This year saw some fantastic sessions organised by a variety of international NGOS, all of which can be downloaded as MP3 audio files here.

To save you some time, I’ve picked out the ones I think are probably of most interest to readers of this blog:

• Climate-change policies and trade rules: Conflict or coherence? – Organised by the Center for International Environmental Law (CIEL), and Friends of the Earth Europe (FOEE).  Download the audio here.

• A new global contract for food and agriculture: What can the WTO contribute? – Organised by the Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy (IATP). Download the audio here.

• Human rights impact assessment (HRIA): A pertinent tool for informing and improving trade governance? – Organised by 3D for Trade — Human Rights — Equitable Economy. Download the audio here.

• Labour and environment provisions in bilateral and regional agreements: Challenges for the multilateral trading system

• - Organised by the International Centre for Trade and Sustainable Development (ICTSD). Download the audio here.

• Multilateralism, our global crises and strategies for the future – Organised by the South Centre and the Global Development and Environment Institute, Tufts University.  Download the audio here.

• How do agreements on trade in services have a role in the financial crisis and the measures to deal with the economic crisis? – Organised by the Third World Network (TWN) and Centre for Research on Multinational Corporations (SOMO). Download the audio here.

• Fundamental human rights at work and the role of the WTO:  operational routes – Organised by the European Trade Union Confederation (ETUC). Download the audio here.

That should keep you listening for a few hours!

So, to pick up where I left off, I did promise a follow-up on the G20 meeting in April.  You don’t really remember it? Don’t worry: not that much ended up happening anyway.

Quick summary for those with not much time: The IMF won, ordinary people lost.

For a more in-depth analysis, the Bretton Woods Project has a good summary of what was decided (more money for the IMF and for its Special Drawing Rights) and and what was glossed over (real reform of the IMF, real money for the world’s poorest, and concrete commitments to slowing greenhouse emissions) at the meeting.

The Third World Network also offered some great analysis of the outcome – you can get a flavour of it with article titles like “A DEVELOPMENT-BLIND G20 OUTCOME THAT EMPOWERS AN UNREFORMED IMF” and “Reality behind the hype of the G20 Summit”

Online think tank Foreign Policy in Focus also featured a great analysis from  John Cavanagh and Robin Broad titled: “London Econ Summit: Born of Good Intentions, But Ends in Disastrous Results“.  Needless to say, they weren’t impressed at the outcomes either (note to John & Robin: don’t give away your punch-line in your title!)

And just released today (!) is a new report from organisations involved in the Put People First alliance in the UK, which finds that progress at the April G20 was insufficient to create “transformative” economic change.  The report argues that G20 leaders strengthened  institutions like the IMF which hace been responsible for overseeing the policies that caused the global financial crisis in the first place. But luckily there are a variety of positive recommendations for changes that governments should make at the next G20 meeting (in November), in areas like

• Delivering democratic governance
• Delivering justice and ending global poverty and inequality
• Creating a safer climate and a green economy

You can download the full report from the Put People First website here.

Please leave a comment if you’ve seen some other, incisive analysis of the meeting….

Update: Just remembered: if you want more analysis, check out G20 Voice, an initiative of Oxfam GB bringing together 50 bloggers to analyse the G20 meeting.

If you haven’t been following the discussion, below is a collection of some of the best or most important reports and articles I’ve seen in the lead-up to the G20 meeting, including the various issues around the financial/economic crisis which will be discussed there, and the various governments and non-government bodies that have opinions about it all.  In the next few days I’ll also post some of the best analysis following the summit about what gets decided.

Enjoy:

Background:

- Nobel Prize Winner and former World Bank cheif economist Joseph Stiglitz has been leading a commission which has been looking at hw to reform the global economic system.  The grandly named Commission of Experts of the President of the UN General Assembly on Reforms of the International Monetary and Financial System released its report about a fortnight ago.  The Commission has made some exciting, far-reaching and possibly (hopefully!) world-changing recommendations for new global institutions.  You can read the full report here (PDF), or a summary article from Stiglitz in The Guardian here: Reform is needed. Reform is in the air. We can’t afford to fail. There’s more extended coverage of the report from the Third World Network here and here.

- The Africa Progress Panel is Chaired By Kofi Annan, and brings together a variety of political leaders and experts on development including Michel Camdessus (former Managing Director, IMF), Goodall Gondwe (Minister of Finance, Malawi), Gilbert Houngbo (Prime Minister, Togo), Trevor Manuel (Minister of Finance, South Africa), Simon Maxwell (Director, Overseas Development Institute), Festus Mogae (former President of Botswana), Linah Mohohlo (Governor, Bank of Botswana), Todd Moss (Senior Fellow, Center for Global Development), Benno Ndulu (Governor, Central Bank of Tanzania) and Ngaire Woods (Director of the Global Economic Governance Programme, University of Oxford).  The panel has just issued its report ahead of the G20 meeting, warning that “reform of global governance will fail if poorest countries are sidelined.”  The report, New Multilateralism is available here.

- From 25 to 27 of March, the UN held an Interactive Thematic Dialogue of the UN General Assembly on the World Financial and Economic Crisis and Its Impact on Development at its headquarters in New York.  The Dialogue brought together many of the key players in the international development world – you can find a good summary of the meeting here, or read some of the more in-depth reports, including from UN Conference on Trade And Development, the World Bank, and the International Labour Organisation, or watch some of the hours of video on the Dialogue home page, including this excellent one of Joseph Stiglitz’s presentation (Real Player software needed).

What should be done (articles from the Guardian):

• Jeffrey Sachs, the Earth Institute, Columbia University; Nariman Behravesh, IHS Global Insight; Gerard Lyons, Standard Chartered; Heiner Flassbeck, UNCTAD; Alistair Milne, Cass Business School; Kevin Watkins, UN: various responses.

• Mark Weisbrot: The G20 should end rich-country rule

• Howard Davies: More & Better Regulation

• John Kay: Restore Narrow Banking

• Aditya Chakrabortty: Give up our blind faith in economic growth

• Jeremy Seabrook: an opportunity to redress the inequalities that exist between rich and poor

• Will Hutton: Everything must be re-examined.

On the Summit:

• From the Bretton Woods Project, read an overview of official standpoints and proposals of participating countries ahead of the London summit (PDF)

• Or check out the leaked G20 draft communiqué.

• Or an interesting historical perspective from Dani Rodrik.

On the Protests (from London’s Guardian – again!):

• We were right the whole time!

• Some background

• Coverage from the weekend protests

• Perspectives from various activists

• That spoof of the Financial Times

More places to look for more analysis of the crisis and the G20 summit:

• Rethinking FInance: Alternative Voices for a New Financial Architecture

Phew!

The report is only 27 pages long, so if you have a change, please read through it.  Otherwise, here’s the main thrust, from the Executive Summary:

This report examines the empirical evidence of the impact of free trade agreements on jobs. Using studies and statistics collated here for the first time, the report shows how past trade liberalisations caused huge job losses in both Africa and Latin America, the two continents that bore the brunt of early experiments in structural adjustment and other free trade policies. Findings from those experiments reveal a pattern of deindustrialisation, job losses and falling wages whose impact continues to be felt to this day, condemning whole generations to unemployment and poverty and stifling hopes for sustainable development.

In sub-Saharan Africa, trade liberalisation led to job losses across a wide range of countries, including Kenya, Malawi, Côte d’Ivoire, Zimbabwe and Morocco. Zambia saw unemployment double as the formal sector lost tens of thousands of jobs. Nor were these short-term losses: even today the vast majority of Zambian workers are forced to eke out a living in the informal economy, and 95% do not earn enough to lift themselves and their families above the $2 a day poverty threshold. Industrial employment in Ghana fell by 17% during the first eight years of trade liberalisation reforms, and by 22% for women.

Latin America experienced a similar loss of industrial and manufacturing jobs as a result of trade liberalisation. Unemployment in Latin America increased from 7.6 million to 18.1 million over the 1990s, almost entirely through the loss of existing jobs. Trade liberalisation in Brazil alone reduced net employment by 2.7 million jobs between 1990 and 1997. In Mexico, the trade liberalisations which saw the rise of the maquila sector brought huge job losses in the agricultural and manufacturing sectors, as well as a catastrophic decline in the value of wages. In real terms, the minimum wage dropped to just one fifth of its 1976 value by 2000.

Despite this evidence of the impact of previous trade liberalisations, some politicians are still calling for the swift conclusion of the Doha round of negotiations at the World Trade Organisation (WTO). Yet the International Trade Union Confederation (ITUC) has calculated that millions of jobs are at risk in developing countries as a result of the new trade liberalisation which the Doha round would require. Even the EU’s own assessment predicts that a conclusion to the Doha round along the lines currently proposed will cause significant job losses across the agricultural, industrial and service sectors of the developing world.

. . .

Free trade is no answer to the current economic crisis. At a time when unemployment levels are already rising sharply as a result of the global recession, further trade liberalisation will only exacerbate the threat to jobs. The free market approach undermines the possibility of decent work and of achieving sustainable development. War on Want believes that states must retain the policy space and levers of control in order to govern markets, manage international trade and provide decent work for all.

Download the full Trading Away Our Jobs report here.

Now China has taken the lead, calling for a new global currency which seems to closely resemble the Bancor – JM Keynes’ 1940s proposal for a global reserve currency to solve large global economic credit & debt imbalances.

Chinese central bank governor Zhou Xiaochuan released an essay on Monday calling for a similar system:

“A super-sovereign reserve currency managed by a global institution could be used to both create and control global liquidity.  This will significantly reduce the risks of a future crisis and enhance crisis management capability.”

It is of course an excellent idea – if only the US had agreed to Keynes’ proposal in 1944 in the first place!

The report says that

Liberalisation of overseas markets has been pushed aggressively by the industry’s lobbyists via free trade deals, firstly at the World Trade Organisation and more recently at the bilateral level.

It highlights two major impacts:

Firstly, the entry and presence of foreign banks is associated with the ‘cherry-picking’ of richer customers (both individuals and large businesses) and a decline in services and credit for poorer customers and smaller businesses. Rural communities are especially affected; foreign banks rarely have a meaningful presence outside large urban areas.

Secondly, the entry and presence of foreign banks produces a discernible and negative shift of credit away from productive activities (investment in agriculture, industrial production or local services) which can boost local development, and towards personal consumption, via credit cards and credit for items such as cars and mortgages.

You can dowload the full (52 page) report here or get a 2-page briefing here.

The course will run in Melbourne (Carlton) on Monday evenings from April 14 to June 15 2009.

Understanding Globalisation is a 10-week course which examines the agreements, institutions and philosophies of the global economic system in an approachable, easy-to-follow way. Taking an Australian and global perspective, Understanding Globalisation will bring together 15 Australian and international experts in politics, economics and development to support participants in exploring the complexities of globalisation.

Through lectures, workshops and other activities, the course examines the relationships between the global economy and the current global financial, food and climate crises and equips participants to track future developments in globalisation and the global economic system.

For more information, download an information booklet and application form here or apply online now.

Please email us if you have any questions about the course.

Speakers include: Professor Frank Stilwell (University of Sydney-Political Economy), Professor Jane Kelsey (University of Auckland – Law/Trade/Globalisation) & others.

When: 28th March 10am – 4pm

Where: Amnesty International, Level 1, 79 Myrtle St, Chippendale

Cost: $15 (student/concession) $25 (waged) $40 (passionate) – Some fee waivers available.

Tea and coffee will be provided. BYO lunch.

To confirm your place, contact campaign@aftinet.org.au or lara@aidwatch.org.au by Monday 16 March.

PROGRAM

10:00 – Registration

10:30 – 11:15

Basic Rundown on Economic Theory – What are the fundamentals behind contemporary economics? What are the differences between the predominant economic theories? What are the shortfalls of these theories?

11:20 – 12:05

Neo-liberalism 101 – A more detailed look into what neo-liberalism is and what its impacts are in the real world. From sweatshops to financial crises, is neo-liberalism on the decline?

12:10 – 1:05

Global Resistance and Alternatives – A look at what is the global justice movement and what alternatives exist how the opposition to capitalism/neo-liberalism exists. What role has fair trade and protests played in this?

LUNCH 1:05 – 1:40

1:40 – 2:25

Capitalism/Global Social Democracy – Global Financial Crisis and its impacts on economics, is capitalism dead, or will it just be nicer?

2:30 – 3:15

Australia’s Policies – How do Australia’s aid and trade policies reinforce current economic inequalities and pre-configure what ‘development’ means? What impacts are these policies having on Australia and other countries?

3:20 – 3:45

What you can do? – A discussion about what’s going on and what you can do to work towards an economically, socially and environmentally just future!

The first talk is here (2006), the second one is here (2007).

They were given at successive years of the TED (Technology, Entertainment, Design) conference in California.

What stuck with me most after watching them was that changes in many important indicators of development – in particular child mortality – didn’t have a clear correlation to increasing economic growth or increasing wealth.  China, for example, achieved almost all its 20th century decrease in child mortality during Mao’s reign, when economic growth was stagnant.  After his death, when China opened up, overall wealth increased hugely, but child mortality has not decreased much as a result.

But the Third World Network published an interesting historical analysis of the so-called “Doha Development Round” a couple of weeks ago.

The article gives a good overview of some interesting WTO history, concluding that

Some of the most malignant features of the international trading system in recent years have gone undiscussed. In particular, as promoted at the WTO, under the banner of “free trade”, the neo-mercantilist interests of the US and EU have been sought to be advanced, and has repeatedly met with rebuffs from the majority of the membership.

With the US and the EU unwilling to reduce their heavy subsidies to the agriculture sector, but wanting market opening in developing countries for their agriculture products and exports, as well as drastic tariff cuts in industrial tariffs in the major developing countries, and on top of it for “zero tariffs” in sectors where the US has the dominant advantage, the Doha negotiations have reached an impasse.