The Global Crisis, solutions, and implications for EU Trade Policy

[Sucker Punch]

In the second of the two videos about 9mins in, Susan George highlights the need to continue the struggle for social rights in Europe by resisting the failed neo-liberal policies which have culminated in the crisis which Europe and the world are now faced with. Scornful of the Commission, George is under no illusions that freedom of services, (meaning in many cases privatisation) will continue under the Lisbon agenda regardless and will be equally facilitated by what George describes as the "carbon copy" of the TEC; the Lisbon treaty.

Z Video Productions - Global Crisis Pt. 1

Z Video Productions - Global Crisis 2

I've posted this quote below to put some of the above in context as to my mind the decreasing voter turnouts and disengagement of civil society as high-lighted by such political scientists as Putnam can be well understood, were we to give critics of neo-liberalism consideration.

That was simply false. Deregulation and privatisation continued, with the result that the profit motive took over the public sector completely. Budgets for social welfare, health for the poor and aged, and schools were slashed; defence, law and order (i.e. police and prisons) were fed more state money and/or privatised. The major loss has been in democracy and social practices. For when the country is ruled by the market (in the US a period of great prosperity for the top half of the country, poverty for the bottom) and with the state in fact given over to the most powerful corporations and stock market businesses (symbolised by the tremendous growth in electronic business), there is less and less incentive for the individual citizen to participate in a system perceived as basically out of control so far as the ordinary population is concerned. The price of this neoliberal system has been paid by the individual citizen who feels left out, powerless, alienated from a market place ruled by greed,.

first published September 20, 2000
Z Space - EdwardSaid

[Sucker Punch]

So to return to the question, is the course the EU is trying to maintain under the Lisbon Agenda reasonable having witnessed such instability from the encroachment of financial liberalisation into the "real economy" and its consequential and damaging speculation?

The liberalisation of financial services was included in trade treaties without any guarantee of whether the right regulation and supervision was in place.

In fact, the EU requested many countries to eliminate particular prudential rules, some of which had been put in place after the Asian crisis.

The EU requests were clearly based on specific demands from the financial industry, who had easy access to the negotiation documents and EU negotiators.

By contrast, only after strong insistence were Dutch parliamentarians allowed to look at those hundred of pages of requests in a small room - and they were prohibited from taking notes!

BBC NEWS | Business | Alternative views of the economic crisis

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So to return to the question, is the course the EU is trying to maintain under the Lisbon Agenda reasonable having witnessed such instability from the encroachment of financial liberalisation into the "real economy" and its consequential and damaging speculation?

BBC NEWS | Business | Alternative views of the economic crisis

No, I think it's clear that those aspects of the Lisbon Strategy were wrong-headed and should be revisited. Mind you, that's what we get for electing "free-market" governments for the last couple of decades.

[Sucker Punch]

No, I think it's clear that those aspects of the Lisbon Strategy were wrong-headed and should be revisited. Mind you, that's what we get for electing "free-market" governments for the last couple of decades.

Interesting NGO report from the EU observer, what's good for us is apparently not good for them and vice versa, in other words double standards. Latest indications are that Africa will be hit hard by the continuing economic meltdown, additionaly crop yields look to be down too.

Brussels pushing finance deregulation in third world:

"financial services component of GATS would mean that countries would not be able to introduce new rules that are more restrictive than those already operating, making it difficult to pass laws on risky trading such as "short-selling" or to limit the numbers of service providers or the number of transactions.

All new financial services would also have to be permitted, giving the green light to the very same complex financial products that have been held responsible for the creation of the toxic asset problem in the north

The report reveals that where banking liberalisation has occurred, looking in particular at India and, crucially, Mexico - home to one of the most liberalised financial sectors in the world, with 80 percent foreign ownership, poor people and small businesses see their access to credit, bank accounts and other financial services restricted.

EUobserver

[ibis]

Interesting NGO report from the EU observer, what's good for us is apparently not good for them and vice versa, in other words double standards. Latest indications are that Africa will be hit hard by the continuing economic meltdown, additionaly crop yields look to be down too.

EUobserver

Yeah - I won't be sorry to see the back of some of the current Commission, but governments will put in people that reflect them, so the next Commission could still be free-market oriented. On the other hand the prevailing winds might produce a more regulation-oriented Commission, which would no doubt be bitterly complained about.