GLOBALISATION: Finland and Tanzania Point to a New Way

By IPS Correspondents Reprint | | Print |

Mark Waller

HELSINKI, Mar 17 2004 (IPS) - Long associated with human rights and East-West bridge building, Helsinki has given its name to a new effort to democratise North-South relations and end rapacious market policies imposed on poor countries.

The Helsinki Process on Globalisation and Democracy, an initiative of the Finnish and Tanzanian governments, aims for a partnership between civil society and states to put the world finance and trading system under democratic control.

It has recruited an array of leading globalisation actors and activists with the aim of creating what it terms “a new consensus on accountable and credible governance.”

Finland and Tanzania conceived the initiative in May 2003, and it was subsequently fleshed out in forums held during the rest of the year and launched at a conference in October.

The process comprises a 20-member panel of international experts known as the Helsinki Group. It also has three parallel ‘tracks’, or working groups, which focus on new approaches to global problem solving, financing development, and human security.

It will continue until 2005, when a conference in the Finnish capital involving all participants in the process will assess its impact.

The initiative includes representatives of heavyweight corporate interests such as the International Chamber of Commerce, the Trilateral Commission and the Club of Rome.

They are joined by civil society organisations and think tanks, including the Third World Network, the World Commission on the Social Dimension of Globalisation, Amnesty International and the World Council of Churches.

The process also includes representatives of the United Nations, the European Union and national and local governments from North and South.

“It will make recommendations on solving the most urgent challenges, particularly reducing poverty and enhancing equity,” Dr Flora Mndeme Musonda of the Economic and Social Research Foundation based in Dar-es- Salaam told IPS.

“It will then create an equal platform for fair competition, which should lead to lasting reforms of the institutions of global governance.”

Prof Raimo Vayrynen from the initiative’s Finnish secretariat says the organisers are well aware of the conflicting interests and values associated with globalisation.

“Some of these conflicts run so deep that there is no way to eliminate them by any reformist measures,” Vayrynen told IPS. “But there are practical solutions in debt relief and the management of the global commons from which the great majority of people would benefit.”

Vayrynen says consensus should be possible on enhancing the influence of the South in international economic organisations and reorganising the representation of the civil society actors in them.

Susan George of the Amsterdam-based Transnational Institute says that the strong point of the initiative is that it comprises influential business people and two progressive governments from North and South.

“NGOs can try to change the balance of forces within public opinion, but unless you come to grips with what is happening inside governments you’re just whistling,” George says.

A recent report of the International Labour Organisation (ILO) calling for an urgent rethink of the course of globalisation and the need for pervasive democratic global governance provides much substance for the Helsinki Process.

The ILO report ‘A Fair Globalisation: Creating Opportunities for All’ was prepared by the World Commission on the Social Dimension of Globalisation. The presidents of Finland and Tanzania co-chaired the World Commission, allowing the two countries added traction for the Helsinki Process.

Omary Mjenga from the Tanzanian secretariat for the initiative says that this linkage should mean it remains committed to results. “The process has to come up with concrete suggestions on how to govern globalisation for the benefit of all.”

Mjenga says Tanzania’s input into the Helsinki Process is to engage with governmental forums and civil society across the global South.

Martin Khor director of the Third World Network, believes that the main challenge facing the Helsinki Process is to put words into deeds.

“The first meeting we had of the Helsinki Process, in January, agreed that we would be action oriented and not just rhetorical,” Khor says. “The Process needs to see whether it can form alliances to tackle the problems in the vacuum on democratic global governance.”

Khor says the Helsinki Process needs to propose solutions to the main problems of globalisation.

These include the financial instability of all currencies worldwide, the continuing crisis of external debt faced by developing countries and the poverty caused in them by the constant fall in commodity prices.

“We have a destabilising flow of funds in the whole area of finance where there is no global governance,” says Khor.

“The solutions put forward by the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank for market-based instruments have not worked. We need a new international initiative with the developing countries.”

Khor believes that the aggressive push by the United States, Canada, Europe and others to open up the developing countries’ economies further is unrealistic. “If this happens, many developing countries will have even greater economic crises.”

Ann Pettifor of the London-based New Economics Foundation agrees that the time is right for the Helsinki Process to intervene in a ruinous globalisation process.

“The international finance system is severely stretched. We are in the midst of a huge stock market bubble, and it is soon going to burst,” says Pettifor. “The last time that happened, in 2001, it was compensated for by a massive injection of credit and tax cuts, but that can’t be repeated next time.”

Pettifor says that Finland’s position outside the vortex of international finance capital interests and Tanzania’s situation as a victim of globalisation may mean that the Helsinki Process will attract powerful players who want to see real change.

“I hope the process will be joined by countries such as Malaysia, India, Brazil and Chile – middle income countries that have much leverage in global debates.”