Message-ID: <19990811204557.AAA21789@LOCALNAME> Date: Wed, 11 Aug 1999 17:49:30 +0000 From: Kerry Miller <mailto:kerryo@ns.sympatico.ca> Subject: Re: Action against the WTO To: mailto:DEVEL-L@AMERICAN.EDU
> No Kerry you're wrong. I protest against many things. But I
> don't respond to requests to protest unless I am given a convincing
> reason. So far II've not seen one. I have seen many convincing
> reasons to change WTO, which is a different matter.
You draw an interesting distinction between protest and change. The easy inference is clearly wrong -- that protest is futile while change is effective (or else you would not have objected to anyone's calling for protests), but it does seem that relative degrees of power is involved. Can you clarify your idea here? (If, for instance, my posting was not a convincing reason for response, was it necessary that you take it as a personal 'request'?)
> And I most certainly do not hold to the view that the individual
> cannot effect changes in association with others.
I admit to being somewhat surprised that the message > Why the heck should we do that? And who give it the title
> International Day?
originated with you. All the more reason, I hope, for you to clarify what you see to be the relation between on-line discussion (including 'requests for protest' ), individuals associating with others (including 'protest'), and the righteousness with which this response presumed to speak for others besides yourself (1) and to imply that there might be some central office which issues permits for efforts to be declared International.
> Sorry I used the word "isolationist" which may not be true. What would you replace
> the WTO with??????
>
If you read the announcement (below) again, you will see that it is a call not to dismantle the WTO, but to rethink the need for a 'Round' (as it is, in fact, formally referrred to) -- specifically, to assert citizens' rights to determine local social, environmental, and labour policies *independently of economic issues, especially when those are defined by 'international' operations and operators, some of whom have more *economic resources than several nations put together).To conflate the existence of the structure (created for trade issues, btw, not investment) with the decisions (2) it makes may be merely evidence of hasty judgement -- twice. On the other hand, it may be a conscious attempt to distract and confuse the discussion (one which imo should take place, altho we can talk about the proper venue for it) -- but I sincely hope you do not belong to that school of discourse. (It's bad enough that the intellectual climate is such that even distinguishing social from economic forces is described as irrelevant to 'development'!)
Notes: 1. Likewise, you choose to interpret my 'what ails the world' as a direct interpretation of your personal position. Is it not possible that the world could suffer from something that you yourself have not succumbed to? My hyperbole may be offensive, but for it to be wrong needs more evidence than your authoritative word, I think, even on a list where brevity is so highly valued.
2.May we reserve the word 'policies' for decisions affecting a *polity (which of course the WTO doesnt have)? The WTO proposes 'treaties' (which, in the wisdom of the US legislature, are not required to be consented to by anyone but the President), and how direct foreign investment can be construed as a matter for *treaty requires some mental gymnastics all by itself.
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Mark your calendar for the international Day of Action against the World Trade Organization (WTO), September 15, 1999. There will be simultaneous press conferences around the world, call-in campaigns to members of Parliaments/Congress, protests, hearings and teach-ins etc., to launch the international campaign against a "New Round" in Seattle.
kerry