<a href=www.wired.com>Wired, By Bruce Sterling

The Aesthetic Imperative 

Is our ability to alter nature changing what we consider natural? 

The Sound of Stolen Thunder 

New World Disorder 

The High Cost of Efficiency 

Scott Menchin

We denizens of the early 21st century cling to a leftover notion that anything "global" is remote, abstract. That's no longer true. A global problem is everyone's problem, often in intimate ways. Chinese germs multiply in American bloodstreams. Colombian narcoterrorists maintain branch offices in every major US city. There's only one atmosphere, and no pulldown menu for selecting a new one.

American bombs and satellites are impressive, but they can't stop SARS, AIDS, or drug-resistant TB. European regulations and good intentions can't manage dwindling fishing stocks, water shortages, or climate change. Asian hard work and community values barely dent the global trade in drugs, arms, and humans. Vast tracts of the developing world are no longer developing at all but visibly and violently decaying.

EMEK
Four types of mechanisms exist to finesse the world's world-sized problems. Unfortunately, none of them are of much use.

At the top of the heap are the global multilaterals, the brass-plate institutions whose members include diplomats from the world's 190-plus nation-states. Examples are the World Bank, the International Monetary Fund, the World Trade Organization, and the United Nations. They might look big and scary to street protesters, but once you peek behind the velvet curtains, it's dead obvious that they're stretched thin, put-upon, weak, fractious, crooked, and low in morale. They lack public legitimacy and democratic representation. Street opinion, the "second superpower," hates and fears them bitterly. The first superpower, the one with stealth bombers, can't stand them either. That's bad news for global multilaterals.

The second system involves international treaties and conventions. These vast, clotted webs of apparent consensus are too many, too messy, and too meager to manage a teeming, boisterous world. Often treaties are signed but never ratified. Many that are ratified aren't enforced. National leaders just plain lose track of all their accords. Consider environmental agreements, more than 200 of which have been promulgated in the past 40 years. Whatever the subject, the Bushites take positive pleasure in sweeping away clutter like the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty, the Biological and Toxin Weapons Convention, the Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties, the International Criminal Court treaty, and whichever target of opportunity they choose to hit next.

The third arrangement is the coalition of the willing. More of these exist than you might think, including the Group of Seven Industrialized Nations, the Group of Eight, the Group of 20, and the weirdly named Group of 77 Plus China. Coalitions of the willing are barely coalitions, they're rarely willing, and they're never broad enough. Nafta has been good at dissolving trade barriers, but outside the gates of the Nafta consumer's club, Argentina collapsed while Brazil and Venezuela turned hard left. The top willing coalition, the European Union, is a golden exception to the norm, because it boasts an occasional accomplishment.

The fourth approach is to stage glamorous international powwows like the Rio Summit, Rio Plus Five, Rio Plus Ten, the Cairo summit on population, the Durban racism summit, the Copenhagen Social Summit, and, lately, nongovernmental countersummits like the World Social Forum. These massive blabfests are ritualized and wooden. They make proper noises, but they have no teeth, no budget, and no follow-through. They're good for consciousness-raising and for swapping business cards, but they have no effect on the awful crises they purport to address.

Outside the US, most people believe the planet recently suffered a massive, bomb-flinging breakdown in the new world order. The news is worse: There never was any order to break down. If the war in Iraq had gone badly for the US, the world would now be staring into an abyss, a pit of lawless, dog-eat-dog mayhem. We need - we really need - a global civil society that isn't made of toffee and chicken wire. Forging it will require new ideas, methods, and technologies, new principles and a new realism. If we can't confront the big issues with real grit, competence, and determination, we've got problems waiting that will make Iraq look like Disneyland.

The New World Order, proclaimed in Gulf War I, died in Gulf War II. The Next World Order has means, motive, and opportunity now. Instead of the customary 20th-century hot air and phony baloney, it might turn out to be rather hands-on, tough-minded, and practical. There are good reasons to think this will happen, with or without American cooperation. The Next World Order may well look like nothing we previously were led to expect.

The global future is already here. It exists somewhere on a slider bar between dusty refugee camps and a suite at the Ritz-Carlton. Sometimes, as on 9/11, it's both those things. When we've created a world order that can walk the walk in our planet's very best and very worst locales, 24/7/365, then we'll have a world order that can actually order the world.

Email Bruce Sterling at bruces@well.com.

NEW YORK, June 13, (<a href=www.arabtimesonline.com>Agencies): The ranks of the world's millionaires increased in 2002, but at a slower pace than in the past because of weak global economies and stock market declines. An annual study released Wednesday estimates that there were 7.3 million people in the world with financial assets of $1 million or more at the end of 2002, up 2.1 per cent from the previous year. The increase, down from 3 per cent in 2001, was the lowest rise in the survey's seven-year history. The numbers of millionaires actually dropped last year in North America, which includes Canada and the United States, and in Latin America, but rose in other regions. The wealth these people have amassed, meanwhile, grew 3.6 per cent in 2002 to $27.2 trillion, compared with growth of 3 per cent in 2001 to $26.2 trillion, the study showed. In market boom years such as 1999, millionaires saw their wealth grow as much as 18 per cent. The "World Wealth Report" was prepared by the Merrill Lynch brokerage firm and the Cap Gemini Ernst & Young consulting firm. Brokers, bankers and other financial experts watch the figures closely because people with high net worth tend to be their best customers, although they represent just a small fraction of the world's 6.3 billion people. James P. Gorman, executive vice president of Merrill Lynch and head of its private client group, said that the fact that there were more millionaires in the world despite global economic difficulties "reflects the resilience of this very attractive market segment." The study predicts, too, that their wealth will increase an average of 7 per cent a year over the next five years to $38 trillion at the end of 2007. Gorman said that wealthy individuals were not hurt as badly by stock market declines because they tend to be conservative investors. He said that the typical high net worth individual last year had 30 per cent invested in fixed-income instruments such as bonds and 25 per cent in cash, with just 20 per cent in equities. Their other holdings included 15 per cent invested in real estate and 10 per cent in alternative investments, such as hedge funds. That shows, he said, that "a properly diversified portfolio is resilient even in the most difficult market environments." James S. Greene, a vice president at Cap Gemini, said that the wealthy were helped in both preserving and increasing their assets by an average of seven to nine financial advisers, from planners to accountants, brokers and lawyers. On a regional basis, the number of millionaires declined in North America, where stock markets fell sharply, and in Latin America, where economic and political turmoil took a toll, the report said. Their ranks increased, meanwhile, in Africa, the Middle East, Asia-Pacific and Europe, it said. The study's regional breakdown: ** Europe. The region with the largest number of millionaires, Europe saw the ranks of its high net worth individuals rise 3.9 per cent to about 2.6 million, while their wealth rose 4.8 per cent to $8.8 trillion. The report cited strong economic growth in emerging European economies and appreciation of the euro and British sterling against the dollar. ** North America. The number of millionaires fell 1.9 per cent to about 2.2 million, while their wealth fell 2.1 per cent to $7.4 trillion. Problems from weak economic growth were compounded by "a significant drop in stock market capitalization and decrease in savings rates," the report said. ** Asia-Pacific. This region had the strongest growth in both the number of high net worth individuals, up 4.9 per cent, to 1.8 million people, and wealth, up 10.7 per cent to $5.7 trillion. The report said solid economic growth and continued high savings rates outweighed mixed market and currency performances. ** Latin America. The number of high net worth individuals declined 3.6 per cent to 300,000, but their wealth rose 2.7 per cent to $3.6 trillion. The report noted that economic growth was weak in Brazil and Mexico, while the oil crisis in Venezuela and crash of the Argentine peso sparked recession. ** Middle East. The number of wealthy individuals rose 4.7 per cent to 300,000, while their wealth increased 4.6 per cent to $1.1 trillion. ** Africa. The region saw its wealthy population increase 4.9 per cent to 100,000, while their wealth rose 4.3 per cent to $600 billion. Also: DUBAI: One out of every 67 people in the oil-rich United Arab Emirates (UAE) is a dollar millionaire, a newspaper said Thursday, citing the "World Wealth Report." The number of "high net worth individuals" in the UAE with financial assets of more than one million dollars grew last year to 45,000 from 40,000 a year earlier, the survey by Cap Gemini Ernst and Young with brokerage Merrill Lynch showed, said Khaleej Times. The report, which was released in Dubai as well as in New York on Wednesday, showed that the number of millionaires around the world had grown to 7.3 million last year, despite a fall in the United States. With the total UAE population estimated at more than three million, the millionaire segment, including nationals and expatriates, accounts for some 1.5 per cent, Khaleej Times said. Expatriates, most of them low-paid Asian labourers, make up 80 per cent of the UAE's population.

Posted on Fri, Jun. 06, 2003 Associated Press

NEW YORK - U.S. crude oil futures ended at an 11-week high Friday, as traders covered short positions ahead of a meeting of three key oil ministers.

The oil ministers of Saudi Arabia, Venezuela and non-OPEC Mexico met unexpectedly in Madrid on Friday to discuss market conditions ahead of a meeting of OPEC ministers in Doha, Qatar, next Wednesday.

In a statement released after the market closed, the three ministers - Ali Naimi of Saudi Arabia, Rafael Ramirez of Venezuela and Ernesto Martens of Mexico - pledged to watch the markets closely and to ensure "normal" crude supplies.

While asserting that market fundamentals are in balance, the three officials vowed to ensure fair oil prices.

In recent years, the three countries have coordinated their output policies to keep oil prices relatively high.

Although OPEC is widely expected to leave its output quotas unchanged at the Doha meeting, the unexpected gathering of the three oil ministers served as a reminder global oil producers "intend to keep supplies tight," said Mike Fitzpatrick, an energy analyst at Fimat Futures Inc.

At the New York Mercantile Exchange, the July contract rose 54 cents to close at $31.28 a barrel, the highest settlement for a front-month contract since March 18.

July heating oil gained .95 cent to close at 78.18 cents a gallon. July gasoline gained .83 cent to close at 89.35 cents a gallon.

July natural gas futures fell 1.1 cent to $6.51 per 1,000 cubic feet.

At London's International Petroleum Exchange, July ended with a gain of 34 cents at $27.78 a barrel.

As recently as last month, some OPEC officials, concerned that a flood of oil pumped ahead of the Iraq war and a resumption of Iraqi oil exports would cause a price collapse, had indicated that the group may cut output.

But with oil prices up more than 22 percent over the past four weeks and Iraqi exports of about 2 million barrels a day suspended for a third month, the producer group is now widely expected to keep output quotas unchanged.

OPEC agreed in April to remove about 2 million barrels a day of oil from the market, while simultaneously jacking up its official output ceiling to 25.4 million barrels a day. The agreement went into effect June 1.

Still, the possibility, however remote, of a surprise output cut cannot be discounted, said Phil Flynn, an analyst at Alaron Trading Corp. in Chicago.

Indeed, Ramirez, speaking to reporters ahead of the Madrid meeting, didn't rule out the possibility of an output cut at next week's meeting.

But while some analysts see an OPEC move to leave output quotas unchanged to send prices lower, others are convinced that growing signs of strength in the U.S. economy will underpin oil prices.

Fundamentals aside, technical charts point to further short gains, traders and analysts said.

Longer term, however, few analysts expect the recent gains to stick. The reason: a recovery in U.S. oil inventories and the return of Iraq to the market.

Asia Times Online World on Fire by Amy Chua Review by Sreeram Chaulia Can two seemingly unrelated issues like globalization and violent ethnonationalism actually have a priori linkages? Yale University professor Amy Chua's new book takes the globalization debate into uncharted territory via myriad comparative examples to show the explosive collision between free market democracy and ethnic hatred. Chua begins with the murder of her Chinese Filipina aunt in Manila, an expression of the extreme frustration and anger of the indigenous majority towards Chinese "outsiders" who dominate key sectors of the Philippines' increasingly globalized economy. Plutocrats of Chinese descent, whose fortunes have ballooned due to free market economic policies, appear "to the vast majority of Filipinos as exploiters, as foreign intruders, their wealth inexplicable, their superiority intolerable". (p 4) The same story is being replayed in many other parts of Southeast Asia. In Burma's new liberalized economy, Sino-Burmese minorities have been transformed into a garishly prosperous business community that monopolizes the gem, teak wood and light consumer industries. "Today, ordinary Burmans speak of 'the Chinese invasion' or 'recolonization by the Chinese'." Vietnam's post-1988 pro-market reforms have also marked the resurgence of Chinese commercial dominance at the expense of the impoverished locals. Here too, there is a bitter outcry against "the Chinese stranglehold". In Thailand, all but three of the most powerful business groups are owned by Thai Chinese. In Malaysia, Chinese minorities comprise a third of the population but account for 70 percent of the country's market capitalization. In Indonesia, which has witnessed bloody anti-Chinese riots, the 3 percent Chinese minority controls 70 percent of the private economy. Throughout the region, "there festers among the indigenous majorities deep anti-Chinese resentment, rooted not just in poverty but feelings of envy, insecurity and exploitation". (p 47) Moving to South America, Chua finds the same pattern of a "market-dominant minority" from outside grabbing the lion's portion of globalization's benefits and stoking ethnonationalist fires. Bolivia's Amerindian majority is largely excluded from the modern economy, while the white capitalists originating from Europe and North America own the most valuable natural resources and the most advanced economic sectors. "Global markets have intensified the economic dominance of Bolivia's white elite over the country's growth-stunted, impoverished indigenous majority." (p 56) In Peru, Guatemala and Ecuador too, Amerindians represent a mass underclass being bossed around by the light-skinned rich. All of Mexico's lucrative corporate sectors are concentrated in the exclusive hands of a small clubby white market-dominant minority. The latifundia feudal land ownership system, dominated by Spanish-blooded families, is booming further with each new round of pro-globalization reforms. Other outsider minorities making hay under the neo-liberal economic order in Latin America include Lebanese, Jewish and Palestinian businessmen, who corner enormous profits in Brazil, Panama, Argentina, Belize and Honduras. All over the region, traditionally soft in ethnic identity assertion, "distinctively ethnic resentment against market-dominant light-skinned elites is on the rise." (p 73) In post-Communist Russia, six out of the seven wealthiest and most powerful oligarchs, wielding mind-boggling political and economic leverage, are Jewish. Owing to the virulent history of Russian anti-Semitism, this racial profile of the nouveau riche has not gone unnoticed. How, it is being asked on the streets, did members of a minuscule "outsider" ethnic minority come to wield unimaginable might since 1991? Chua notes that political anti-Semitism is on the rise, as a majority of ordinary Russians believe "they have been impoverished at the expense of rich Jews." References to "Zioncrats" and "bloodsucking Yids" who hijacked privatization and stole the wealth of the Russian people are commonplace. In southern Africa, English-speaking whites, thanks to the gargantuan head start of colonialism, lord over lucrative industries like gold, platinum, diamond mining, finance, insurance and technology. Namibia, Zimbabwe and South Africa have market-dominant white minorities that are stretching this historical lead longer due to laissez-faire market conditions. Kenya has an inordinately prosperous, disproportionately skilled white minority that cavorts in colonial fashion in country clubs and golf courses, while the 31 million blacks survive on less than two dollars per day. Indigenous Kenyan market-dominant minorities, the Kikuyu, are seen by the toilers as accomplices of these white "rulers". Nigeria's Ibo community is another indigenous market-dominant minority that dominates key sectors and is enriching itself in the globalized economy due to its long experience of manipulating markets. The Bamileke of Cameroon and the Susu of Guinea are other indigenous minorities subject to widespread resentment by the masses. Besides whites, the other non-indigenous market dominant minorities in Africa are Indian and Lebanese merchants. Indian Kenyans, less than 2 percent of the population, "benefit extremely disproportionately from globalization and market liberalization because of their international connections" and access to capital. (p 113) Lebanese market dominance in Sierra Leone, Gambia, Cote d'Ivoire, Benin, Ghana and Liberia is astounding, encompassing fields like diamonds and gold, finance, retail, construction and real estate. Lebanese entrepreneurs, together with a handful of native politicians and foreign investors, are the principal beneficiaries of globalization in West Africa. Chua's second part of the thesis relates to raw majoritarian democracy which, when added to markets, cooks a recipe for upheaval and ethnic conflagration. "As markets enrich the market-dominant minority, democratization increases the political voice and power of the frustrated majority." (p 124) The violence directed at Zimbabwe's white farmers and their black farmhands is "an anarchy born of democracy", ie Robert Mugabe's vote hankering and reduction of democracy to bare minimum electoral connotation. Nationalization of "foreign-owned property" is the result of this sort of lopsided democracy that is being imposed on the third world. Confiscations and expropriations in developing countries have explicitly and exclusively targeted assets and industries of the hated market-dominant minorities, giving an outlet to the popular frustration and vengeance demanded by the majority population. Demagogues promising to restore the honor and possessions of the majority are supported with wild enthusiasm, be it in post-Suharto Indonesia, which embarked on an anti-Chinese business pogrom, or Putin's Russia, which is turning on Jewish media moguls. Hugo Chavez came to power in Venezuela by attacking "rotten white elites", and the mysterious right-wing coup against him in April 2002 failed because the new leadership excluded the Pardos majority from power entirely. To preempt confiscations, market-dominant minorities sometimes enter into symbiotic alliances with corrupt indigenous politicians, better known as crony capitalism. Sierra Leone under Siaka Stevens saw Lebanese magnate Jamil Mohammed become a shadow "co-president", with "global markets generally approving of these arrangements". (p 150) Kenya's Daniel Arap Moi concluded a network of deals with a coterie of Indian businessmen in 1978. Suharto's Chinese-friendly autocracy in Indonesia was similarly a backlash by market-dominant minorities after Sukarno's nationalizations. Marcos' crony capitalist empire with the Chinese business community in Philippines was a payback for Ramon Magsaysay's anti-Chinese drive of the fifties. Some market-dominant minorities do not rest at crony capitalism or rent seeking and seize power directly. Apartheid South Africa and the whole of Latin America bear testimony. The most horrific outcome of free market democracy in the face of a market-dominant minority is government-sponsored attempts to "cleanse" the outsiders. Non-Russian former Soviet Republics cleansed and drove out 2 million ethnic Russians after 1991. Russia, Ukraine and Belarus upped anti-Jewish violence and expelled nearly 1 million "shylocks" in 1999. Ethiopia deported 50,000 Eritrean-Ethiopians who used to dominate commerce in the last few years. An estimated 110,000 Chinese families fled Indonesia around the same period. Hutu Power advocates in Rwanda called for "majority rule" and "democratic revolution," only to mastermind a bloodcurdling genocide against Tutsi "invaders" in 1994. In the Balkans, Croat and Slovene minorities that were disproportionately prosperous vis-a-vis the more populous Serbs faced the deadly fate of mass expulsions and genocidal violence. Extending the theory of market-dominant minorities beyond the confines of the nation-state, Chua argues that in the Middle East as a region, "globalization has wildly disproportionately benefited an 'outsider'- Israeli Jews - fuelling ethnic resentment and hatred among a massive Arab population that considers itself the 'indigenous' true owner of the land". (p 211) Besides cultural and historical enmities, the Middle East is a conflict between 221 million, largely poor Arabs, against Israel's starkly prosperous 5.2 million Jews. Arab squalor and mass frustration runs headlong into Israel's highly educated, skilled and Westernized Jews. That is why "one often hears half-admiring, half-contemptuous grumblings about Jewish wealth, greed and moneymaking tendencies" among common Arabs. (p 222) Rapid democratization of the Arab states, being pushed by the US government as a cure-all, will exacerbate ethnonationalist hatred for the market-dominant Jews and fuel even greater bloodshed. Chua's piece de resistance is the idea that "America today has become the world's market-dominant minority." The principal beneficiary of globalization and spread of free markets, the United States, has attained heights of global economic power that are wildly disproportionate to its tiny numbers. "Our extraordinary market dominance, our global invincibility have earned the envy, fear and resentment of much of the rest of the world." (p 231) American products, companies, investors, entertainment, cuisine and culture are viewed as "outsider" threats to legitimate "indigenous" society all over the third world. Anti-Americanism is a form of "frustration heightened by access to images and information about how much better Americans live"/ (p 246) Anti-American investor confiscations and expulsions have occurred in Mexico, Argentina, Chile and Uruguay before the era of globalization, but countries daring to expropriate American property today risk serious consequences, a fact that heightens suppressed fury. The September 11, 2001 terror attacks, reminds Chua, prompted "momentary jubilation of millions of poor and exploited people around the world", not just in Muslim countries. It was a reflection of the crushing humiliation perceived to be inflicted by the US on the Third World. Chua concludes with recommendations to prevent ethnic hatred from devouring the globalizing South. Educational reform and equalization of opportunities for poor indigenous-blooded majorities are imperative. Strong redistributive measures - progressive taxation, social security, unemployment insurance, antitrust regulation, affirmative action, dispersed capital market ownership - need to be implemented in Asia, Africa and South America. The precedent of Malaysian Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad's ethnic quotas for bumiputra Malays could be worth emulating. Market-dominant minorities themselves should eliminate corrupt and illicit business practices that enrage the majority community, and invest in the local economies in which they thrive. Corporate responsibility by Indian firms in East Africa and Roman Abramovich in Russia are current instances of softening the ethnic fault lines that have been opened by global markets. Washington "should not promote unrestrained, overnight majority rule" by shipping out ballot boxes for national elections in countries that have market-dominant minority problems. It must also improve its dismal foreign aid record (the US has the lowest aid budget among advanced economies, viz 0.1 percent of GDP). Chua fails to add that the vice-like grip of the United States on global financial institutions is a major source of anti-Americanism that also needs restructuring. For those countries that ill-fit her model, Chua has an escape clause disclaimer to the thesis that free market democracy, as is being vigorously exported by globalization advocates, aggravates ethnic imbalances and distrust in the developing world. "This book is not proposing a universal theory applicable to every developing country." (p 15) She cautions against misappropriating her thesis to cases that are exceptions and outliers. As a result, she leaves scant room for disagreement or criticism. Marxists will dislike this book since it complicates the simplistic class struggle blueprint by introducing the ethnicity card. Thomas Friedman and other globalization honchos will also dislike it for questioning their core tenets of "trickle down effect" and "lifting all boats". For those not married to ideology, Chua's sui generis theory will make a lot of sense. World on Fire: How exporting free market democracy breeds ethnic hatred and global instability by Amy Chua, Doubleday, New York, 2003. ISBN: 0-385-50302-4. Price: US$26. 340 Pages

Felicity Lawrence, consumer affairs correspondent Monday May 19, 2003 The Guardian

The government's policy of liberalising trade and removing protectionist measures such as subsidies and tariffs is dangerous for millions in the developing world, the former trade and industry secretary Stephen Byers says, showing a remarkable change of heart, in the Guardian today.

Mr Byers led the UK delegation to the world trade talks in Seattle in 1999 and was responsible for pushing the government's agenda to make developing countries open up their markets to international competition. Removing protectionist measures is still a plank of Labour policy.

Mr Byers said he had changed his mind after a personal visit to Africa.

"I was aware of the arguments, but it's not until you see first hand the consequences of policies, that you see they need to be changed."

It was "getting away from Whitehall and the persuasive arguments of trade policy experts" and discovering the plight of ordinary farmers in developing countries that made the difference.

Aid organisations welcomed his comments as an important turning point in the debate on globalisation.

Andrew Pendleton, a Christian Aid spokesman, said: "This is incredibly significant. It is the first time we've heard from someone close to the heart of government that making developing countries open their markets is very damaging."

Oxfam, which has campaigned against the current trade rules, called on the government to listen to Mr Byers.

"The fact that a former trade minister who helped negotiate the current trade rules has come out and rejected established trade orthodoxies is remarkable.

"This should make our government radically rethink the impact of its policies on poor people around the world ahead of the WTO [World Trade Organisation] meeting in Cancun," said Justin Forsyth, its policy director.

Mr Byers says: "The course of international trade since 1945 shows that an unfettered global market can fail the poor, and that full trade liberalisation brings huge risks and rarely provides the desired outcome.

"The evidence shows that the benefits that would flow from increased international trade will not materialise if markets are simply left alone.

"When this happens, liberalisation is used by the rich and powerful international players to make quick gains from short term investments."

He has been converted to a "regime of managed trade in which markets are slowly opened up ... with subsidies and tariffs being used to achieve development goals."

His new thinking was dismissed as "ill-informed" by the former head of the economics and statistics department of the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development, David Henderson.

Professor Henderson said: "The widening of the gap between the rich countries and many of the poor ones cannot be blamed on globalisation."

"None of these factors explains the current problems of, for example, North Korea under Kim, Liberia and Somalia under their respective warlords, or Venezuela under Chavez." Internal influences, including the actions of their governments, were what had kept them poor, he said.

The Department for International Development maintains that free and fair trade is best achieved by removing barriers through the WTO.