The following is a statement, slightly abridged, from the coalition of Korean unions and radical groups protesting against the October 20 summit of the Asian-European parliamentary meeting, ASEM, in Seoul.
Today, the United States, the World Trade Organisation, the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank insist that "there is no alternative" and force neo-liberal globalisation on the world.
Right now, government officials from all over Europe and Asia are meeting in the conference halls of the palatial ASEM Tower, a tower that cost 1.5 trillion won to build, to talk about pushing neo-liberal globalisation.
But we know. We know that neo-liberal globalisation is the deliberate project of capitalists facing a crisis of falling profits. They'll channel the majority of profits back into financial speculation. We know that the grave reality is that this neo-liberal globalisation will bring about the "globalisation of poverty".
Neo-liberal globalisation wreaks havoc, and we have seen the results of that globalisation.
First, exploitation of workers has intensified, and working conditions are determined by the race to the bottom. In the name of "flexibilisation of labour", redundancy dismissals are ruthlessly underway, unemployment rates have shot up, and irregularisation of work has advanced.
In many Asian nations, it is nearly impossible to even establish a trade union and even in countries where laws allow trade union activity, government repression of trade union activities has grown intense.
Second, in the course of neo-liberal globalisation, exploitation of women workers has increased. In most countries, when companies hit hard times, the logic of profit and patriarchy rules, and women workers are the first to be sacked.
Sexual harassment in the workplace and sexual assault have increased and, with trafficking of women, prostitution has also increased.
Third, because of transnational capital's pursuit of profit, destruction of the ecology has proceeded rapidly. Genetically modified crops have reduced the diversity of plant species and the damage from ecological destruction will now boomerang back to the human race.
Fourth, under the WTO regime, agriculture has become the target of liberalisation and small farms are going bankrupt. Small-scale farmers are sinking into extreme poverty, burdened with heavy debt. Agribusiness dominates food production, food security is under serious threat, and consumers' right to health is thrown to the wind.
Fifth, because of neo-liberal globalisation, most Third World nations undergo cyclical debt crises, and are pretty much in a state of bankruptcy. National sovereignty is under serious attack.
Sixth, although the cold war system has been dismantled, conflict between regions, states, and ethnicities has not decreased. The arms race, although temporarily halted, has begun to escalate again, and the National Missile Defence plan promoted by the US and Japan is none other than this escalation.
We, who take part in the "ASEM 2000 Anti-neoliberalism Seoul Action", demand the following of the governments of Asia and Europe:
- Regardless of whether one is a woman or male worker, migrant or local worker, regular or irregular worker, all workers should be guaranteed workers' rights. To pursue this, each country's laws and international agreements must be reformed. Restructuring that undermines workers' rights, a restructuring carried out under the excuse of Third World debt crisis, should be withdrawn.
- Ecological systems should be preserved and when development takes place, it must not be controlled by the government and big capital but rather the democratic consensus of the people in those communities.
- To remove the instability resulting from transnational financial speculation and to ensure the stable development of the Third World, currency trading should be taxed and Third World debt should be totally cancelled.
- ASEM discussions on trade and investment liberalisation, such as the removal of currency controls and privatisation of public enterprises that give advantage to only transnational capital, should be immediately stopped.
- The government of each country should try to democratise fundamentally or abolish international institutions that promote neo-liberal globalisation, such as the WTO, IMF and the World Bank, and each government should oppose bilateral and regional investment liberalisation treaties that give total freedom to transnational capital and sacrifice workers' rights and the ecological system.
- The NMD-TMD plan, driven by the USA and Japan, places the world in a new arms race and makes the lives of the people more difficult. The NMD-TMD plan should be immediately scrapped.
If the governments of Asia and Europe don't listen to our above demands and instead accelerate neo-liberal globalisation and intensify the exploitation and exclusion of the people, we who are gathered here today from all over Asia and Europe will struggle in solidarity through every means possible.
The torch of the people's international solidarity struggle that has come here today from Seattle, Davos, Bangkok, Washington DC, Millau, Melbourne, and Prague will be passed on to Dakar, Paris, and Porto Alegre.
We are confident! Another world is before us. Let's change the world.
Preparatory Committee of ASEM 2000 Anti-neoliberalism Seoul Action, October 20, 2000.