which had been its best pupils.
This has been the experience from Mexico to Argentina via Korea, Russia and SO many others. Beyond these crises we see a territying rise in inequality, inside countries and between countries that are forced to compete with each other.
This is the direct result of capitalist globalisation which puts the workers of the whole world in direct competition.
Those who can find a place in the globalized sector can only do so on condition that their low level of wages, which the capitalists call an "advantage", is maintained.
The others are tossed aside, because of their inability to rise to the levels required by this hyper-competition: they lose their jobs, their incomes and are deprived of the means of satisfying their basic needs. 3. We are against this globalisation because it is a way of eroding social rights, including in the most advanced countries.
The argument of competiLaurent Grouet Ecological debt is the debt contracted by the industrialized countries in regard to the countries of the South, linked to the past and present exploitation of their natural resources. This debt has its roots in the slave trade and imperialism. A historic debt possible by a century of pillage
This was when the vast European world were integrated
Brazil, India, New Caledonia, towards the export sector, which marked the end of their self-sufficiency in food.
This forced integration into the world market was such that the "Great Depression" of the late 19th century caused famines of a scope unequalled in human history.
The soil was exhausted, water courses diverted, populations were uprooted -and these processes of material panied by upheavals in farming affect the capacities of the countries of the South to liberindustrialized countries based responsibility for the excess of deeply affecting the climate of our planet.
It will be the developing countries that are most affected by global warming and its consequences: heat waves, more tornadoes, rising water levels, changes in rain pattems.
In addition to this 'structural" ecological debt (carbon debt) there is the enormous environmental liability of the private companies: pollution of the soil and water by the oil and mineral mining companies, the dumping of waste, dangerous industrial processes etc.
This year marks the twentieth anniversary of the catastrophe at Bhopal, where 5,000 people died after the explosion at the Union Carbide pesticide factory. The site has still not been cleared of pollution and tens of thousands of people suffer from chronic diseases.
The appropriation of living organisms, by means of patents, is a new way of plundering the peasants of the South developed by the companies of the North.
The results of natural selection, developed over centuries, by the peasants are being subjected to patents. The right to sell or cultivate their own plants is taken away from the peasants. Freedom to pollute
The ideology of "free trade" also affects the transport of toxic waste. Theoretically limited by the Basle convention, the trade in waste is growing fast, since only waste as such is banned. It doesn't stop dustbin ships, containing tons of asbestos and heavy metals being sent in heavy seas to other parts of the world. Many other highly toxic objects (such as computers) are recycled" in countries where no health standards protect people or employees. Financial debt
Financial debt is not only iniquitous, but worsens the ecological debt. In order to repay foreign debt, financial institutions like the IMF force indebted countries to increase their productivity and to support the export sectors (like Intensive monocultures) - and as a consequence increase pressure on the environment.
Not only do we demand cancellation of foreign debt, we also call for reparations for the colossal ecological debt contracted by the countries of North towards the countries of the South.
These reparations mean financial compensation for the victims of pollution. Vast projects must be started to clean up existing pollution, and technology transfers should be made urgenty make it possible for the South to develop without degrading its environment.
We must also demand that companies apply the same environmental standards in the South as in the North.
it is vital that social and ecological struggles come together, particularly because is often the same companies that lay off employees in the North in order to better exploit and pollute in the South.
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