They say their jobs have been taken by non-union scabs and gone to such countries as Ghana and Venezuela.
The Washington Association of Churches' United Church Council is concerned with human rights, child labour, and hunger. It has rallied many mainstream Christians and has brought hundreds of people to the protests from all over America.
Jubilee 2000 is a coalition calling for the cancellation of debts of the world's poorest countries. It is well-funded and well organised …." (The Australian, 2/12/99)
"….Business groups attending the WTO meeting were taken aback by the protests, which showed they would have to do more to explain how trade creates jobs and cuts costs.
"We assumed everyone understood why trade is good", said Mr Randy Pebble, director of the US Trade Alliance, a grouping of business consortia. "This shows we have to explain why." …." (Joanne Gray, Seattle, Australian Financial Review, 2/12/99)
Unfortunately, there were no reports of those speaking for the hundreds of thousands of Australians whose jobs have been exported overseas by the insane, blinkered global policies of successive governments - Hawke, Keating and now Howard. But even in Australia there's an awakening - and it's going to be much tougher for men like Mark Vaile, Peter Reith, Peter Costello, old Uncle Tom Cobleigh and All in the future.
Afterthought: What a golden opportunity the ALP is missing!
CORPORATE FUNDING FOR THE PARTY: There is now no pretence about where party funds are coming from. It remains as true as ever that "he who pays the piper calls the tune". Here's one example:
"Corporate heavyweights have bolstered the debt-ridden NSW Liberals coffers by a further $300,000 at the first Millennium Forum fundraiser at Sydney's Westin Hotel.
New Liberal donors include Mr Kerry Packer's PBL., Adler Corp., Merrill Lynch, Wood Coffil Funerals, property developer Australand Holdings, Deutsche Bank, Delta Gold, and Chubb Security ….Each of the 60 new sponsors signed in past weeks has paid from $10,000 to $175,000 for sponsorship entitlements to the Millennium Forum, reducing the party's $3.6 million debt by more than one-third …." (The Australian Financial Review, 2/12/99)
So what's the quid pro quo?
By far the best comment we have seen on the question of the World Trade Organisation coference in Seattle appeared in a brilliant letter to The Australian, 1/2/99:
"I refer to Alan Oxley's article on protests against the World Trade Organisation's meeting in Seattle, "Fighting WTO not the way to go", 21/11. What's wrong with US unionists attempting to preserve their jobs? Should they just roll over and allow clothing to flood in from the Third World where wages are a pittance? Far from being "street theatre", the protests in Seattle are akin to a global Hanson phenomenon.
Since 1979, when free trade kicked off, the bottom 60 per cent of the US population have seen their real income decrease. The next 20 per cent saw modest gains. Needless to say the top 20 per cent saw their incomes rise 18 per cent. And the top 1 per cent saw their incomes rise obscenely by over 80 per cent. In the same period, 60 per cent of all US jobs created paid less than $7000 a year. That's a good economy? Peter Reith might think so. Many people don't agree.
Free trade on a global scale is about nothing more than enriching the already rich and impoverishing the already poor. Free trade is not improving the lot of the Third World - quite the reverse. On every indicator the people of the Third World countries are going backwards. The gap between the poorest fifth of the world's people and the richest fifth has widened from 30 to 1 in 1960 to 78 to 1 in 1994.
Once these countries could at least feed themselves. But under free trade, they are forced to export to pay their debts, and under harsh IMF prescriptions they have reduced what little social services they ever had. That's progress? It's not if you take the welfare of people as your measure.
Most consumers in the advanced countries do not benefit from free trade either. Their wages have been reduced so that they can only afford cheap, imported rubbish. There's often no choice in regional Australia anyway. You have to buy jugs that won't turn off, irons that don't steam, horrible synthetic clothing, mops whose handles split in half, tacky pegs and so on.
Free trade is destroying the advanced nations' skilled work-forces as manufacturing jobs are exported to low-wage countries. In short, free trade's losers, once skilled and well-paid workers, are now expected to be grateful to wipe the tables of the winners who eat out, even for breakfast.
And despite all the propaganda that what's happening is inevitable, nothing could be further from the truth. Free traders are as ideologically rigid as the communists were. Economic efficiency is not the be-all and end-all of life for most people. In fact it is profoundly immoral and profoundly stupid to make it the supreme virtue. Many intelligent economists agree. "Pure" free trade has already failed. As if Japan is ever going to stop growing rice. As if France is going to stop subsidising its small family farms. As if the US will abandon its farmers. It's got absolutely nothing to do with economics, and that's where the free trade ideologues lose the plot"
Antonia Feitz, Rocky River, NSW