IMF AND WORLD BANK TO MEET ACTIVISTS.
The International Monetary Fund and World Bank have agreed to a public debate with leading anti-globalization activists during the organizations' annual meetings in Washington next month, reports the Financial Times (p.1). The debate, in the midst of demonstrations that are expected to bring tens of thousands of protesters to the US capital, could prove a defining moment in the intellectual battle over economic globalization.
Responding to a request from a coalition of four anti-globalization groups (Global Exchange, Jobs With Justice, 50 Years Is Enough and Essential Action), the World Bank and IMF said they are in principle happy to meet them in public debate, writes the story. "Informed public discourse on the global economy is clearly needed," said a joint letter from Tom Dawson, head of external relations at the IMF, and Mats Karlsson, his counterpart at the World Bank. But they said it would only be possible if the anti-globalizers renounced violence and agreed to a civilized and constructive dialogue. "In the past, there have unfortunately been a number of instances where this has not been the case," they said.
Also reporting, the Irish Times writes (08/18, p.12) that Washington-US security forces are gearing up for violent protests at next month's IMF and World Bank meetings in Washington, and the city's police chief said yesterday he could be "hard-pressed" to maintain order. The Hindu adds (08/19) that the prediction is that the number of protesters could be as high as 100,000 and some real trouble expected in the process. In a letter to President George W. Bush, the Mayor of the District of Columbia has warned of demonstrations "of an intensity, scope and magnitude that we have never seen in this city."
The New York Times reports (A7, 8/18) that Washington officials said that federal assistance would be needed to cover security expenses for the meetings. Margret Nedelkoff Kellems, deputy mayor for public safety and justice, said Washington was "not in a position to absorb the costs of the event," which she estimated at about $30 million.
District officials used a news briefing on Thursday to predict that 100,000 protesters would descend on Washington, reports the Washington Post (B1, 8/18). The 100,000 figure would match the high police estimate of the most recent protests, in Genoa, Italy.
Further, the Daily Yomiuri (08/18 p.9) quotes World Bank's Vice-President of External Affairs Mats Karlsson saying that "the openness revolution and the anti-globalization backlash have brought the bank's poverty reduction mission under global scrutiny." Bank spokeswoman Caroline Anstey is also quoted saying that "support for multilateralism is in danger of dwindling just at the time when we believe that global action on trade, on AIDS and on poverty is more necessary than ever."
Commenting on European-wide police cooperation to tackle violent anti-globalization protesters, The Independent, meanwhile, notes (p.3), that many of the protesters' complaints may be ill-defined or wrong-headed, although the campaign to persuade G8, IMF and World Bank meetings of the urgency of Third-World debt relief was justified. But the right to protest should be defended unto death, not hemmed in and harassed by the agents of the state, whether operating at a national or a supranational level.
The news come as Felix Rohatyn, a former US ambassador to France, writes in the FT (p.11) that so far, the answers to the protests against the World Bank-IMF Annual Meetings, the WTO and the G8 summit have essentially focused on the security side: more police, shorter meetings, more remote locations. That is not a very promising response to what is, at a certain level, a challenge to western capitalism as the best system to deal with global poverty, Rohatyn says. And it is a response that will fail because it is devoid of intellectual content.
"I have believed for some years that the time has come for a new Bretton Woods conference," writes Rohatyn. The role of institutions created 50 years ago needs to be updated to suit the needs of a world that has changed beyond all recognition. Both the World Bank and the IMF have been indispensable but it is essential to review their role in a world where the economic agenda is now set by the movement of private capital coupled with rapid technological innovation and the primacy of intellectual property. A new Bretton Woods, convened by the president of the US with the secretary-general of the United Nations, would include representatives of the developing world as well as of the developed world, representatives of non-governmental organizations and private sector leaders, he notes. It would, first, determine the facts behind the assertions of anti-globalization protesters and, second, based on the findings, it would recommend policies to address the most contentious issues, particularly the impact of globalization on developing countries.