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tortillaconsal punto/dot com
By Karla Jacobs, 22nd May 2009
(Note: the summit has been postponed by a vote this week of the General Assembly until Junes 24th)
President of the 63rd Session of the UN General Assembly (UNGA), Miguel D'Escoto, is at the front of the organization of a historic global heads of state summit to discuss the impact of and response to the global financial crisis. The summit will take place between June 1st - 3rd at the UN headquarters in New York. As part of the outcome of the UN International Conference on Financing for Development (Doha, December 2008), senior government representatives from over 160 UN member countries signed a request to D'Escoto to organize such a global conference at the highest level.
As D'Escoto (former Nicaraguan foreign minister, 1979 - 1990) explains in a recent interview with Cuba's official newspaper Granma, the reason the upcoming conference is both historic and radical is that, during the existence of the UN system "it is been prohibited for the General Assembly to discuss or intervene in international financial affairs, such matters were reserved for the International Monetary Fund, the World Bank and the World Trade Organization."
He argues that the rules of the existing International Economic Order "were imposed" on the world by the US and other nations that considered themselves "victors" of the Second World War. "So this summit will the be the first time in the history of the UN that we are saying to everyone, 'come and lets all talk about the International Economic Order'."
D'Escoto, who during his time at the head of the UNGA has been the target of fierce criticism by Western Bloc representatives and snide reports by Western corporate media, further explained the importance of the June summit during a press conference at the UN office in Geneva in early May: "In the 21st Century, the century of inclusive democracy ... the idea that a minority can go on making decisions for everyone else must be forgotten about. With all due respect to the G20, those countries represent a minority. It is the G192, represented at the UN General Assembly, that must decide our future."
Outcome document watered down after initial consultations
On May 8th D'Escoto presented the first draft of the outcome document to be discussed and adopted during the summit. The document is the result of five months of intensive investigation led by the Commission of Experts on Reforms of the International Monetary and Financial System, a process of in-depth consultation and discussion at the UNGA and other forums, and inputs from specialized UN agencies, civil society organizations and private sector representatives.
The Commission of Experts on Reforms of the International Monetary and Financial System was set up by D'Escoto in December and is comprised of economists and finance officials from all global regions. Nobel award winning economist Joseph Stiglitz presides the commission.
On May 18th following informal consultations with member countries the first revised version of the outcome document was presented. Currently formal consultations with all UN member countries are taking place prior to the presentation of the second revised version immediately before the summit.
The first revised version of the outcome document is half the length of its predecessor and less progressive both in terms of the language used and the recommendations made.
The original draft gives specific recommendations about the creation of nine new global entities to oversee and regulate the global economic and financial system including a global tax authority, a global financial regulatory authority, a global economic coordination authority and a world monetary board. The officials of these global entities, states the original document, would be elected by and answerable to the UNGA. Until the consolidation of these global institutions is achieved, the document concludes, "globalization will continue to lead the world into chaos."
The lines of actions recommended in the first revised version are not so bold. Although the need for the reform of existing global financial and economic entities and the creation of new such entities is underlined, less detail is given about these proposed changes.
Another of the many specifics that was omitted from the revised version was the recommendation that nations should be charged for use of global public goods such as oceans, space and cyberspace, as well as for carbon emissions and other forms of pollution. The funds made available as a result of this international taxing system would be used as financing sources for sustainable development in the majority world. Funds from the carbon tax would be used to provide humanitarian assistance to environmental refugees.
Despite amendments, revised document still opposes continuation of current economic order
Despite the watering down of the most progressive statements and conclusions, the revised version of the document describes the globalized economic order as "unsuitable" for the 21st century underlining the failures of the international financial institutions, the inappropriateness of national currencies being used as international reserve currencies and the unquestionable need for more and better government involvement in the economy.
Detail is given to describing the impact of the crisis on individuals and societies around the world: "Hundreds of millions of people all over the world are losing their jobs, their income, their savings, their homes and their ability to survive. The number of chronically malnourished is expected to rise to over one billion. ...
"The greatest impacts may be difficult to quantify, [however]. At its heart, the present crisis is a crisis of human security ... the impacts [of which] include the evaporation of hope in a better future ... and fear of what tomorrow may bring. ... This crisis has put a disproportionate burden on women who also face greater income insecurity and increased burdens of family care. ... [Furthermore, the crisis] has exacerbated the challenges and impediments to attaining internationally agreed development goals. ... It risks becoming a social and human crisis with implications for political stability and peace."
Among the concrete orientations for lines of action in the revised version is the request that the UN General Secretary should immediately develop a proposal for a UN Vulnerability Monitoring and Response Mechanism and a strategy setting out the UN system's response to the crisis. The UN General Secretary is also requested to monitor and report on international institutions' compliance with announced commitments for institutional, assistance and policy reform.
A number of mechanisms are recommended in order to ensure the continuation of initiatives from the summit can be monitored. These include; the creation of a new Global Economic Council within the UN system to "provide coordination and oversight of the response to global challenges"; the revision of the agreements between the UN and the Bretton Woods organizations in an attempt to "enhance cooperation" with the UN and to "strengthen the development mandates of both institutions."
Finally, the President of the UNGA is instructed to ensure the continuity of the global forum on the global financial crisis naming specialized work groups and organizing future high level meetings.
EU attempts to undermine summit
As can be expected, rich country governments are less than happy about the summit and the processes that may be set into motion as a result of the encounter. During the previously mentioned press conference in Geneva on May 12th, Miguel D'Escoto commented on what he described as "a coming together of the representatives of the European Union against the [first draft of the] outcome document."
The European Union (EU) presented its criticism as being in relation to procedural imperfections. According to D'Escoto, however, the EU has been opposed to the summit from the beginning, given their insistence that the conference to be solely about the impact of the crisis on developing countries and not about the International Economic Order in general.
It is beyond doubt that Western Bloc powers are busy pressurizing friendly heads of government in the majority world not to attend the summit or not to sign the summit declaration. One wonders to what extent this strategy will succeed, however.
As events in the Central American and Caribbean region have demonstrated, circumstances have made it harder than ever for even centre and right wing governments to maintain a position of unquestioning submission to US and European powers. With nothing to offer in terms of resolving the Central American and Caribbean nations' chronic and worsening energy crisis, the US has watched one "ally" after another sign onto Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez' regional energy integration initiative Petrocaribe.
No matter how strong an ideological affinity majority world political parties and individual leaders may feel with Western Bloc powers, as politicians their first thought has to be how to guarantee public support at home. Few political parties are able to maintain support if they are unable to access the resources they need to avoid dramatic drops in people's standard of living.
Organizers may have compromised to ensure consensus
As Miguel D'Escoto has stated many times, in order for the conclusions of the June summit to command the respect of the international community the outcome document must be signed by as many member countries' heads of state as possible. It may not be unreasonable, therefore, to assume that the revisions made to the first draft of the outcome document were deemed necessary by the organizers in order to counteract the possibility of an overly progressive document putting off centre and right wing majority world governments susceptible to Western Bloc demands.
In terms of whether near unanimous support for the summit's declaration could achieve even a fraction of the proposed reform of the International Economic Order, it is hard not to be sceptical. In the short term, certain superficial changes may well result, for example the transition from the use of the US dollar as the international reserve currency to some other arrangement. (According to D'Escoto there is almost complete global consensus on this issue going into the meeting.) But obviously what really matters is the arrangement that replaces the current system.
US Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner was recently quoted saying that the US is "quite open" to some IMF-based alternative to the US dollar's status as reserve currency. The alternative the US is open to exploring, however, involves an increase in the use of the IMF's Special Drawing Rights, something that would ensure rich nation's continuing control over the management of the international reserve currency system.
According to current UN rules, it is impossible for the UNGA to oblige global powers to obey its resolutions. If this summit can provoke some progress in the implementation of mechanisms that project the voice and influence of the UNGA (the only universal body made up of sovereign states) on the stage of global power politics then it should be considered a success. Perhaps the most important thing the summit has the potential to achieve is to strengthen majority world opposition to the status quo imposed on humanity by Western Bloc imperialism.