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This document wraps up the First People's Summit held in Santiago
in 1998. All discussion forums are resumed and provide the reader
with an extensive list of alternatives.
General
Principles Background
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No country can nor should remain isolated from the global economy. This does not mean, however, that the current "neo-liberal" or free market approach to globalization is the only, much less the best, form of economic integration. This dominant free market approach (embodied in the North American Free Trade Agreement, large multinational corporations' negotiating agenda for the Free Trade Area of the Americas, and the temporarily stalled Multilateral Agreement on Investment) argues that the global market on its own will allocate and develop the best possibilities for each country. Thus, free trade does not simply involve opening ourselves to global trade; it also entails renouncing our role as active subjects in determining our future, and instead allowing the market to decide the future for us. According to this view, it is unnecessary for us to envision the kind of society we want to be or could be. We only need to eliminate all obstacles to global trade, and the market itself will take on the task of offering us the best of all possible worlds. The difference between this dominant approach and the alternative vision presented in this document lies not in whether we accept the opening of our economies to trade. The two fundamental differences are the following:
1) whether to have a national plan we can fight for or let the market determine the plan, and
2) whether capital, especially speculative capital, should be subject to international regulation.
The recent trend has been to allow all capital, even speculative capital, free rein, and let the world follow capital's interests. We argue that history has demonstrated that the market on its own does not generate development, let alone social justice. In contrast, we propose a world economy regulated at the national and supra-national levels in the interest of peace, democracy, sustainable development and economic stability. Our position in this regard is very clear: we cannot remain on the sidelines, but must claim our role as valid stakeholders in the globalization dialogue. We must refuse to accept the current neo-liberal form of globalization as irreversible. We must not only reduce its negative consequences, but put forward a positive alternative. We must find ways to take creative advantage of globalization and not passively submit to it. As citizens of the Americas, we refuse to be ruled by the law of supply and demand, and claim our role as individuals rather than simple commodities governed by the laws of the market. Free trade has produced social and economic exclusion.
This has resulted in the creation of a social stratum of citizens devalued by the current economic system and the societies that support it. Exclusion renders people unable to enter or re-enter the economic circuit, leading to a process of social "disqualification" and the loss of active citizenship. Anyone who has felt the negative effects of the transition to free trade, has become chronically unemployed, or whose job is precarious, lives and knows this exclusion. We are not opposed to the establishment of rules for regional or international trade and investment. Nor does our criticism of the dominant, externally-imposed form of globalization imply a wish to return to the past, to close our economies and establish protectionist barriers, or to press for isolationist trade policies. But the current rules have not helped our countries overcome, nor even reduce, our economic problems. We propose alternative rules to regulate the global and hemispheric economies based on a different economic logic: that trade and investment should not be ends in themselves, but rather the instruments for achieving just and sustainable development. Our proposal also promotes a social logic that includes areas such as labour, human rights, gender equity, the environment, and minorities-that is, previously excluded issues and people. While our critique and proposal have a technical basis, they also spring from an ethical imperative. We refuse to accept the market as a god which controls our lives. We do not accept the inevitability of a model of globalization which excludes half or more of the world's population from the benefits of development. We do not accept that environmental degradation is the inevitable and necessary evil accompanying growth. A profound ethical imperative pushes us to propose our own model of society, one supported by the many men and women united in hope for a more just and humane society for themselves and future generations. Guiding Principles: 1. Democracy and Participation Debates, decision-making, and framework building in matters of economic integration have mostly been dominated by financial, corporate, and political élites. Greater democratization in trade and investment decision-making must be introduced.
International agreements should be ratified by citizens through direct consultation: for example, through plebiscite or national referendum. The democratization of debates and decision-making is a necessary precondition, but not sufficient in itself for the development of new just and sustainable rules on investment, environment, and labour. Citizens must not only approve economic and social policies, but also participate in their formulation, implementation, and evaluation. Furthermore, they must be able to change or modify these policy directions. In order to realize this goal, it may be necessary to implement special initiatives to guarantee access to debate for marginalized or oppressed social groups, including women. Global corporations have grown so large that they can no longer be effectively controlled by our governments. We need new instruments to reassert public control and citizen sovereignty over these firms. The political stability needed for sustainable development requires agreements on economic integration to include mechanisms to ensure democratic security. Stability should be based on democratic participation and not on coercion. Any agreement should promote democracy in the Americas, without being interventionist in internal affairs. Democratic and non-coercive security entails civilian monitoring (accountable to citizens) of the forces of law and order. Civilian control is required, for example, to halt the arms race and the militarization of broad areas of the Americas which is currently being conducted under the pretext of fighting arms and drug trafficking and drug production. International democratization requires the reform of United Nations institutions, including the Security Council, as well as international financial and trade institutions. The reforms must be based on consultation in every country and should be oriented to serving humankind's objectives: sustainable development and democracy and peace based on justice and respect for human dignity.
Free Trade in the Americas: The Perspective of Quebec Labour and Popular-Sector Organization April 1997 Peter Bakvis, secrétariat général, CSN The province of Quebec is often blamed, or praised, for bringing Canada into the US-Canada Free Trade Agreement (FTA) because of it gave the Mulroney government a renewed mandate in the so-called “Free Trade Elections” of 1988. In fact, a vigorous anti-free-trade movement did exist in Quebec, but the virtual unanimity of Quebec’s business and political elite in favour of free trade no doubt contributed to the movement’s defeat. When negotiations began in the early 1990's on the possibility of extending free trade to Mexico to create NAFTA, the opposition movement in Quebec adopted a more nuanced position than their counterparts in English-speaking Canada. Rather than opposing all forms of continental integration, Quebec organizations proposed a model of integration based on a social charter that would respect basic social, environmental and labour standards. The aim of this paper is to explain how this position evolved and in what sense it is consistent with the strategy of labour and popular-sector organizations throughout the Americas to attempt to impose international rules on capital, given that national rules are less and less effective. As in the rest of Canada, free trade with the other countries of the Americas has been a major issue of debate in Quebec for over ten years. It became a front-page issue for the first time with the March 1985 Quebec City summit, when Prime Minister Mulroney and President Reagan signed an agreement in principle to start free trade negotiations between Canada and the United States. The issue captured public attention for months on end as the FTA was negotiated and then publicly debated during 1986-88. Public discussion about the impact of the FTA was just beginning to wane when the United States and Mexico started their free trade talks, which Canada later joined. Debate about the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) lasted more then three years, the initial NAFTA negotiations having been stretched out first by a new round of negotiations on the environmental and labour side deals and then by a long ratification procedure in the United States (1990-93). The publicity given to continental free trade spilled over to the Uruguay Round of the GATT negotiations in the early 1990's and much attention was focussed on the eventual consequences of the GATT on Quebec’s economy, particularly in agriculture. In the autumn of 1995, free trade became a subject of public debate once again as the “No” side in Quebec sovereignty referendum claimed that an independent Quebec would become an isolated Quebec, since it would be able to join NAFTA only after a long and difficult new round of negotiations.
Quebec opposition to free trade has been based in labour and popular organizations. In 1986, the major Quebec labour federations (CEQ, CSN, FTQ) along with the Quebec farmers’ union (UPA) formed the Coalition québécoise d’opposition au libre-échange (Quebec Coalition Against Free Trade), a year before the major cross-Canada coalition, the Pro-Canada Network (later called Action Canada Network) was formed. However, despite carrying out studies, publishing articles and organizing public fora, the Coalition québécoise never achieved the success of their counterparts in English-speaking Canada in stimulating debate and opposition to the FTA. Much has been said and written about the differences in public reaction to free trade between Quebec and English Canada. Suffice it to say that, despite attempts to the contrary by the Coalition québécoise, in Quebec the opposition to free trade was more narrowly based and the array of pro-free trade forces broader than in the rest of the country. For example, anti-free trade forces in the nine English-speaking provinces could count on the support of the artistic community, nationalist organizations and at least one government or major opposition party in the provincial legislature. Such was not the case in Quebec. Unlike in English Canada, where the perception of free trade as an attack on Canadian sovereignty became the dominant theme in the public debate, in Quebec the issue was debated essentially on the economic pros and cons. The defeat of the anti-free trade forces in Quebec, which occurred when the Conservative Party increased its majority in Quebec in the November 1988 federal election, also exposed weaknesses in the campaign of opposition to free trade. Spokespersons for the latter often found themselves in the uncomfortable position of being perceived as defending the status quo by not having a clear and articulated alternative to free trade. When NAFTA became a public issue in late 1990, the Quebec organizations that had been active in the anti-FTA movement decided to adopt a new approach. Before announcing their reconstituted coalition in April 1991 -- the Coalition québécoise sur les négociations trilatérales (CQNT), or Quebec Coalition on Trilateral Negotiations -- the founding members drew up a joint declaration which became the CQNT’s alternative to NAFTA. Denouncing the “ deterioration of the environment and the increased inequalities and injustices” which would result from the “Bush-Salinas initiative”, the declaration stated that a continental and, eventually, hemispheric agreement should include enforceable commitments by signatory governments on basic social programmes, labour standards, human and democratic rights, adjustment measures for workers, environmental standards, protection for agricultural producers, and finally, alleviation of Mexico’s foreign debt burden. The declaration further proposed that “specific implementation measures would provide for financing, time frames and adjustment deadlines tailored to the economic and social constraints of each country”. Without specifically using the term, the CQNT adopted the idea of negotiating a social charter within the framework of the NAFTA negotiations. Its platform specifically criticized the fact that NAFTA was limited to trade and warned that if it did not include social content, NAFTA would lead to job losses, downward levelling of social programmes and labour and environmental standards, the marginalization of certain sectors of the population and certain regions, as well as increased inequalities between and within countries. An alternative to NAFTA As stated above, during the debate on the bilateral FTA, the Quebec anti-free-trade coalition limited itself to opposing the negotiations and then, once the negotiations were concluded, opposing ratification. In the first meetings of the newly-created CQNT, it was felt that simply objecting to Canada’s participation in trilateral free trade talks was not appropriate. First, it meant being placed in a defensive, pro-status quo position when one did not have a clear alternative. Second, the member organizations felt that the kind of argument that had been used to oppose free trade with the US -- that it would lead to increased domination of the Canadian economy -- was not an acceptable response to a proposed agreement with Mexico. The coalition felt that, if it rejected outright any type of agreement with Mexico, member organizations could be accused of being anti-Mexican and anti-Third-World, whereas in fact most of them were on record supporting more and better relations of all kinds with Third World countries. It was felt that the NAFTA talks provided an opportunity to challenge the Canadian and Quebec governments to define a more open and equal-footing relationship between Canada and a major Latin American country. Simply saying “No” to free trade with Mexico would preclude the definition of such a relationship. A number of factors explain why the CQNT adopted a social charter approach. One is that the Quebec union federations which created the CQNT called on Quebec-based international cooperation agencies working with Mexico to join the coalition. Several of them did -- namely AQOCI (the Quebec umbrella organization for international cooperation organizations), CEDAL, CUSO-Quebec and Development and Peace.
These organizations brought a Third-World perspective that had a marked influence on the new coalition. Another influence came from Mexico. The CSN labour federation has had a long-standing relationship with the Mexican labour federation , the FAT (Frente Auténtico del Trabajo, the Authentic Labour Front) and the FAT played a key role in forming the only major Mexican anti-NAFTA network, RMALC (Red Mexicana de Acción frente al Libre Comercio, or Mexican Action Network on Free Trade). While the CQNT was drawing up its platform on NAFTA, RMALC was doing the same in Mexico by adopting a very similar stance: rather than rejecting outright the idea of three-country trade talks, it proposed that the talks be broadened to include an agenda social covering things like labour standards, social programmes, environmental standards and the foreign debt. A CSN delegation to Mexico in April 1991 provided an opportunity for an exchange of ideas and strategies. Although the CQNT’s platform was well received by the Mexican anti-NAFTA movement, such was not the case in the rest of Canada. When CQNT representatives presented their platform at a meeting organized by the Common Frontiers project in 1991, several people accused the CQNT of waffling in their opposition to free trade by presenting the prospect of an acceptable NAFTA. This position probably explains why anti-free trade coalitions such as Common Frontiers and the Action Canada Network (ACN) did not address the question of alternatives to NAFTA until much later. CQNT member organizations tried to avoid any public display of differences with the ACN on free trade, but differences did come into the open on some occasions. In early 1993, for example, the new Clinton administration in the US made good on its electoral promise to start trilateral negotiations for environmental and labour side agreements to add on to NAFTA, which had been concluded a few months earlier. The CQNT saw these negotiations as an opportunity to promote its platform for including social content in the agreement. While criticizing the much-to-limited scope of the side agreement talks, the CQNT argued that compulsory and enforceable rules on labour and environmental standards would set an important and progressive precedent. ACN spokespersons, meanwhile, denounced the very idea of side agreements, arguing they would only create a smoke-screen to hide a NAFTA that was inherently flawed. This point of view was apparently shared by the major member organizations of the ACN, such as the Canadian Labour Congress (CLC). When the Canadian government set up an ad hoc advisory committee on the labour side agreement in 1993, the CLC chose not to participate until the very end, when the agreement was already concluded.
As a result, the CSN representative found himself virtually alone in pushing for an agreement which would include compulsory and enforceable labour standards based on ILO conventions. Both the Canadian government and the employers’ representatives favoured voluntary guidelines. Their positions coincided with those of the Mexican government and the employers from the two other countries and no doubt contributed to the watered-down agreements that were concluded in August 1993. Curiously, while the CLC stayed away from the issue of a social clause in NAFTA, it publicly endorsed the idea of including such a social clause in the GATT. A hemispheric agreement The environment and labour side agreements that ended up in the NAFTA package were far inferior to what the CQNT and the Mexican and US coalitions which committed themselves on the issue had proposed. The CQNT denounced the side agreements and recommended that the Canadian government not ratify the NAFTA package. The three countries did, of course, all eventually ratify the agreement and NAFTA came into effect January 1, 1994. Like anti-NAFTA coalitions throughout North America, the CQNT questioned the role it should play in the post-NAFTA context. In early 1994, the members decided to change the Coalition’s name. The newly-named Réseau québécois sur l’intégration continentale (RQIC), or Quebec Network on Hemispheric Integration, recruited new members, particularly in the environment and popular-sector areas and decided to focus on the prospect of a hemispheric trade agreement. Chile had been touted as the most eligible candidate for rapid accession to NAFTA and the possibility of a hemispheric trade treaty became even more tangible when, at the Miami Summit of 1994, all countries of the Americas (except Cuba, which was not invited) endorsed the principle of a pan-American free trade zone by 2005. Working from the premise that hemispheric integration was, to a large extent, an ineluctable process, the RQIC decided that the issue was not over being for or against integration, but, rather, over the type of integration to take place. It decided its mission would be to propose strong and enforceable social, labour and environmental protection in an extended NAFTA or any new hemispheric agreement. The Quebec organizations found support for their approach in the policies adopted by their counterparts in Latin America.
The RQIC’s continued exchanges with Mexico’s RMALC were one source of ideas. Another source of inspiration came from Brazil, where unions, organizations of agricultural workers and others began elaborating policies with regards to Mercosur (the Southern Cone Common Market), proposing a social charter for the Mercosur. The Brazilian trade union federation, the CUT, pioneered this approach and the protocol of co-operation between the CUT and Quebec’s CSN facilitated their exchanges of ideas. What type of hemispheric integration? In May 1995, the RQIC sponsored a conference - “The Social Dimension of Hemispheric Integration” - in Montreal. It brought together some 200 participants and 36 speakers who addressed various facets and consequences of hemispheric integration as well as policy and strategic questions. The final conference plenary developed a detailed policy platform on hemispheric integration, based on a draft proposed by the RQIC and debated at length by the participants. In June 1995, after the conference, the RQIC wrote a final version of its platform taking into account the comments made at the conference. It begins with a description of the negative consequences of the FTA and NAFTA, particularly in Canada and Mexico, and states that “the content of NAFTA must be completely revised not only to protect the interests of those countries that presently are members of NAFTA but also in order to offer real perspectives for harmonious integration between economies of the North and of the South”. It then listed ten provisions that should be included in any hemispheric integration accord. Other clauses in the RQIC platform propose that negotiations for a hemispheric accord be on a multilateral rather than a bilateral basis; that not only governments but also popular-sector, women’s, trade union and business organizations participate in such negotiations; and that any hemispheric accord be subject to a popular consultation in each country. It is worth noting that the RQIC conceives of a social charter with a wider scope than, for example, the social clause proposed by the international labour movement, which is limited to labour standards. The platform suggests the establishment of “mechanisms of surveillance, means of recourse (i.e. bodies where aggrieved parties can submit their complaints) and the application of sanctions in case of non-respect”. Discussions within the RQIC favour trade sanctions, since all international trade treaties, including NAFTA, recognize trade sanctions as the ultimate recourse that gives teeth to provisions. Other kinds of sanctions would be difficult, if not impossible, to design and apply, while the absence of sanctions would reduce the social charter to a wish list. RQIC platform on hemispheric integration 1. Adjustment measures for affected workers, industries and regions. 2. A human and democratic rights code with surveillance mechanisms and specific provisions for women, children and natives, based on UN coventions. 3. A charter of minimum labour standards, including collective and individual rights, based on ILO conventions, and enforceable through sanctions. 4. An enforceable environmental charter based on the principles of sustainable development, proper management of non-renewables and pollution control. 5. A charter on basic public services and social protection such as education, health and income security. 6. Provisions for the protection of particularly vulnerable sectors of the population such as peasants and aboriginals. 7. Protection for migrants workers. 8. Measures to reduce the burden of foreign debt. 9. Provisions based on universally recognized principles but, in some cases (such as minimum standards expressed in monetary units) adapted to specific national circumstances. 10. Financial resources generated through contributions from member countries made available where necessary to allow specific countries to meet the requirements of the above provisions. (One form of financing would be a tax on all transactions between member countries and notably on speculative transfers.) Debate over the social charter The RQIC has been conscious of the fears in some circles, particularly in Third-World countries, that social charters may be used as a tool by stronger countries in the North to impose their own rules on the weaker countries, in essence violating their sovereignty. It is for this very reason that the RQIC has suggested that the social charter be based on internationally agreed standards established by the UN or UN member agencies such as the ILO, and not on nationally determined standards set either by an accusing country (as is the case with the labour standards code of the US international trade legislation) or by the country accused of violating standards (as is the case in the NAFTA side deals on labour and environment). The RQIC’s proposal also includes provision for financial resources to implement those programmes or standards that would entail significant costs. These would be financed either by contributions from member states or by something like an international financial transactions tax. This proposal was inspired by the European Union, where the European Social Fund and Regional Fund each spend tens of billions of dollars annually to finance basic social programmes or support the development or reconversion of high-unemployment and low-income regions. The detailed social charter platform adopted by the RQIC in June 1995 represents a consensus on the part of a broad spectrum of Quebec popular organizations: the principal trade union federations, environmental groups, international solidarity organizations, and Quebec’s coalition of community-based organizations, Solidarité populaire Québec. As well, the platform encompasses almost all the opinions expressed at the May 1995 conference. However, it was unable to integrate two critiques, expresses by a small number of participants at the conference. One of these was that principles such as human rights and minimum labour standards are “too important” to be included in a trade agreement and, additionally, that including some rights as enforceable provisions for a hemispheric agreement, while not including others, downgrades the status of the latter. The other critique was that the social charter approach means, implicitly, accepting the overall strategy of international capital and institutions such as the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank to integrate national economies into the world system, when one should be opposing this strategy. The RQIC debated these critiques and decided they were incompatible with the approaches taken in the platform. In the opinion of the Réseau, enforcing respect for human, democratic, and social rights and labour and environmental standards through trade sanctions would give teeth for the first time to lofty principles that have existed for decades, but only as voluntary codes that are routinely flaunted by many countries. Even if theses sanctions were initially to be applied only to a limited number of rights, it would create an important precedent. As for the idea that one should resist integration rather than attempting to improve it, the RQIC felt such an approach ignored the basic reality that economic integration was taking place whether formal treaties were signed or not. In addition, it was noted that the idea of adopting a “No to integration” approach, rather than proposing a more equitable integration between North and South, was not a strategy shared by our major counterparts in the South and, in the final analysis, could be interpreted as a form of anti-Third World protectionism. Strategies and solidarity Since the adoption of the RQIC’s social charter platform, different member organizations of the Réseau have been promoting the idea in their respective sectors. For example, the president of the CSN gave a speech in June 1995 to the Conseil des relations internationales de Montréal proposing the inclusion of a social clause in an extended NAFTA and Solidarité populaire Québec has conducted a major campaign for the adoption of a social charter by an independent Quebec. Because success in obtaining a social charter in an hemispheric agreement cannot be achieved in one country alone, the RQIC and member organizations such as the CSN recognize the importance of a concerted international strategy between like-minded groups throughout the Americas. For this reason, they have used every occasion to maintain exchanges with their counterparts in the rest of Canada, the United States and Mexico and have begun dialogues and exchanges over hemispheric integration and social charters with their partner organizations in other Latin American countries. The possibility of arriving at a labour and popular-sector consensus among all countries of the Americas is greater than ever before. Even Canada’s CLC, which previously rejected the social-charter approach, endorsed the inclusion of a social clause based on ILO conventions in the Canada-Chile FTA that was negotiated in 1996. As the process leading to a Free Trade Agreement for the Americas is set to intensify in 1997, a common perspective on the part of progressive organizations in the various countries of the hemisphere is obviously of great importance.
Debate over the social charter The RQIC has been conscious of the fears in some circles, particularly in Third-World countries, that social charters may be used as a tool by stronger countries in the North to impose their own rules on the weaker countries, in essence violating their sovereignty. It is for this very reason that the RQIC has suggested that the social charter be based on internationally agreed standards established by the UN or UN member agencies such as the ILO, and not on nationally determined standards set either by an accusing country (as is the case with the labour standards code of the US international trade legislation) or by the country accused of violating standards (as is the case in the NAFTA side deals on labour and environment). The RQIC’s proposal also includes provision for financial resources to implement those programmes or standards that would entail significant costs. These would be financed either by contributions from member states or by something like an international financial transactions tax. This proposal was inspired by the European Union, where the European Social Fund and Regional Fund each spend tens of billions of dollars annually to finance basic social programmes or support the development or reconversion of high-unemployment and low-income regions. The detailed social charter platform adopted by the RQIC in June 1995 represents a consensus on the part of a broad spectrum of Quebec popular organizations: the principal trade union federations, environmental groups, international solidarity organizations, and Quebec’s coalition of community-based organizations, Solidarité populaire Québec. As well, the platform encompasses almost all the opinions expressed at the May 1995 conference. However, it was unable to integrate two critiques, expresses by a small number of participants at the conference. One of these was that principles such as human rights and minimum labour standards are “too important” to be included in a trade agreement and, additionally, that including some rights as enforceable provisions for a hemispheric agreement, while not including others, downgrades the status of the latter. The other critique was that the social charter approach means, implicitly, accepting the overall strategy of international capital and institutions such as the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank to integrate national economies into the world system, when one should be opposing this strategy. The RQIC debated these critiques and decided they were incompatible with the approaches taken in the platform. In the opinion of the Réseau, enforcing respect for human, democratic, and social rights and labour and environmental standards through trade sanctions would give teeth for the first time to lofty principles that have existed for decades, but only as voluntary codes that are routinely flaunted by many countries. Even if theses sanctions were initially to be applied only to a limited number of rights, it would create an important precedent. As for the idea that one should resist integration rather than attempting to improve it, the RQIC felt such an approach ignored the basic reality that economic integration was taking place whether formal treaties were signed or not. In addition, it was noted that the idea of adopting a “No to integration” approach, rather than proposing a more equitable integration between North and South, was not a strategy shared by our major counterparts in the South and, in the final analysis, could be interpreted as a form of anti-Third World protectionism. Strategies and solidarity Since the adoption of the RQIC’s social charter platform, different member organizations of the Réseau have been promoting the idea in their respective sectors. For example, the president of the CSN gave a speech in June 1995 to the Conseil des relations internationales de Montréal proposing the inclusion of a social clause in an extended NAFTA and Solidarité populaire Québec has conducted a major campaign for the adoption of a social charter by an independent Quebec. Because success in obtaining a social charter in an hemispheric agreement cannot be achieved in one country alone, the RQIC and member organizations such as the CSN recognize the importance of a concerted international strategy between like-minded groups throughout the Americas. For this reason, they have used every occasion to maintain exchanges with their counterparts in the rest of Canada, the United States and Mexico and have begun dialogues and exchanges over hemispheric integration and social charters with their partner organizations in other Latin American countries. The possibility of arriving at a labour and popular-sector consensus among all countries of the Americas is greater than ever before. Even Canada’s CLC, which previously rejected the social-charter approach, endorsed the inclusion of a social clause based on ILO conventions in the Canada-Chile FTA that was negotiated in 1996. As the process leading to a Free Trade Agreement for the Americas is set to intensify in 1997, a common perspective on the part of progressive organizations in the various countries of the hemisphere is obviously of great importance. t continue to be the tools of large multinational corporations and nuclear powers.
Trade and integration accords, as well as domestic economic policies, should include social objectives, time-tables, indicators of social impact, and corrective remedies. National governments must protect local efforts aimed at achieving viable, economically sustainable and food-self-sufficient communities, both urban and rural. Giving priority to welfare in international agreements means reducing military budgets and allocating resources to people's education and health. Money saved through military reductions in powerful nations should be channelled toward an international war on poverty. Combatting drug production, trafficking and consumption should be an element of integration accords. Rather than taking a purely military approach, however, this should be achieved through mass educational campaigns, the elimination of the poverty driving this lucrative business, fighting against corruption and the involvement in the drug trade of high-level authorities, and other measures aimed at the root causes of the problem. International agreements must preserve the sovereignty of nation states over domestic matters and in the application of their own laws. They should not allow for the presence of armed troops or foreign police forces within the borders of a sovereign nation. 3. Reduce inequalities A main objective of any agreement should be the reduction of inequalities within and among nations, between women and men, and among races. Among nations: The rush toward the integration of highly unequal economies without social protections is creating a climate in which large corporations can reduce the standard of living and wages in all regions of the world. The new rules should include mechanisms to reduce imbalance among nations through raising living standards in the poorest countries.
This would not only be a step toward meeting the demands for justice and equity in these countries. It would also reduce the power of corporations to take advantage of such inequalities to weaken standards and wages everywhere by threatening to move production to areas where labour costs and environmental protections are lower. Within nations: Inequalities and extreme poverty have been on the increase for more than a decade in the Americas. The new rules should reduce these inequalities, encouraging redistribution of income, land and natural resources. Between women and men and among races: Women, people of colour, and indigenous people have had to shoulder a disproportionate share of the economic and social decline caused by neo-liberal policy. The cuts to public sector services and employment and the reduction of secure employment and democratic structures have personally affected more women then men and have hit girls harder than boys. When resources are scarce, decisions made by many families and societies, consciously or unconsciously, tend to favour males. On top of this, as society's traditional care-givers, women end up with the responsibility to help others whose access to jobs or publicly-funded programs have been cut. This burden comes in addition to existing disparities in the economic, legal, social, and political position of women in countries throughout the hemisphere. Discrimination must be ended by implementing new strategies and economic models to reverse the effects of current policies.
Countries should also meet existing international obligations to achieve equity and implement social programs and intensify international cooperation toward this end. 4. Sustainability Along with the war on poverty, sustainability and protection of the environment are the fundamental challenges for any economic strategy or integration agreement. Trade agreements should give priority to the quality of development, which implies establishing social and environmental limits to growth. Sustainability and the welfare of the population should take precedence over short-term profits. The new rules on integration should allow for more democratic control of land and natural resources and genuine respect for indigenous rights and land. Rich countries and major corporations have accumulated an ecological debt and occupy an "ecological footprint"1 far greater than their population and territory warrants. New agreements should allocate the costs of transition towards a sustainable model based on principles which recognize common concerns and different responsibilities. A truly sustainable alternative agreement would also include a comprehensive restructuring of incentives and rules designed to ensure that industrial production reflects its true, long-term costs. Finally, efforts to promote sustainability should go beyond the natural world to include social sustainability, including the protection of the welfare of girls and boys, as well as family groups, and minority rights. This requires the creation of effective sanctions against policies which attract investment through promises of low wages, super-exploitation of workers, especially women, or a free hand in exploiting natural resources in areas where the population is under the control of local élites.
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