Is GLOBALIZATION weakening national sovereignties?

Nipawin - Monday, July 9, 2001 - by: Mario deSantis

to
make
money
Our hegemonic laissez fair economists are demanding that money, goods and services be able to move around the world transcending any local market economy or national border. This push to artificially define one global worldwide market place is not driven by people with different culture, different languages, different aspirations, different needs. Instead, the Globalization of one world wide market is driven by our transnational corporations for the purpose to make money.

new
ethical
value
Money has today lost its original purpose as a medium for exchanging goods and services, and it has become the new ethical value driving our corporate societies. We have financial businesses who can arrange $100 loans out of $1 original bank deposit, and this is the reason why we have bubbles in the financial market place, and this is why in the last twenty years the assets of big corporations have increased by 5000% while the minimum wage has practically stayed the same.

not
sustainable
The definition of one global world wide market place is wrong and this state of affairs is not sustainable for providing healthy communities and healthy people.

copyrights
Another way to make more money in the one global world wide market place is by the rigid and longer protection of copyrights. The shorter the term of copyrights and the more flexible our economies can become to innovate themselves, and it is strange how our laissez fair economists want to liberalize the markets while at the same time they want more world wide protection of corporations' copyrights.

AIDS
To understand the absurdity of liberalizing the markets by having one global world wide market I can make reference to our transnational drug corporations. The world is afflicted by the epidemic of AIDS, yet our transnational drug corporations have been demanding monopolist prices for their medicinals to cover the assets of their research efforts. I tell you how these corporations have been covering up their assets, not only by shifting profits from country to country to pay less taxes, but by manipulating costs and evading taxes as well.

forty
times
We understand that transnational drug companies operating in Canada have dodged taxes by paying their corporate cousins abroad as much as forty times the going rate for chemical ingredients. These transnationals include the Canadian arms of the Glaxo, SmithKline and Hoffman-La Roche groups, and their allegiance is not to Canada or any local market but their allegiance is to the bottom line: money.

-----------Some References

LIFE AFTER CAPITALISM, Presentation for Edmonton, Calgary, and Saskatoon. By David C. Korten, November 1998 http://www.ratical.org/many_worlds/capitalism.html

AIDS Drugs Case Puts Our Ideas About Medicine on Trial. Undiplomatic Dispatch: TIME.com's Tony Karon argues that a lawsuit over patents in South Africa should challenge us to rethink conventional wisdom on profit in health care. By Tony Karon http://www.time.com/time/world/article/0%2C8599%2C101494%2C00.html

Taxman targets drug firms. Government alleges offshore purchases were inflated to dodge Canadian taxes. Colin Freeze, Investigations Unit, July 7, 2001 http://www.theglobeandmail.com/gam/National/20010707/UPHARN.html


Nipawin - Monday, July 9, 2001 - by: Mario deSantis
to make money	Our hegemonic laissez fair economists are demanding that money, goods and services be able to move around the world transcending any local market economy or national border. This push to artificially define one global worldwide market place is not driven by people with different culture, different languages, different aspirations, different needs. Instead, the Globalization of one world wide market is driven by our transnational corporations for the purpose to make money.

new ethical value	Money has today lost its original purpose as a medium for exchanging goods and services, and it has become the new ethical value driving our corporate societies. We have financial businesses who can arrange $100 loans out of $1 original bank deposit, and this is the reason why we have bubbles in the financial market place, and this is why in the last twenty years the assets of big corporations have increased by 5000% while the minimum wage has practically stayed the same.

not sustainable	The definition of one global world wide market place is wrong and this state of affairs is not sustainable for providing healthy communities and healthy people.

copyrights	Another way to make more money in the one global world wide market place is by the rigid and longer protection of copyrights. The shorter the term of copyrights and the more flexible our economies can become to innovate themselves, and it is strange how our laissez fair economists want to liberalize the markets while at the same time they want more world wide protection of corporations' copyrights.

AIDS	To understand the absurdity of liberalizing the markets by having one global world wide market I can make reference to our transnational drug corporations. The world is afflicted by the epidemic of AIDS, yet our transnational drug corporations have been demanding monopolist prices for their medicinals to cover the assets of their research efforts. I tell you how these corporations have been covering up their assets, not only by shifting profits from country to country to pay less taxes, but by manipulating costs and evading taxes as well.

forty times	We understand that transnational drug companies operating in Canada have dodged taxes by paying their corporate cousins abroad as much as forty times the going rate for chemical ingredients. These transnationals include the Canadian arms of the Glaxo, SmithKline and Hoffman-La Roche groups, and their allegiance is not to Canada or any local market but their allegiance is to the bottom line: money.

-----------Some References
	LIFE AFTER CAPITALISM, Presentation for Edmonton, Calgary, and Saskatoon. By David C. Korten, November 1998 http://www.ratical.org/many_worlds/capitalism.html

	AIDS Drugs Case Puts Our Ideas About Medicine on Trial. Undiplomatic Dispatch: TIME.com's Tony Karon argues that a lawsuit over patents in South Africa should challenge us to rethink conventional wisdom on profit in health care. By Tony Karon http://www.time.com/time/world/article/0%2C8599%2C101494%2C00.html

	Taxman targets drug firms. Government alleges offshore purchases were inflated to dodge Canadian taxes. Colin Freeze, Investigations Unit, July 7, 2001 http://www.theglobeandmail.com/gam/National/20010707/UPHARN.html