Background: Guided by Voices, Mag Earwhig!

Tokyo feels cold for the first time so far this year. Not cold, really. Brisk. It feels brisk. I'd like to say I've really been looking forward to this, the whole change of seasons and all that, but I can't. Cold means Winter, and Winter means snow, and I frankly loathe snow. I'll take balmy over snow anyday, yes sir.

Big things are happening in Seattle next week, as anyone who follows the news knows. Here in Japan, in my self-imposed news vacuum, it's difficult to keep up with these things (news), but I'm finding a way to keep abreast of Current Events now that things have gotten interesting again. I picked up a copy of The Economist the other day, attracted by this weeks cover featuring a menacing hurricane formation and the teaser Storm over world trade. Looking at their current web site I find two things that are particularly interesting. The first is that they've obviously borrowed some key aesthetic elements from Denbushi.Net (scoundrels!), and the other is that the teaser reads Storm over globalisation. What gives? Were they afraid that that disconcerting British s in Globalisation would baffle readers of the Asia-Pacific edition? Doubtful. Extra clarity for the reader abroad? I really have no idea, but like so many other things (like Japanese pop music), I find it puzzling. Anyway, let's get on with the article content.

So I open the front cover to find this overview of the lead story: Protests in Seattle next week at the World Trade Organisation will be as much about globalisation as about trade, but they still need to be vigorously countered. Now, this being The Economist, I was hardly surprised by the apparent business-centric position on the WTO talks, but it did prompt me to buy a copy (8.36 USD) to see just exactly what they had to say about "the Battle in Seattle." (Catchy, no?)

Most of the article was predictably pro-business, pro-"growth" and intent on championing the virtues of the global economy, an as-yet-unrealized panacea that gives corporate interests the freedom to operate unregulated and unmolested without regard to borders or the particular interests of local populations throughout the world.

"Protectionism" (or some variant on the term) seems to be the preferred buzzword for the Cult of Globalisation as represented in the popular business press, and this one article offers a generous eleven servings for overly ebullient capitalists who have a keen appetite for this kind of soundbite-rich reporting.

Protectionism, for those who missed the 1992 elections, refers to any economic or political policy that inhibits Business from operating freely, which is say in the absence of meddlesome governmental regulation or other efficiency-stifling constraints that might elicit a raised middle finger from the magical hand of Adam Smith. In many circles today you need only whisper the word protectionism to provoke a chorus of pooh-poohs from thoroughly re-educated business folk who for the life of them can't see the benefit of governmental scrutiny of business practices.

I see the benefit, however. Without the intervention of government we wouldn't have OSHA regulations protecting workers, or the 40-hour work week, or child labor laws, or consumer protections, or regulations on dumping and the disposal of toxic waste. Business never wanted those things and doesn't want them now. Business is concerned with the bottom line, folks, and when our appeal as simple consumers begins to wane you and I take a back seat to that or don't get to ride at all. The "wisdom of the market" is a snow job that sells fine in places like America and Japan and Germany, where the success or failure of global economic policy is measured by the price one pays for a pound of Seattle's Best Coffee.

To give The Economist credit, the other side of the debate gets an obligatory shake in the article as well. Ralph Nader's success in rallying support against the MAI and the distrust of poorer nations with regard to the intent of economic juggernauts like the US, the EU and Japan are touched on briefly, but always within the larger context of their just not getting "the benefits [of free trade]--cheap imports, better jobs, [and] faster growth."

But for the most part these voices of concern (or alarm) are lumped together as "extemist," the empty-headed protestations of radicals who seek to protect their own "narrow interests" with little regard for the greater good that globalisation offers us all. And even though The Economist asserts that the WTO has "become the whipping boy for practically every interest group everywhere," I hardly feel compelled to wax sympathetic over this turn of events. If unions, consumer advocates, environmentalists, conservationists and developing countries globally are prompted to unite in opposition to the growing power (and relaxed accountability) of multinationals around the globe, I would argue that it's time all of us stood up and took notice.

• A debate on globalization and the World Trade Organization
• A schedule of fair trade events
• The World Trade Organization web site