Global governance is out of date. Much of its remnant institutional form is delaying or preventing the development of modern systems of international relations. Most of its personnel suffer from deformation professionnelle and work for the maintenance of their positions and salaries rather than the aims these institutions once embraced.
The lofty and emotional language in which those purposes are often cast does not sit well with modern economic, financial and strategic goals, it belongs with the 20th century - in its glories, pities, struggles, horrors, achievements and despairs. Which is not to say that the requirement for institutions for global governance is not even more pressing now than ever.
The United Nations, (and all its offspring), the World Trade Organisation, the Bretton Woods institutions of the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund, the outworn 'defence' pacts, the whole shebang of people on international benefits could end now.
The UN, bankrupt (in every aspect of the word), unable to command funds internationally and with the great powers refusing to bankroll unwelcome initiatives however they may fit the ostensible aims of the UN , with a Security Council refighting the last world War, and an Assembly where China and Botswana have one vote each.
The IMF, designed to sustain world demand yet now leading to concerted deflation through the imposition of theoretically unsupported, one size fits all, hyper-liberal policies.
The World Bank, lending an insignificant fraction of emerging countries investment, and lending primarily to countries that have perfectly good access to international financial markets which, on the whole, do not repay their loans; neglecting the environmental implications of investment it finances , not to speak of the internal corruption in an institution that denies finance to what it defines as 'corrupt' governments. All this applies to its sister regional development banks for Latin America, Africa, and for Asia.
The WTO, no more than a debating club; supposed to promote free trade but which sanctions protectionist reprisals against states practising protectionism; and rather than promoting the diffusion of ideas and technology, prevents this through the protection of intellectual property to extremes unrequired by the promotion of research and invention.
The International Labour Office, well meaning but toothless, has failed even to end slavery, never mind child labour, indeed has presided over their expansion; slavery is far more widespread since the end of British imperial administration.
NATO, obsolete since December 2001 .
As the world gets closer to a global economy through international trade, migration, and delocalisation of production activities, global governance lags behind; there are more commercial blocs (200) than there are members of the WTO (150); the only country that does not belong to a commercial bloc is Mongolia.
These blocs are countries' attempts to govern their economic integration which cannot be done yet on a world scale, not least because of the Gilbert and Sullivan operetta of so-called international institutions.
Power is being brokered directly, bloc to bloc, state to state, face to face decisions being taken by government leaders. Increasingly global governance is conducted by summits of these government leaders, from the G24 to the G 8, (marginally a progress from the United States dream of a G 1.) We are back to the form of international relations in the ancient world.
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11 comments:
That soundsc like a good thing all in all HG. I don`t much like the idea of Global power of any soport and certainly not superstates.
Agreed, it would be nice to stop paying all their salaries and pensions though, all these jobsworths costing ther earth. Go home!
Kinnock , Mandleson and I do believe Ruth Tuner is shortly to be recieving a jolly stipend from the EU. ....funny that.
I am reading 'Time to Emigrate' , George Walden.Perhaps you will come back some day HG but so many have gone , its rather sad.
HG; you do hit the spot don't you!
Can you bring it all back home to here, where micro-economics exist on this reduced scale which you so eloquently descibe, and which affect small property development businesses like mine.
I am controlled by junior versions of all those you have written about. My endeavours are constantly hampered by 'Future Pensioners' who have no love for getting a job done, and fester amongst all the tosh which is fed to them by their 'consultants'!
If I was really good at Excel, I'd write a spreadsheet to show how everyone working in local government was costing the taxpayers and how much we are paying for their pensions.
So, I'll just make sure I beat the basterds another way!
I haven't emigrated N, though it did feel like the great escape when we finally left. Mr HG comes from here - he was the migrant and now, like so many who first studied, then worked in England, he's gone home taking his family with him. And taking everything he earned - goodness knows how much wealth that ought to be reinvested in the UK is pouring out and reinvesting in foreign infrastructures, or how the personal skills, gained in institutions and firms in the UK, loss affects the UK.
But it's unsurprising that a wet July has resulted in extensive flooding - no infrastructural investment for a decade, they didn't even clean out the drains.
Global warming only seems to have struck England, the Continent is having a perfectly normal summer.
All that tax is being used to fund other people's individual life styles, and no sign of any reform.
Yet here Prodi has just won a ferocious battle to end perfectly capable people declaring themselves ' retired' at taxpayers' expense, and made huge inroads into state-funded 'jobs'. His government nearly fell twice, but he's won through, partly by being equally determined to collect less tax but collect it from everyone.
What calls itself the Labour party rules by buying votes with taxes, as we know. What we don't know is how to interrupt the process.
S, transparency in accounting for tax expenditures, a clear showing of how and where and why welfare and 'benefits' are allocated is among the most important things people like Frank Field are calling for.
We won't be getting it, I expect.
But the individual determination not to let them get away with confiscating wealth we generate is encouraging the presence of an entirely different political and fiscal landscape beyond the state's reach. And more power to our elbows.
I would love to see some sort of overall analysis of generational or temporal borrowing . PFI`s , Pensions and housing ,I wonder what the combined effect is .
So you feel for an Italian did you...blimey that takes me back. they were always queering my pitch on school skiing trips with their scented ears gelatinous patter and brilliantined teeth . Grrrrrr
Brilliantined teeth? (I'll concede the scented ears).
Temporal / generational borrowing - yes, Mr Mania this lies at the root of my standing challenge to the economists to tell us how (& when!) McBroon's Enron economics are destined to come unstuck
(What's frustrating is that I can do this exercise for Enron lui-même (historical out-turn), and jolly interesting it is, too)
Parlaying the future into the present is the easiest trick in the book when you have at your disposal such tools as do goverenments, insurance companies (!), property firms, utilities and companies with access to AAA credit.
"Temporal / generational borrowing"... "how (& when!) McBroon's Enron economics are destined to come unstuck"...
"Parlaying the future into the present is the easiest trick in the book when you have at your disposal such tools as do goverenments, insurance companies (!), property firms, utilities and companies with access to AAA credit".
Now, this is a bombshell of a comment, and a very tall order.
Enron's use of "mark to market" accounting (with SEC blessing) allowed its crooked managers to boost current profits by inventing and writing in today's balance sheet non-existing future incomes. They set up companies, "special purpose vehicles", that borrowed and channelled funds to Enron but (with the blessing of their crooked auditors) did not include their liabilities in the group's consolidated accounts.
Governments can and do the same, shifting through time assets and liabilities (e.g. magicking some future revenue into the present by "securitizing" it), playing down contingent liabilities (such as guarantees), shifting resources across and outside budget borders.
The key words are "quasi-fiscal activities". This is what the IMF should monitor, though they tend to do it for emerging countries rather than the (submerged) UK. But search the web for "quasi-fiscal, UK", and you will get 24,500 entries for starters.
Quasi-fiscal activities will be considered, Caronte (even though some think liddy women-folk can't do big economics words).
It is here the discussion and analysis of UK governance over the last decade should be centred, not in 'easy' psuedo-constitutional, attention-diverting debate. Three months ago, before they succeeded, yes; now we must accept that the UK constitution stalled, for good, with that tiny Labour cabal imposing the yielder of untramelled executive power on the country. It's all over for the superstructure.
The economic base isn't so easy to defeat, and can never be ignored.
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