GLOBALIZATION
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GLOBALIZATION
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GLOBALIZATION and INDIGENOUS PEOPLESThroughout the United States, Canada and the world, political, economic, environmental, social and cultural pressures are rising. Unsustainable development is being fed, like a hungry beast, by imperialism, neo-colonialism, capitalism, privatization, and globalization. IEN feels the source of these pressures can be traced to the long historical processes by which humans have become increasingly alienated from the Mother Earth. This results in an alienation from self, community and nature. The long history of imperialism, both in the Americas and in the world, seems to be threatened by land-based cultures that have strong profound spiritual relationship to the Mother Earth. This concept of alienation has roots in imperialism and colonialism and is currently being carried out through economic globalization, initiatives of free trade, privatization and development policies that have no tie to nature. Intellectually it is rooted in the western concept of dualism, which sets humanity apart from nature and legitimizes the view that humanity has not only the right, but also the obligation to subdue nature for its own benefit. Institutionally it is rooted in the institution of money, which creates a powerful illusion that people can live apart from, and are no longer dependent upon, nature. The dominant industrialized society has no understanding of their relationship to the sacredness of our Mother Earth. Through governmental practices of imperialism, neo-colonialism, capitalism and privatization, this pushes forward an unsustainable concept of the natural world as "property" and therefore commodities to be exploited freely and bought and sold at will. This has resulted in disharmony between human beings and the natural world, as well as the current environmental crisis threatening all life. This concept is totally incompatible with a traditional Indigenous worldview. WHAT IS GLOBALIZATION?At its most basic, there is nothing mysterious about globalization. The term has come into common usage since the 1980s. "Economic "globalization" is a historical process, the result of human innovation and technological progress. It refers to the increasing integration of economies around the world, particularly through trade and financial flows. The term sometimes also refers to the movement of people (labor) and knowledge (technology) across international borders. Globalization refers to the process in which goods and services, including capital, move more freely within and among nations. As globalization advances, national boundaries become more and more porous, and to some extent, less and less relevant. INDIGENOUS PEOPLES TAKE ACTIONIndigenous peoples from the United States and regions of the world are expressing their concern over how a global agenda of imperialism and neo-colonialism is continuing today. The world is become controlled by a relative handful of super-wealthy people and powerful corporations and the countries they control. The insatiable quest for power and profit continues today at the expense of the livelihoods of approximately 350 million Indigenous individuals in the world that make up approximately 90% of the world's cultural diversity. Over 80% of the worlds remaining biodiversity is found within Indigenous peoples' lands and territories. Through global initiatives such as the World Trade Organization (WTO) and other free trade negotiations such as the Free Trade Areas of the Americas (FTAA) and recent emergence of U.S.- lead regional free trade initiatives will further destroy Mother Earth and the cultural and biological diversity of which all humans and all life are a part. Civil society and Indigenous peoples are organizing within the U.S. and globally to intensify the resistance against the undemocratic WTO and these free trade initiatives that is dominated by the U.S. and imperialist powers. On the agenda of the dominant governments are the extension of liberalization on a broader range of products and services. These forces are imposing such one-sided agreements as the Agreement on Trade and Services (AOA), the General Agreement on Trade and Services (GATS) and the Trade Related Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPs). Those cover such issues as the privatization of health, education and water, forcing genetically modified organisms (GMO) foods and seeds on member countries and patents on life forms, especially ripping apart the natural protective barriers of countries for their basic agricultural products. Trade liberalization and export-oriented development, which are the overriding principles and policies pushed by the WTO, are creating the most adverse impacts on the lives of Indigenous peoples, local communities and especially the developing countries. The aim of the WTO is to pry open the local economies of local communities and developing countries for plunder by giant corporate monopolies. While the imperialist countries protect their own industries and agriculture through subsidies and credit, they dictate on others to remove so-called barriers to "free-trade" such as tariffs and foreign exchange controls. Indigenous tribes in the U.S. inherent right to sovereignty and self-determination, and treaties and other constructive agreements which Indigenous tribal nations negotiated with the U.S. are undermined by most of the WTO Agreements. The disproportionate impact of these agreements on our communities, whether through environmental degradation, actions of bio-piracy with the patenting of Indigenous medicinal plant and seed knowledge, or the militarization and violence that often accompanies development projects, is serious and perpetuates imperialism and with it an increase of corporate terrorism disguised as protection and security actions to protect its assets. Through imperialism, neo-colonialism, capitalism, privatization, and globalization the WTO regime has created a world of widespread poverty, wasteful consumption by a few and ever widening gap between the rich and poor. The whole philosophy underpinning the WTO Agreements and the principles and policies it promotes contradict Indigenous peoples' core values, spirituality and worldviews, as well as their concepts and practices of development, trade and environmental protection. The Indigenous Environmental Network and other U.S. based Indigenous non-governmental organizations are challenging the WTO by applying Indigenous rights and human rights based approach in organizing to redefine its principles and practices toward a "sustainable communities" paradigm, transparency and democratic processes, and to recognize and allow for the continuation of other worldviews and models of development. The remaining Indigenous peoples of the U.S. and the world are a threatened human species, most especially, those that still maintain and practice their land-based cultures. But Indigenous peoples are fighting for all people and all life that is threatened by this imperialism and its agenda for world domination and control. Indigenous peoples from the U.S. and globally, believe that it is also they who can offer viable alternatives to the dominant economic growth, export-oriented development model. Indigenous peoples sustainable lifestyles and cultures, traditional knowledge, cosmologies, spirituality, values of collectivity, reciprocity, respect and reverence for Mother Earth, are crucial in the search for a transformed society where justice, equity, and sustainability will prevail. What is the World Trade Organization (WTO)?The WTO was established in 1995 at the end of the Uruguay Round of GATT (The General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade) negotiations. The WTO is comprised of trade representatives appointed by its 134 member nations and functions as a sort of supreme global trade court. Prior to the WTO, international trade rules were not legally binding and were limited to questions of tariffs and quotas. With the ratification of the WTO, international trade rulings were given legal supremacy over national laws, and their jurisdiction was massively extended to include "non-tariff barriers to trade" - i.e. any legal regulation which at all interferes with transnational trade. The WTO is the culmination of a long history of economic and political domination. In stopping the WTO we take our first steps towards ending capital-dictated government and reclaiming our power of self-determination. The WTO provides transnational corporations (TNCs) with the legal channels to coerce foreign nations to repeal any trade regulations which the WTO deems a "trade barrier" (i.e. any regulation which values life over profit.) The TNC must appeal to a member nation to bring their complaint to the WTO. If the WTO rules in the TNC's favor, then the TNC's country may sue the resistant foreign nation for compensation until they repeal their regulation. It is important to note that governmental regulations which protect human rights, labor, health, or the environment are "barriers to free trade," and will, if the WTO has its way, be repealed. The WTO reserves the right to dismantle legislation, and yet its own mode of governance is entirely undemocratic. Trade disputes brought before the WTO are decided upon by three trade bureaucrats regardless of their conflicts of interest. No outside council is sought, which means that the only represented side of the debate is trade - neither the environment and nor human rights are permitted a voice in their defense. Meetings are held behind closed doors, without any outside appeals process, and are not open to citizen reviews. Not surprisingly, majority of cases brought before the WTO has been ruled in favor of "free trade." Some argue the next line of defense against the WTO is a strengthening of the nation-states. However there are two sides of the same coin. The WTO is the offspring of our capital controlled nation-states. It is under the direct control of its member nations-states - and particularly of the United States. The US trade bureaucrats who take part in the WTO are appointed by our President, and are often the same bureaucrats that fought tooth and nail against the environmental and human rights legislation that the WTO is repealing in the first place. Our nation state has been bought - has always been bought. The WTO is by far the most advanced and far reaching form of domination that our worlds has ever known, however, it is the product of a long history of domination. "Global capitalism" is simply an extension of the colonial experiment. It is not the result of capitalism as it was intended to be. Inherent in capitalism is a propensity for the greater accumulation of wealth in fewer and fewer hands. It's a "grow or die!" economy - and unfortunately it is the oppressed of the earth that are doing all the dying. So what can we do about it?There is no easy answer. There is no quick fix. The WTO cannot be reformed, and we cannot trust to our "representatives" to remedy the situation. We must look to each other to break the cycle of capital domination and to devise a new society that values life over profits. We can begin by waking each other up to our collective power to fundamentally change the social order. We must create revolutionary movements wherever we find opportunity movements that foster decentralization, non-hierarchy and participatory democracy. We must secure power in the hands of all people and realize a truly equal society. The WTO is a frightening institution, yet within its abominations lie a tremendous opportunity for us to educate people about the dangers of a political system so tightly gripped by capitalism that it is choking the life out of our planet. Written by the PeopleThe World Trade Organization (WTO) enforces "free trade" at the explicit expense of human rights, health, labor, and the environment. Since the inception of the WTO has forced Guatemala to stop warning mothers of the dangers of breast milk substitute; it has put an end to sea-turtle-free shrimpage laws; it has forced countries to repeal their ban on the known carcinogen asbestos; and it is in the process of forcing bovine growth hormone down the throats of Europe - all in the name of corporate profits.
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Documents from Earth Summit, held in Rio de Janeiro in June 1992. Some of these files are packed using the zip format, therefore once transferred to your computer, you must unzip file in order to read or print the documents with your word processor or text editor.
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Sustainable Development Issues Network (SDIN) announces new SDIN listserver for the World SummitAs you may know, the Sustainable Development Issues Network (SDIN) is a coalition of nongovernmental issue-based caucuses and networks during the year before the World Summit on Sustainable Development. The purpose of the coalition is to provide mutual support and exchange of information among NGO caucuses and networks promoting sustainable development. We would like to announce and invite you to join a new listserver http://sdissues.net/sdin/discuss.aspx hosted by SDIN to encourage substantive DISCUSSION AND DIALOGUE on the important issues and strategies of concern in the World Summit on Sustainable Development. In the remaining weeks of the Summit there are many topics and questions of concern to participants and observers that will need to be addressed by NGOs. For more information about some of the issue caucuses and networks involved in the WSSD, see www.sdissues.net Note: The purpose of this listserver is NOT to compete or be an alternative with the other listservers on the World Summit already operating which are providing useful information about the WSSD process and events. In fact, we strongly discourage the use of this listserver to post duplicate announcements of events, activities and other news already carried on these current listservers. Other WSSD listservers carrying information about the Summit include:
There are also several other listservers as well as websites focusing on the Summit and we encourage you to find out about them. |
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Dear friends, We are forwarding you 8 interventions that were verbally presented by the Indigenous Peoples' Caucus at the World Summit on Sustainable Development Prep Com II in New York, NY. The other interventions were not yet made available in digital format or were submitted in handwritten form to the WSSD Secretariat. Many members of the Caucus have left NY to participate in Convention on Biodiversity meetings in Montreal, Canada. Others will stay in NY to lobby governments next week on issues that we feel should remain in the official outcome of the session. We will be sending more information when it becomes available, including how to access the archive of Indigenous Peoples' statements and relevant background information that has been in the process of being assembled by one of the co-facilitators of the Indigenous Peoples' Major Group Caucus (the International lndian Treaty Council). We recognize the need to have these documents translated into Spanish (to start with), French and Russian, and will work to find thos organizations/others who could accomplish this task. Best wishes for all of the work being done by you at various international and other meetings,
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