YCL Statement - No FTAA
During the week of November 17-21st hundreds of thousands of workers, unions, environmental groups, youth and student organizations, global justice groups and civil and human rights organizations throughout North and South America will be participating in a week of educational activities, protests, marches, speakouts and forums focused on defeating the ratification and implementation of the Free Trade Agreement of the Americas (FTAA). The fight against FTAA is part of the struggle to defeat the right wing attack on our civil and labor rights, democracy and our environment. We demand truly democratic trade agreements that include the participation of the people and respect workers rights and the environment, putting the needs and rights of the people before the interests of multinational monopoly corporations. In Miami thousands will gather to protest the anti-worker, anti-environment, anti-democratic and anti-human rights FTAA agreement and demand that a trade policy be developed which encourages true and equal sustainable economic and social development and democracy. The Young Communist League will join this broad coalition of forces in Miami to protest the eight trade ministerial meeting to discuss FTAA in what looks to be the largest anti-globalization mobilization since Seattle in 2001.
What is FTAA?
FTAA stands for the Free Trade Agreement for the Americas and will basically make the entire North and South American continents the world? largest free trade zone. The trading block covered by FTAA will include a population of over 800 million people and its rules will affect every country in our hemisphere with the exception of Cuba. FTAA threatens workers rights, environmental protection standards, national sovereignty, human rights, public health and safety protections, real sustainable economic and social development, public services and democracy.
FTAA: NAFTA on Steroids
We know that FTAA will fail to meet the needs of the people, encourage democracy and protect our workers and environment. Need proof? It has been 10 years since the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) was implemented and its effects have been devastating. In the United States, Canada and Mexico, workers and the people have lost with NAFTA. In Mexico poverty levels have risen dramatically due to NAFTA. Since its implementation it is estimated that 8 million people have been pushed into poverty. In Canada and the United States the effects of NAFTA have also been felt sharply. It is estimated that over 1 million jobs have been lost in the US because of NAFTA. Under FTAA the provisions and regulations are even more undemocratic and hurtful to the people and the environment. FTAA would extend rules and regulations to cover industries and public service sectors not covered under NAFTA including, health care, education, construction, transportation and energy. FTAA will include a race to the bottom that will put in jeopardy the millions of jobs in the public sector and open up these sectors for huge privatization campaigns.
What does FTAA mean for Youth and Students?
Not only is FTAA bad for workers, farmers, civil and democratic rights and the environment it also directly attacks the rights of youth and students. FTAA is bad news for public education systems. It threatens to limit access to and lower the quality of public schooling for millions of youth throughout the Americas. FTAA poses a serious threat to public education by guarantying corporations the right to challenge any accreditation requirements or professional standards that inhibit their access to privatize or participate in public schooling system. This is especially dangerous for those countries that are still struggling to establish accessible public service systems. It is estimated that the total world expenditures for education reach $2 trillion and many predict that public education will be hit by a wave of privatization in the next decade just as we have experienced with public health care. Corporations such as Merrill Lynch and the Lehman Brothers are well aware of this and are already planning their bids to privatize public schools throughout the FTAA-covered region. FTAA rules and regulations encourage these ventures and make it illegal for governments to protect their public school systems from privatization, even when that privatization leads to greater inequality, poorer educational standards and increased class sizes.
What happened to Democracy?
CLOSED DOOR NEGOTIATING
While advocates of FTAA claim that it will promote and ?pread?democracy, the truth is that FTAA is inherently undemocratic. FTAA has, since the beginning, been negotiated behind closed doors. Labor, environmental groups and popular organizations have been shut out of negotiations while over 500 giant corporations have been granted special rights to participate in the drafting and implementation planning of FTAA. Furthermore, fast track legislation gives the right to President Bush to negotiate trade agreements without the input of Congress, which will only have 60 days to vote on the agreement and has no ability to amend or change any part of the agreement. This of course further limits our democratic rights and restricts public participation.
NATIONAL SOVEREIGNTY ?CHAPTER 11
The FTAA threatens the autonomy and sovereignty of the countries of the Americas through the dangerous Chapter 11 clause of NAFTA that allows private corporations to sue governments whose laws and policies conflict with FTAA trade policies and principles; namely the ?ights?of corporations to make a profit. Chapter 11 of NAFTA has been the center of much controversy as it has allowed the rights of governments to protect its people to be usurped by the rights of corporations to have ?qual access?to markets. One example of this was when a US chemical corporation sued the Canadian government on the grounds that its ban on a dangerous carcinogen found in gasoline violated NAFTA. The corporation won and the Canadian government had to pay a fine of $13 million dollars, write a letter of apology and retract the law that protected the Canadian people from the dangerous effects of this particular carcinogen. FTAA will further restrict the autonomy of member countries to enact laws that protect its people and environment. An appointed board of arbitrators will be the body empowered to decide and enforce FTAA rules and be able to impose sanctions and fines on countries whose laws or public service systems are deemed restrictive to ?ree trade? This means that a country could be fined or sanctioned for maintaining a public education system that resists privatization efforts.
Who actually wins with FTAA?
Only a small sector can actually claim that they have benefited from NAFTA and will continue to do so under FTAA. Those who stand to win with FTAA are the large multinational corporations who use FTAA to strangle local businesses and use this power to manipulate prices and control markets. The FTAA will only open the door wider to exploitation and economic domination of US monopoly corporate interests at the cost of centuries of struggle throughout the Americas for the labor, civil and democratic rights of our people.
This is what democracy looks like!
Despite efforts to squash or hide opposition to the FTAA, today the movement against the FTAA is stronger than ever. Countries like Brazil have held popular plebiscites against FTAA and received mass support. Several trade ministers including Venezuela? have publicly stated that they will not affiliate with FTAA as is and of course Cuba has been an outspoken opponent of FTAA hosting the S?o Paulo Forum and other public conferences and debates to discuss FTAA and its dangerous consequences for the people of Latin America and the Caribbean. In the U.S. the AFL-CIO has spearheaded a No To FTAA campaign which includes the collection of tens of thousands of Vote No ?allots?which will be presented by local unions and labor councils to the trade ministers meeting in Miami. A large Stop FTAA campaign has been endorsed by over 60 organizations ranging from major labor unions such as the United Steelworkers of America to the Sierra Club and includes local coalitions, anti-war groups, global justice organizations and international solidarity organizations. Of course youth and students are an important part of this coalition and during the week of November 17-21 we will join labor, environmental groups, anti-globalization forces, civil rights organizations, community groups, women, organizations and many others in what looks to be the broadest coalition against FTAA and globalization to date. The Young Communist League will be on the streets of Miami and in our local communities protesting the ministerial meeting and we urge our friends and allies to do the same.
The fight against FTAA has captured the heart and imagination of hundreds of thousands of youth throughout our hemisphere. Young people and students will be a major force in Miami and throughout the Americas as the battle against FTAA heats up and the YCL will be there with them in the streets to show what real democracy looks like and to demand that another world is possible!
[back to top]
FTAA and Education
The Free Trade Area of the Americas (FTAA) agreement has many hidden negative effects on the lives of people throughout the Western Hemisphere. One of the most malicious of these is the agreement’s assault on public education.
Of course, the right wing and their corporate masters have targeted public education for attack for decades. Under modern capitalism, education is increasingly seen as a simple commodity to be bought and sold for profit. According to CorpWatch, “The ‘education industry,’ a term coined by EduVentures, an investment banking firm, is estimated to be worth between $630 and $680 billion in the United States. The stock value of 30 publicly traded educational companies is growing twice as fast as the Dow Jones Average. Brokerage firms like Lehman Brothers and Montgomery Securities have specialists seeking out venture capital for the \'education industry.\'�?
Industrialists at one time viewed public education as a necessary expense for educating an urban workforce. Now capitalism sees public education as redundant due to the world economic crisis, market liberalization and the increasing separation of workers into technical and unskilled workforces. By cutting taxes, outsourcing educational services, corporate merchandizing, privatizing school management and the wholesale privatization of campuses and schools, capitalism threatens the educational future of millions of students.
Today, regional and global trade agreements are trying to extend the corporate reach to all aspects of public life including public education. What was in many countries a given—universal guaranteed public education -- is now being threatened everywhere. Public education, of course, is a right that the peoples of the Americas have struggled for and won at great cost and FTAA threatens to take away this right with the stroke of a pen. If the FTAA agreement is adopted, its sections overseeing “trade in services�? could potentially undermine public funding and management of education as an “unfair labor practice.�?
FTAA is not alone among capitalist trade agreements in jeopardizing public education. The World Trade Organization is attempting to include education as part of the General Agreement on Trades in Services (GATS). “If the WTO’s “non-discriminatory�? clause came into effect it could require governments to provide at least equal amounts of funding to private enterprises (universities) as is given to public entities, irrespective of tuition and housing rates that are levied at private institutions,�? writes Yves Engler in Z Magazine. Similarly, the services section of the FTAA agreement could force governments to fund private education or to open up public school and universities to private “competition.�?
This provides the opening for a number of disastrous situations for public education. For instance, under FTAA guidelines a corporation could sue a local or national government body for providing subsidies to public schools on the grounds that this creates an unequal market environment. The case would be decided on by a small unelected panel of corporate lawyers. The government could potentially be forced to pay fines or provide equal subsidies to corporations as it does to public schools. In another likely scenario, local school districts could be forced to open up their schools to a bidding process. They would then be required under FTAA regulations to go with the lowest bidder, no matter how disastrous that company’s practices would be for the quality of education.
Like other international trade agreements, FTAA is structured to primarily benefit U.S. corporations at the expense of public institutions, workers and small businesses. In a speech titled “Keep Public Education Out of Trade Agreements�? delivered at the World Forum for People’s Education, Larry Kuehn, Director of Research and Technology British Columbia Teachers’ Federation, Canada said “At a recent meeting in Vancouver, a WTO official said that the push in the WTO to create an international agreement on services came from the United States trade officials… Further growth in education exports would help further to reduce the U.S. trade deficit.�?
Student organizations throughout the Americas and across the world have responded with resistance. November 17, 2002 student and youth organizations around the Americas took part in the Day of action against the FTAA. The International Student Union (IUS), the United States Student Association (USSA), the Canadian Federation of Students (CFS) and the Continental Organization of Latin American and Caribbean Students (OCLAE) as well as the Young Communist League, USA endorsed the Day of Action.
The Canadian Federation of Students’ fact sheet on FTAA sums up the sentiment: “The aim of the FTAA is to remove \'barriers\' to trade and investment. In the world of international trade our public schools themselves are considered such barriers…Any policy that restricts investment by foreign-based, for-profit universities and colleges (like affirmative action hiring or residency requirements for governing boards) could be challenged as a trade barrier…Under the FTAA, the public education system itself will become slowly dismantled as public funds are depleted.�?
National student federations in Latin America and the Caribbean, regional alliances, campus groups and youth political organizations are pledging to put the pressure on to keep FTAA from including public education in its rules on services. Youth and students worldwide demand that education be a right for all and not a privilege for a few. They refuse to allow undemocratic institutions to undermine public institutions of education.
Talking Points
FACTS
• The FTAA expands NAFTA in three ways. It covers the entire Western Hemisphere (except for Cuba), it covers new parts of the economy, and it allows corporations and investors even greater rights.
• In Miami from November 17th to 21st , trade ministers of 34 countries will gather for talks on the FTAA.
• The FTAA would make it easier for companies to relocate to areas where the average wage is less than $4 a day, like Haiti and Guatemala. This would lower standards for workers throughout the Americas.
• The FTAA could make it impossible to ever enact universal health care, because that would ‘unfairly exclude’ for-profit HMOs.
• The FTAA has no negotiating groups on labor or the environment, only on different business sectors.
• Current US regulations giving preference to local, minority-owned, or women-owned business could be undercut by the FTAA.
• Targets for privatization – corporate, not public, control – that are covered by the FTAA agreement include education, health, transportation, consumer services, financial services, and the media.
• Under ‘fast track’ rules, Congress must vote on the FTAA agreement within 60 days of it being presented, with no review by committees, and no amendments allowed. This is not a fair vote, and it shuts constituents out of the process.
WHAT IS THE FTAA – WHY ARE YOU AGAINST IT?
• These negotiations are entirely undemocratic. The decisions are made in secret and without input from the people who will be profoundly affected.
• The FTAA could force countries to privatize a wide range of social services. Experience here in the US, as well as in countries like Argentina, has shown that privatization does not work.
• The FTAA would violate the sovereignty and self-determination that the peoples of the Americas have fought for. An unelected panel of trade arbitrators would decide whether countries’ labor and environmental regulations violate the FTAA, and would have the power to impose sanctions.
• Governments could be forced to end subsidies for public education and health care on the grounds that public services are ‘unfair competition’ for private corporations.
• Most of the details about the FTAA are still being kept secret from the public of the countries that would be affected. Meanwhile, 500 representatives of big corporations meet regularly with the negotiators to help draft the agreement.
• NAFTA allows corporations to sue governments. These suits are decided through an undemocratic process that excludes domestic courts. This allows corporations to do end runs around the rights that the peoples of the Americas have struggled for at great cost – and around democracy. The FTAA promises to expand this backhanded corporate tactic.
• The FTAA would force poor nations to compete with each other to attract foreign investment – by lowering their labor and environmental standards in a ‘race to the bottom.’
• The FTAA aims to permanently open up public services to for-profit corporations.
• Under the FTAA, we could see the type of job losses that NAFTA created in the industrial sector happen in the public sector.
• The privatization encouraged by FTAA rules would allow companies to ‘cherry-pick’ the most profitable areas of public service, leaving the unprofitable parts – for instance, mail delivery in rural areas – to the public agencies.
• “Free Trade�? is another way for rich countries and big companies to enforce the kind of “structural adjustment�? we’ve seen from the International Monetary Fund. The FTAA would dramatically cut the ability of governments to legislate and regulate in ways that protect their citizens from corporate greed.
WHO WOULD BE AFFECTED?
• The FTAA would expand rights for corporations, at the expense of the basic workers’ rights laid out in the United Nations International Labor Organization declaration.
• Lowered environmental standards would affect people of color – who already suffer most from pollution, toxic waste, smokestack industries and dumps – first and foremost.
• The power of working people to organize is undercut by trade agreements like the FTAA. The freedom given to corporations to move jobs and money across borders lower standards everywhere, decreasing the bargaining power of US unions.
• Under NAFTA, more than 766,000 US jobs have been lost, and living standards and wages are declining rapidly for working people in Mexico. We can expect more of the same from the FTAA.
• Third World countries are affected. Many are calling trade agreements like the FTAA part of a “new colonialism.�? The unfair trade rules that participating countries are forced into come from above, with no input from the voters in those countries.
• Women are affected. Women provide two thirds of the world’s labor and receive only 5% of the income. The FTAA will almost certainly lower wages in the Americas even further.
• Small farmers are affected. Trade policies currently in place that favor small farmers could be called “unfair competition�? under FTAA rules – another win for big agribusinesses.
• Youth are affected. The FTAA would give corporations the right to bid on running our public schools – and then mandate that our communities choose the lowest bidder, even if that company violates labor and safety standards.
WHAT IS YOUR ALTERNATIVE? WHAT ARE YOU FOR?
• We are not just anti the FTAA or globalization. We are for a world economy where human rights, workers rights, and the environment come before the interest of corporations. Globalization should not be a ‘race to the bottom’ in which rights and dignity are sacrificed for greed and profit.
• Here in Miami we have two conflicting agendas. The official trade negotiations are serving the interests of transnational corporations and government officials. But representatives of labor unions, small farmers, youth, people of faith, environmentalists, and indigenous people are here to build the movement for a truly democratic global economy.
• We are for alternative international trade relations that strive for fairness to all trade partners, democracy, workers rights, and environmental protection.
• The movement against corporate globalization has grown broader and wider in recent years. The general strikes in Argentina and Paraguay, the elections in Ecuador and Brazil, and the growing global awareness of US unions are all signs that the people of the Americas are not about to take the FTAA lying down.
• We say yes to trade policies that protect jobs and workers rights.
• We say yes to trade policies that protect environmental regulation.
• We say yes to open and democratic trade negotiations that allow citizen participation.
The FTAA: Trick or Treat
President Bush claims that the Free Trade Agreement of the Americas (FTAA) will help farmers, workers, businesses, and consumers - both in our country and in the rest of the hemisphere.
But do you trust someone who has taken us from a budget surplus to the largest deficit in US history? Someone who has overseen the loss of about 3 million total jobs - the worst record of any president since the Great Depression?
With the FTAA, Bush is trying to put a nice-looking costume on the ugliest monster of the 21st century. It\'s time to take off the mask.
What is the FTAA?
The Free Trade Agreement of the Americas is a proposed trade agreement between most of the countries of North, Central, and South America and the Caribbean. It\'s a bigger, badder version of NAFTA - a trade agreement between the Canada, the US and Mexico that caused nearly half a million lost jobs in the US, and depressed wages throughout the border regions of Mexico.
So what will it do?
The FTAA will increase privatization of public services (health care, education, energy, and even water) so that companies can make huge profits off of the things we need to live. It will create a race-to-the-bottom, because companies will be \"free\" to move their factories to the places where they are \"free\" to pay their workers less and \"free\" to pollute our environment in cities and countrysides.
That\'s it?
Nope. The FTAA will also expand what are called \"intellectual property rights\" - a company\'s right to keep governments from producing inexpensive generic versions of its product. In other words, important vaccines and medications will remain out of reach of the world\'s poor. And if a government tries to help its citizens, the FTAA will give corporations the right to sue it for getting in the way of so-called \"free trade.\"
Who is negotiating this thing?
The agreement is being negotiated in secret, without any real input from the public. Big corporate lobbyists have access to the negotiators and give them advice on what to write. And because of public pressure, the FTAA is now formally inviting \"civil society\" to present its views...but that doesn\'t mean the negotiators are actually going to listen.
Bottom line: the Free Trade Agreement of the Americas is an international business deal that puts profits over people. We\'ve got to stop this monster before it gets loose!
Media Tips
We know that talking to the media can be a very stressful event. You want to make sure that you get your point across effectively and that the media does not put a negative spin on your words. Here are some quick tips that will help make your experience working with the media more relaxed and hopefully a bit more enjoyable!!
1. Have a concrete plan of what you want to use the media for and what types of media you are going to use. Are you going to just use print, internet, and/or television? Are you going to talk to television reporters at the event? As a group, make up a statement of why you want to use the media. This will help to guide the types of statements and stories you want to communicate to the press. Some sample statements are:
We are using the media to alert the community that young people across the country are organizing against the FTAA.
We are using the media to tell the community that the FTAA is bad for young workers.
2. Create a slogan that will guide your statements. These can be used as openers for discussions with the press. The statement should be short, sweet, and to the point. Some examples of slogans are:
Young people across the country oppose the FTAA.
The YCL is helping to organize young people across the country to protest the FTAA.
3. Create a timeline of when you want to contact the media. Make specific dates of when things HAVE to be done by. Make dates for having a complete list of media contacts, when people will contact the media, when press releases will be sent out, and when follow up phone calls will be made. Things items should be laid out well in advance of the event. It is important to STAY on the time schedule. The media will not be contacting you the night before the event happens!
4. You need to compile a complete list of all the media in your area. This should include newspapers (campus, union, local), television, and internet sites. You should also be sure to include “non-mainstream�? media outlets such as non-english speaking media outlets, community organizations, neighborhood newspapers, and glbtq media outlets. The list should include a contact person (if possible), phone number, fax number, email, and any information of how they have covered other similar news stories.
5. Have specific press contact people. There should be 2-3 people who will do all the talking to the press. There should not just be one person, but there should also not be many different people. You want to ensure that the messages that are conveyed to the press are consistent. The press should be able to contact your press people easily. The media contacts MUST be able to check email and phone messages on a regular basis!!! All questions from the press should be directed to these people. The people who are picked or volunteer to talk to the press, should be very much involved with the organization and, if possible, have a good story about their involvement with the event.
6. Create talking points that the press people can use. Develop 2-3 different talking points that the press people can refer to. These points should short and convey the main objectives of your organization on this event. Creating too many different talking points can make your message too complicated.
7. Before talking with the press, TAKE A DEEP BREATH AND RELAX!! We know that it can be extremely stressful when talking to the press!! Try to be as calm as possible. Remember, you have a great story that they need to know about! Talking slowly and clearly. Take a moment to think about any question that the reporter asks you. Do not be afraid to ask a reporter to clarify a question or statement that they make. You want to make sure that you understand exactly what they are asking you or saying to you.
8. When contacting the press, you should send an email explaining that you have a lead story for them. You need to tell why their audience would be interested in reading this story. When sending an email, do NOT send attachments. After sending an email, you need to make a follow up phone call to send your pitch to the person. Do not be surprised if they say they did not receive your email.
9. If you find out that they are not interested, ask why and the move on. If the person tells you that they are not the person you should be speaking to, get the right persons information and the move on from there.
10. After the event is over, do evaluations of your media work. Look at how many people from the press were spoken to, when did you speak them, and how did they cover the story. Evaluation how effective your talking points were in getting your message across. Update and change your plan as needed!
|
Top level
Issues & Ideas
