Globalisation

The anti-war mobilizations in Washington DC, San Francisco, and elsewhere were the first mass protests against government policy since September 11. Many groups were represented, but all of them had one thing in common - opposition to the so-called War on Terrorism. The anti-globalization, anti-war, and labor movements need to unite under a working-class leadership to fight for a socialist solution to the problems facing working people in the US and internationally.

The "Battle in Seattle" announced to the world that even in the "belly of the beast", there is outright opposition to the policies of imperialism. Around the world, subsequent meetings of the IMF, World Bank, G8, and NATO have been met with a rising tide of militant protest and increasingly ruthless repression by the ruling class. But the attacks of September 11 cast a shadow over the movement in the US - anyone voicing opposition to the policies of imperialism was considered unpatriotic and even a terrorist - "you're either with us or against us!" Now, on April 20, the first major protest event against the "war on terror" is being held in...

Over the weekend of March 15-16 we have witnessed the biggest mass demonstrations seen in Spain for years. Several demonstrations have been held in Barcelona against the EU summit that was being held there. On Thursday about 200,000 trade unionists marched and on Saturday half a million people took to the streets. These were protests against bourgeois policies in the whole of Europe, and against capitalist globalisation. This is an eye-witness account of the dramatic events that took place in Barcelona.

The recent gathering of the World Social Forum in Porto Alegre showed clearly how the anti-globalisation movement is becoming more and more dominated by career politicians, and groups and organisations that do not really represent the millions of youth who look to this movement for an alternative to the capitalist system. The capitalist class internationally is using a dual tactic. On the one hand, where they feel it to be necessary (as in Genoa) they use the most repressive and brutal methods to try to crush the movement. On the other hand they try to corrupt the movement and direct it away from radical anti-capitalist ideas.

Within a few day tens of thousands of workers and young people will come from whole over Europe to Brussels to protest against the EU, capitalist globalisation in Europe and the rest of the world and the new war in Afghanistan. These demonstrations are the next stage in the cycle of mobilisations started in Seattle and which culminated in the 300.000 strong demonstration in Genoa. The European trade unions have announced 70.000 participants on the 13th of December. The next day on Friday 14th of December the European wide network of NGO's, Attac etc. have announced some 30.000 people for "Global Justice and Global Peace". Erik Demeester from the Editorial Board of...

The World Trade Organisation has recently held its summit. Their aim was to skulk in Qatar in the Gulf of Arabia, as far as they could get from the 'teamsters to turtles' coalition against all that is wrong about capitalism. An important part of their agenda has been the General Agreement on Trade in Services - GATS, due to come into by the end of 2002. But what is GATS and why do we need to fight it?

The Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), the body representing the world's richest 30 countries, has predicted that this year economic growth would be as low as 1% and would be only 1.2% next year. At the same time, capitalist economists forecast that global economic growth this year and next would be the worst for 30 years. The great economic recession of the early 21st century is under way.

In this article, Dario Salvetti, a supporter of the Italian Marxist journal, FalceMartello, who actively took part in the Genoa demonstrations analyses the limits of the movement and draws a balance sheet of what should have been done. We believe that the lessons drawn should be taken on board internationally and applied in the future.

What exactly is globalisation? The problem with trying to pin it down is it's not so much a theory, more a buzzword. The general idea is that the whole world is being opened up to world capitalism. All the old barriers are coming down. Capital flows will bring a transfer of technology to the poor countries - which soon will be rich! Mick Brooks looks at the different meanings of globalisation and explains them from the standpoint of Lenin's theory of imperialism.

There is a view fashionable in the media that the world is being taken over by huge multinational corporations, accountable to no one. This allows the argument against globalisation to be depoliticised, reducing it to single issues of "ethical trading" and "codes of conduct", and inviting its co-option. Above all, it misses the point that state power in the west is accelerating. (We are republishing this article with the permission of John Pilger, August 20, 2001)

Global warming is arguably the greatest single threat facing humanity. Yet US president George W. Bush appears largely oblivious to the problem, denying the evidence that is growing at an alarming rate. Regular reports from the 3000 scientists involved with the UN's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) have been issued over the past number of years. Over this period their refined climate model has consistently increased the projected effects of global warming. So why is President Bush in a state of denial? Colin Penfold looks into the interests of the multinational corporations that underly the present impasse.

The movement against globalisation and the world institutions of capital, which was sparked off by the 4 December 1999 demonstrations against the WTO summit (the so-called Battle of Seattle), made a huge impact on the world political arena. To mark the 20-year anniversary of the clash in Seattle, we republish an in-depth analysis of the anti-globalisation movement by Italian Marxist Roberto Sarti, originally written in 2001.

On Sunday, 1st of July, the World Economic Forum (WEF) started its European Summit in Salzburg, Austria. The list of the 1000 members of the WEF is something like the "who's who" of the biggest and most powerful corporations like McDonald's, Monsanto, Nike, Shell, Coca Cola or Microsoft.