> -----Original Message-----
> From: owner-lbo-talk at lists.panix.com
> [mailto:owner-lbo-talk at lists.panix.com]On Behalf Of Patrick Bond
> Nathan, I've got to join Jeff's team on this again. Here's my
> nightmare deja vu: that language is EXACTLY the babble spoken 5
> years ago when the 50th anniversary of the World Bank evoked
> massive popular consciousness and protest.
The problem with the comparison is your definition of "massive." There was no broad grassroots consciousness of World Bank abuses here in the US- hell, I would bet five years ago less than 5% of activists in the United States could tell you what the World Bank was and even fewer could really give you a solid critique. It was only due to the education efforts of the last five years by 50 Years is Enough et al that public understanding of globalization had advanced to the point where a Seattle could occur.
Now, with that mobilization there is a reasonable debate on strategies, but making an argument based on what occurred five years ago makes little sense given a very different situation of public consciousness and mobilization.
Your argument for a pure abolition strategy may be reasonable and you make a good case. (BTW you could never be completely on Jeff's team. You are too civil. Every time you write, I think carefully about abolition. Every time Jeff writes, I think the whole abolition position is driven by elistist intellectual hate of unionists and regular activists.)
However, your context is a frustrating World Bank series of reform struggles. My perspective is the successive fights over NAFTA, GATT and then fast-track authority legislation. In each case, the "fix it or nix it" type strategy was used and it made greater and greater inroads until fast-track authority was defeated- a crucial win that essentially derailed any attempt to expand NAFTA to other countries.
And I have trouble keeping track of the enemies and "sharpies" here, since Jeff labelled Global Exchange as an "insider" reformist, yet you seem to praise Dannaher at GX as a hero of abolition.
Which goes to the heart of my attitude. There are conflicting strategies out there and I have no problem with different pieces being pursued. There should be room for abolition advocates but it is hard for me to feel sympathy for complaints of being shut out of discussions when abolition advocates like Jeff (and occasionally yourself in a more respectful way) denigrate the good faith of those pursuing other strategies. I would happily fight for an open multi-track strategy of globalization opposition, but that requires mutual respect by all involved. Otherwise, no one is going to share a platform with people who will use it to accuse them of bad faith and cowardice (as opposed to proposing an alternative strategy they think will achieve shared goals.)
I've spent lots of my political life fighting to create organizations that respect views I disagree with, so I am serious when I argue for a multi-track movement. But a requirement for that to work is for respect to be extended across differences. The plain fact is that a "fix it or nix it" strategy leaves plenty of room for those arguing to "nix it" as the only real solution; you can argue the message gets lost but as noted, it did not get lost in the defeat of fast-track here in the US.
But there are also legitimate arguments along with legitimate parts of the movement that still see multinational organizations as a counterbalance to private global financial entities. The IMF, World Bank and WTO may not be functioning as those counterbalances, but a pure abolition position can sound like an anti-government, libertarian, Buchanite economic position in the United States. "National sovereignty" may sound progressive in Pretoria, but is the slogan of rightwing nationalist militias in the United States who argue for shooting immigrants at the border as part of preserving that national sovereignty.
In the end, "not this WTO" is a more progressive position than arguing that global deregulation is the best solution we can hope for. Local regulation by countries is a poor substitute given the power of global capital to whipsaw countries in a "race to the bottom" and use selective capital strikes to force favorable terms. Maybe this relates to my skepticism of achieving "socialism in one country", but there it is. At heart, I believe in fighting for global institutions that would fund development in poor regions, would provide capital for those lacking it, and would encourage open and fair trade across the globe. The World Bank, IMF and WTO may fail at these goals, but abolition can easily be understood as implying those goals are invalid.
In that sense, abolition seems like the short-term tactical slogan, while the "fix it" strategy may be flawed tactically (I am open to the debate) but is much truer to most progressives goals for a just global social system.
-- Nathan Newman