international relations

GORIMON / Flickr / CC BY-NC 2.0
GORIMON / Flickr / CC BY-NC 2.0
All is not well with the G20, which lacks democratic legitimacy, is hopelessly divided and is also losing its political influence. The main reason for this is the conflict between the US and China, the EU and the rest of the world. So how should we interpret the predictably surprising outcomes of the meeting of G20 leaders in Osaka, Japan, with respect to the role played by the World Trade Organisation (WTO), US trade wars and EU strategy? In the run-up to the G20 summit, most of the mainstream media predicted another battle in the US trade ...
read more "The G20 in Osaka: all quiet on the Eastern front"
About the Global Working Group The Global Working Group Beyond Development is hosted by the Brussels Office of the Rosa-Luxemburg-Stiftung since 2016. It includes around thirty engaged researchers, activists and popular educators from all five continents which bring together knowledge and experience around the different relations of domination which we confront in actual times – class, race, gender, caste, coloniality and depredatory relations with Nature – and also from processes of alternative transformations towards greater equity, ...
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Mark Fischer, Flickr: Lagoon of Cotonou (CC BY-SA 2.0)
Mark Fischer, Flickr: Lagoon of Cotonou (CC BY-SA 2.0)
The European Union and the AKP-Countries struggle to re-balance their relationshipHistory Throughout its 70 years of existence the European Economic Community (EEC, today’s EU) has always cultivated a “special relationship” with the former colonies of the EEC member-states, known as the African, Caribbean, and Pacific Group of States (ACP). This began with the Treaties of Yaoundé (I+II) and continued after Great Britain’s accession to the European Community with the Lomé Agreements (I–IV). While these pacts (until 1995) focused primarily on maintaining a...
read more "Negotiating a Common Future"
The new book by Attac AustriaRecord poverty in southern Europe, fences and guns in response to refugees, Brexit on the horizon – the European Union is facing the deepest crisis in its history. But does the EU have the potential to become the “social and democratic Europe” that has been presented to us as a political ideal for decades? In order to find answers to these questions, it is necessary to demystify many of our most beloved images of the EU. We must shatter the European illusion – because at its core are competition and neoliberal economic policy. ...
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Outside France, President Emmanuel Macron is probably viewed in a positive light: young, brilliant, a stark contrast to the grievous presidency of the ‘socialist’ François Hollande. After rising to power in France in May 2017, Macron has earned wide appeal beyond his own borders. When on 1 June 2017 Donald Trump withdrew from the Paris climate agreement, Macron retorted with a rousing tweet: ‘Make our planet great again.’ The message was retweeted more than 288,000 times, admittedly well below the record set by Barack Obama in 2012 with ...
read more "Macron: neocapitalist, digital, authoritarian"
Marco Verch / flickr / CC BY 2.0
Marco Verch / flickr / CC BY 2.0
A North American Left Analysis of the USMCASince its implementation in 1994, NAFTA has been roundly criticized by nearly all North Americans to the left of Clintonian liberalism. The North American Free Trade Agreement freed flows of capital, ratcheted up deregulation, and introduced a variety of other pro-corporate measures. Meanwhile, the agreement did nothing to address pollution, labour standards, or consumer protections. The Economic Policy Institute and a host of others have meticulously documented the many ways that NAFTA was bad for working ...
read more "The New NAFTA: Making Matters Mostly Worse"
WTO Public Forum 2018 — “Trade 2030”
WTO Public Forum 2018 — “Trade 2030”
Vision & Fiction This year’s Public Forum of the World Trade Organization (WTO) focused on a vision of how world trade would look like in 2030. And when it comes to visions, fiction is often not too far. However, one thing seems to be already clear—the primary trade by 2030 will be e-commerce. The CEO of Alibaba, Jack Ma, went as far as to confess his believe not only in ‘free trade’ but also in the internet: “‘Made in USA’ or ‘Made in Switzerland’ or ‘Made in China’ will be out, almost everything will be ‘Made in ...
read more "The WTO goes “e”—but head over heels"
Port of Veracruz in Mexico
Port of Veracruz in Mexico
A comment from MexicoThe North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) between Canada, Mexico and the US entered into force on the 1st of January 1994. It is the worst tragedy that has happened in Mexico’s economic history.* Since its beginning, this Free Trade Agreement (FTA) turned out to be a spearhead for a hard offensive by the US to undermine Mexico’s national sovereignty. By being the only country in the world that has followed the Washington consensus to the letter throughout three and half decades, Mexico has ...
read more "Renegotiating NAFTA—an unprecedented reinforcement of subordination"
Report from the forum on "The Shape of Trade to Come"About ten years ago, the European Union (EU) introduced Global Europe, its most ambitious trade policy strategy to date. It was intended to open up new markets worldwide through new bilateral trade and investment agreements. After all, many countries in the South had until then successfully resisted participating in what the EU envisaged to be the new "trade policy of the 21st century". This was not least because it went way beyond simply dismantling customs duties but ...
read more "What to do about the EU’s new trade agenda in Latin America?"
In his paper, the German security expert Wolfgang Triebel discusses the history of NATO and the prospects of such collective security systems as the UN and the OSCE as instruments of international relations. He examines the reasons why NATO, as “the military arm of the leadership elites of the capitalist world”, has for decades been able to maintain itself against systems of collective safety. Moreover, he makes clear why NATO is the wrong organisation to adequately address the ...
read more "Considerations on Replacing NATO with a Collective Security System to Democratise International Relationships"