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While the International Monetary Fund (IMF), the World Bank, the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), the World Trade Organization (WTO) and others adhere to a rigid “neoliberal” ideology that favors deregulation, privatization, and the interests of the global North and the private sector over the poor, UNCTAD has a rich history of favoring people-centered development, promoting interests of the global South, and being a voice of the poor majority in international forums.

It is despicable that in a conference focused on trade and development, rich countries successfully prevented UNCTAD from calling for changes to the WTO, to allow more flexibility for development in poor countries. They even successfully blocked a call for a resolution to trade-distorting subsidies in agriculture that damage developing countries every day.

The EU and US even opposed inclusion of “Special and Differential Treatment” — the simple historical recognition of the fact that rich and poor countries have different economic capacities and need different rules to promote prosperity — although this was finally included.

From the perspective of the global South, the primary extraction of raw materials like coal, the subjugation of popular autonomy, the implementation of debt as a form of social control and the continued expansion of climate change are clearly intertwined.

Under its current form, that is imperialism-controlled, debt is a cleverly managed re-conquest of Africa, aiming at subjugating its growth and development through foreign rules.

Speaking at the memorial service for the miners killed by South African police (above), Julius Malema reprised these themes on Thursday, calling again for nationalization of the mines: The democratically elected government has turned on its people.

So far, these demands have resulted in very modest agreements to change voting weights at the institution (and even these have not yet been ratified by the US). But we cannot help but conclude that IMF governance reform is now firmly on the agenda. Equally important, the current crisis has also marked a substantial curtailment in the geography of the institution's influence in the global south.

Just as the Asian crisis laid the groundwork for institutional developments that have deepened only in the current crisis, so do we expect the current crisis to catalyse further innovation along the lines already in place, and in directions not yet imagined, when the next period of instability emerges.

We should take note of what we see as the beginning of the end of the neoliberal approach to development. The process of discrediting that development model begins in the aftermath of the east Asian financial crisis of 1997–98.

What is new about this phase of capitalism? Its global interconnectedness, driven in part by new technologies, and the dominance of a new kind of finance capitalism mean that, while a crisis of this system has effects everywhere, these effects are uneven. So far the Bric countries seem relatively unscathed, while the impact of economic devastation has spread from Asia and Africa into Europe.

The breakdown of old forms of social solidarity is accompanied by the dramatic growth of inequality and a widening gap between those who run the system or are well paid as its agents, and the working poor, unemployed, under-employed or unwell.

Neoliberalism's victory has depended on the boldness and ambition of global capital, on its confidence that it can now govern not just the economy but the whole of social life. On the back of a revamped liberal political and economic theory, its champions have constructed a vision and a new common sense that have permeated society. Market forces have begun to model institutional life and press deeply into our private lives, as well as dominating political discourse. They have shaped a popular culture that extols celebrity and success and promotes values of private gain and possessive individualism. They have thoroughly undermined the redistributive egalitarian consensus that underpinned the welfare state, with painful consequences for socially vulnerable groups such as women, old people, the young and ethnic minorities.

Globalization and technology are routinely cited as drivers of inequality over the last four decades. While the relative importance of these causes is disputed, both are often viewed as natural and inevitable products of the working of the economy, rather than as the outcomes of deliberate policy. In fact, both the course of globalization and the distribution of rewards from technological innovation are very much the result of policy. Insofar as they have led to greater inequality, this has been the result of conscious policy choices.

As it stands, almost nothing has been done to remove the protectionist barriers that allow highly-educated professionals in the United States to earn far more than their counterparts in other wealthy countries.

doctors in the United States earn an average of more than $250,000 a year, more than twice as much as their counterparts in other wealthy countries.

Trump is simply carrying on that tradition. He’s finding great success because, as MarketWatch columnist Rex Nutting recently noted, Democrats have “sided with the elites on the crucial economic question of our times: Who would win from globalization, and who would lose?”

Instead, we must build a movement for trade justice that rejects both Trump’s opportunism and the long-standing neoliberalism of the Democratic and Republican parties.

In 1999, in the face of a seemingly invincible World Trade Organization, tens of thousands of activists allied with the movements for labor, the environment, human rights, and racial justice united in the streets of my hometown, Seattle, and shut down the WTO meeting. Under the slogan “Teamsters and Turtles United at Last,” the protesters struck a blow against elites and lifted up a vision of a world trading system that put communities ahead of corporations and created jobs while protecting human rights and the environment.

In fact, in a private meeting between U.S. civil society and Robert Gerber, the Deputy Head of the U.S. delegation, he told us that he thought that analyzing “the global economic crisis” itself was outside of UNCTAD’s mandate, which was to focus on trade and development. I’m not sure how to make an argument that these things are not related, but I guess when you’re the United States at the United Nations, you don’t have to have a logical argument.

He also said the language in the text that was most important to the United States was on UNCTAD’s efficiency, effectiveness, transparency and accountability; we’re looking forward to seeing the U.S. push hard for similar issues regarding the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and U.S. aid in Haiti, among other places.

the non-EU bloc of developed countries) was asked directly at one point during the negotiations why he did not want this language included, the representative responded gruffly, “we don’t want any competition in intellectual thinking!”

Brexit defeated an overwhelming array of what Zygmunt Bauman defined as the global elites of liquid modernity; the City of London, Wall Street, the IMF, the Fed, the European Central Bank (ECB), major hedge/investment funds, the whole interconnected global banking system.

What is very curious in the present state of affairs is that, unfortunately, no other country other than China retains those rights. No other major partner (of the G20) has fully retained those rights, although some of the emerging countries such as India and Brazil have done something to that effect. Instead, they have generally accepted the dictates of the US.

It is important to understand that this is the central problem. The problem is the global integrated monetary and financial system, ruled as it is by the dollar, that is ruled by the exclusive prerogative of the US Treasury and Federal Reserve, of the US state. This is not acceptable. That is the problem. The problem is not the exchange rate of the Yuan or that of the Rupee or any other currency. Absolutely not.

First, for those who assume that the system is not so bad, and who accept that the US dollar should continue to be effectively the major, if not absolutely the exclusive international currency, the idea would be to restore the system as it was before the 2008 financial breakdown along with, perhaps, some minor regulatory reforms (most of which are essentially more cosmetic and rhetorical than real). This is exactly what the Stieglitz Commission and the Stieglitz report aim at. It accepts that the US dollar should remain the almost exclusive international currency (with some minor concessions). But it also accepts the right of the US government to manage the currency exclusively and on its own. As for everyone else, they have to adjust to the US dictates. This is, of course, not acceptable, especially for the South. If the Europeans, the British, the Japanese accept it that is their business. But I don't see why the Asians, the Latin Americans, the Africans should accept it. And it is not accepted, certainly not by China and some of the emerging states - India and Brazil in particular. Although it is not accepted morally by African states, in practice they have completely accepted to submit to its consequences - they have done nothing to respond to the challenge. So, that is the Stieglitz style solution. And it has completely failed. Nobody pays attention to the Stieglitz report, which has been dropped in the waste-basket, and nobody really cares about it. It has not convinced the partners, especially from the South. Even the North does not give any consideration to the recommendations of Stieglitz.

I like the Financial Times (FT) for two main reasons: it gives me all I need to know that day in about seven pages every morning, and the fact that its ‘sound.’ By ‘sound’ I mean that, unlike the Murdoch press, I can rely on the FT to tell me the truth since consistently lying to the global investor class is a losing business model. But one should remember that for the FT, as it is for the rest of us, it’s still the truth as they see it.

while political capture gets a lot of the post-crisis press, rightly– with my favorite recent slip being Spencer Bachus (R-Al) cracker that “in Washington, the view is that the banks are to be regulated, and my view is that Washington and the regulators are there to serve the banks”– it’s intellectual capture that, in my opinion, really does the damage (hence my last blog piece on Cowboys and Indians). Indeed, once you start to look for this, you begin to see its effects everywhere.

Hirschman pointed out that conservative arguments come in three distinct theses. First is the “Perversity thesis” where any well meaning reform produces its opposite outcome: ‘welfare makes you poor’ – that sort of thing. The second is the “Jeopardy thesis” where reforms put at risk more than they can ever deliver–­ the fear of extending the suffrage is typical. Third is the “Futility thesis” where reforms are simply pointless – fill in any and all opposition to global warming.

During the 1997–98 Asian financial crisis, when middle-income countries were hard hit by big capital outflows, there was an effort by China, Japan, Taiwan and other countries to put together an Asian Monetary Fund to offer balance of payments support. Washington vetoed the idea, insisting that all assistance had to go through the International Monetary Fund. The result was a mess, including an unnecessarily deep regional recession, as the IMF failed to act as a lender of last resort and then attached all kinds of harmful and unnecessary conditions to its lending.

Western media coverage of these developments has been mostly dismissive, but that primarily reflects the concerns of Washington and its allies. They have had unchallenged sway over the decision-making institutions of global financial governance for 70 years, and the last thing they want to see is competition. But competition is exactly what the world needs here.

Just look at Ukraine, where the economy is shrinking by 5 percent this year and the IMF is imposing austerity that will prolong and possibly deepen the recession.

“Apparently, the TPP’s proponents resorted to such extreme secrecy during negotiations because the text shows that the TPP would offshore more American jobs, lower our wages, flood us with unsafe imported food and expose our laws to attack in foreign tribunals,” said Lori Wallach, director of Public Citizen’s Global Trade Watch. “When the administration says it used the TPP to renegotiate NAFTA, few expected that meant doubling down on the worst job-killing, wage-suppressing NAFTA terms, expanding limits on food safety and rolling back past reforms on environmental standards and access to affordable drugs.”

“Many in Congress said they would support the TPP only if, at a minimum, it included past reforms made to trade pact intellectual property rules affecting access to affordable medicines. But the TPP rolls back that past progress by requiring new marketing exclusivities and patent term extensions, and provides pharmaceutical firms with new monopoly rights for biotech drugs, including many new and forthcoming cancer treatments,” said Peter Maybarduk, director of Public Citizen’s Access to Medicines program. “The terms in this final TPP text will contribute to preventable suffering and death abroad, and may constrain the reforms that Congress can consider to reduce Americans’ medicine prices at home.”

The TPP Intellectual Property Chapter would roll back the “May 2007” reforms for access to medicines. The TPP Environment Chapter would roll back the “May 2007” reforms by eliminating most of the seven Multilateral Environmental Agreements that past pacts have enforced. The TPP Investment Chapter would expand the scope of policies that can be challenged and the basis for such challenges, including for the first time ever allowing investor-state dispute settlement (ISDS) enforcement of World Trade Organization intellectual property terms and new challenges to financial regulations.

Without a currency that could appreciate against those of her trading partners, German productivity increased and its technical excellence produced a declining real cost of exports, while in its European trading partners, deprived of currencies that could depreciate, stable purchasing power and easy credit produced a corresponding increase in demand for German goods.

Stiglitz concedes that austerity may eventually work, but he argues that even if it does, the cost is too high. Better to allow countries to declare bankruptcy and start over, just as individuals and firms can do in a domestic economy. Varoufakis and Galbraith dismiss austerity as flatly self-defeating, because low growth simply ends up increasing the debt-to-GDP ratio.

Germany has emerged almost unscathed—at least so far. Berlin has preserved the existing euro system, which advantages it as an international creditor, an exporter of high-quality goods, and a country that suppresses wage increases. It has enjoyed lower interest rates and higher growth than the rest of Europe, which has depressed the real cost of its exports, resulting in a trade surplus larger in absolute terms than China’s.

It’s not simply that Trump has effectively channeled their pain and anger through his rhetoric. The harsh truth is that Trump gets traction on trade—and his glaring defects get a pass from many—because he’s filling a huge vacuum in the country’s political discourse. For years, neither of the two main political parties has articulated a vision of international trade that puts workers, communities, and our environment ahead of corporate interests.

Only last month, the Obama administration, backed by corporate interests, successfully blocked the Indian government’s massive solar energy program by persuading the WTO that India’s promotion of domestic solar panel manufacturing violated WTO rules.

Clinton’s positions remind us that we have to resist the temptation to distill the trade struggle into a contest between candidates. Instead, we must build a movement for trade justice that rejects both Trump’s opportunism and the long-standing neoliberalism of the Democratic and Republican parties.

This is a systematic plan on a global level to cast two centuries of workers' conquests into a dustbin, to make humanity go backward in the name of national recovery.

Most European countries, which seemed as if they had been vaccinated against coups d'état, are now governed by technocrats, handpicked by Goldman Sachs and other big financial corporations, for whom no one has voted.

The one big institutional difference this time around seems to be the role of the central banks, with the Federal Reserve of the United States playing a leading if not domineering role on the world stage. But ever since the inception of central banks (back in 1694 in the British case), their role has been to protect and bail out the bankers and not to take care of the well-being of the people.

But if everyone tries to live off rents and nobody invests in making anything, then plainly capitalism is headed towards a crisis of an entirely different sort.

What remains of the radical left now operates largely outside of any institutional or organised oppositional channels, in the hope that small-scale actions and local activism can ultimately add up to some kind of satisfactory macro alternative. This left, which strangely echoes a libertarian and even neoliberal ethic of anti-statism, is nurtured intellectually by thinkers such as Michel Foucault and all those who have reassembled postmodern fragmentations under the banner of a largely incomprehensible post-structuralism that favours identity politics and eschews class analysis.

There is one criticism of austerity politics that is both true and, simultaneously, flatly false: that it is ideological. This claim is ambiguous and needs to be unpacked.

Yet Labour’s cuts, though slower and a little less deep, would in any other circumstances be considered a scandal. During George Osborne’s emergency budget in 2010, the chancellor was able to remark that he had inherited from Labour plans for cuts averaging 19 per cent across all departments. (Osborne had ‘merely’ increased the planned cuts to an average of 25 per cent across all departments). This was why canny Labour right-wingers had urged colleagues to calm down the anti-cuts talk, knowing that a Labour government would implement similar policies.

But those dismissing austerity as ideological mean precisely that there is a purely technical, non-ideological means of crisis-resolution. In this sense, the criticism of austerity as ideological is obviously in bad faith. It simply says, ‘their cuts are stupid, ours are going to be super-clever’.

Two months after the February 28 interim agreement between Greece and the EU ‘troika’—the IMF, European Commission, and European Central Bank—in which both sides agreed to continue negotiating—little has changed. In fact, led by its de facto spokesperson, hardline German finance minister, Walter Schaubel, the Troika’s position has continued to harden since February 28.

These measures are particularly annoying to the northern Europe finance ministers and their bankers, since other European governments have introduced, or have plans to introduce, many of the very same ‘labor market reforms’ in their countries. Deepening labor market reforms everywhere throughout the Eurozone is a prime objective of business interests and their center-right politicians and governments.

It has been estimated that more than US$250 billion in assets would be eventually affected by a default, and no one knows the connections linking these assets—i.e. what are the possible contagion effects. The memory of the Lehman Brothers default in 2008 is obviously stronger in the USA than it is today in Europe—hence the Furman public warning. Privately, US officials are even more concerned than Furman, according to the business press.