The question is one of sustainable versus unsustainable trade strategies. The quest for a genuinely post-colonial, post mercantilist international trading regime does imply an apocalypse of sorts for the current owners of the means of production. I am definitely NOT a green apocalypse fan by any means; studied too much evolutionary theory for that....THERE IS NO SUCH THING AS SAVING THE BIOSPHERE!!!!! IT'S BAD RELIGION....
"The question is how to handle a world of inevitable development and free trade. The WTO is clearly no way to do that, but it does no good to associate a legitimate protest against WTO policies with a protest against economic reality. "
The second part of this paragraph is inconsistent with the first. To effect any substantive change in the WTO is to CHANGE some aspects of our current economic "reality".
Economic reality is malleable! That's a no brainer! Our current economic pathologies are due to various epistemic addictions about property, finance, governance in firms and states blah blah blah.
The quest for a genuinely ecological democracy is THE task for the 21st century. Ground Zero is Seattle, WA November 27-December 3.
THINK OUTSIDE THE BOX...Capitalism will mutate; it has in the past, it will in the future, it is an open question whether it will become even more hideous or fall due to it's intrinsic paradoxes and pathologies...Just because it may not do so in our life time does not mean we should embrace the current quietism....
Peace and Pranx, Ian Murray Seattle, WA