The Global Fascists and Binding Instruments of Legal Power
The World Trade Organization (WTO) is a permanent institution given legal personality and international status equivalent to the United Nations, except the WTO is granted enormous enforcement powers denied to the UN. The WTO is the final arbiter in trade disputes between nations and corporations. Democratic countries must obey rulings by such unelected trade tribunals or consequently face fines and sanctions. The WTO�s General Agreement on Trade and Services� most fundamental purpose is to constrain all levels of government in their delivery of services and while facilitating access to government contracts by transnational corporations.
International trade agreements, legally binding and enforceable under the WTO, include the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), the General Agreement on Trade and Tariffs (GATT), as well as the impending Free Trade Agreement of the Americas(FTAA). Under such agreements, labour and environmental standards are often locked where they are and then rolled back to suit the activities of transnational corporations. Chapter eleven of NAFTA includes a mechanism for corporations to sue countries over compensation for lost current and future profit, no matter the government�s benevolent intentions.
While mass media covered Bill Clinton�s sexual affairs, he proposed yet another sweeping multilateral agreement: the FTAA. Referred to as NAFTA�s big brother, the FTAA will no doubt include a clause similar to Chapter eleven. The negotiators in this contract are seeking constraints on government policies related to food safety as well as plant and animal health: from pesticides and biological contaminants to food inspection, product labelling and genetically engineered organisms. Large agri-corporations are moving to completely deny governments in the Americas the right to set safe health, food and environmental standards.
Sovereign and elected governments are signing onto agreements that give power to small, unelected bodies defending solely the interests of the largest multinational corporations. For any signatory countries, any barriers to trade must be reduced and industry must remain unfettered. Corporations are being given free reign to swallow resources, exploit the cheapest labour and operate globally with no interference. Investment treaties enforced by the WTO, such as NAFTA and GATS, have become weapons for corporations to attack national efforts to achieve environmental and other societal goals.
WHAT IS WRONG WITH OUR PLANET?
The planet is lacking sustainable stewardship and is at great risk of exploitation beyond repair. Consumers, businesses, and governments the world over have been irresponsible in sustaining life on Earth. The environmental catastrophe that is here and now is human made and rooted in a global economic system that puts profit before life.
Poverty and The Environment
Which is a more serious threat to the environment, poverty or wealth? The cause of environmental degradation is economic growth, over consumption and the global economy. Poverty and wealth are intrinsically linked to one another. You cannot have one without the other.
The definition of poverty lacks the differentiation between enclosed poverty and the commons regime. Enclosure is the transition from common ownership of the land to private property and equates to displacement. Usually people living under a commons regime, independent and environmentally sustainable peasants, are considered to be below the poverty line. Economic development then comes in to eradicate poverty, but it displaces many and causes much environmental degradation.
The cycle of poverty works like this. By removing people's traditional land rights and enclosing them, poverty leads to unsound environmental practices followed by much degradation. This leads to fewer resources, lower production and ultimately more poverty. This vicious cycle of poverty is a serious threat to the environment and must looked at as not just a problem of poor people, but of the wealthy imposing unsustainable systems as development.
Global Environmental Politics
There some major tensions between the global political system and the global environment. The impact of global economic activities is often debated as either having positive or negative effects on the environment. While governments and big business push for globalization, while non-governmental organizations promote sustainability. Political boundaries cannot accommodate environmental factors because ecology has no borders.
Environmental degradation may cross boundaries via air or water transport. Some problems, like air pollution, have reached a global scale and affect us all no matter the boundaries. Deforestation is an example of a universal problem because of its long term consequences and global scale. Cooperation of states necessary yet difficult to achieve.
States that create problems are not necessarily the ones that experience it, making accountability and responsibility difficult to enforce. Environmentall prblems evolve over a long period of time while politicians are concerned with short-term political gains. The international community must have the ability to deal with complex environmental problems that involve science's interaction with social, economical and political issues.