As the brutal reality of the harm that the global economy does to the poor and the environment manifested itself throughout the world in 1998, the political and intellectual support for the economic liberalization model began to crack. In an effort to pound a chisel into this crack and to offer an alternative to the countless calls by the elite for a "new global financial architecture" - Friends of the Earth-US, the Institute for Policy Studies and the Third World Network brought progressives from around the world to Washington, DC for a conference on international finance and investment. Participants at the conference, "Toward a Progressive International Economy," developed a set of principles, proposals, and strategies to solve the current crises and to prevent future ones.

Political Support Unravels
In the 1997-98 Congress, fast-track" trading authority was defeated not once but twice. The Multilateral Agreement on Investment (MAI) lies in a shambles at the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD). In the U.S. last year, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) faced its most difficult battle for funding ever, which, although it received the funding, so wracked the agency’s reputation that it has hired a public relations firm to bolster its image. The disarray that was first sighted in the Asian economies spread to Russia and is now toppling Brazil. In the United States, we have watched our trade deficit explode and the stock market gyrate. The U.S. economy is by no means safe from the primary symptom of this contagion, recession.

Globalization of Suffering
Russians are suffering from an economic decline on par with the Great Depression. In Indonesia, due to the crisis, a generation of children is going undernourished and missing out on the educational opportunities developed in that country over the last thirty years. In South Korea,
record numbers of children are being orphaned by families that can no longer support them. In Brazil, the social security tax will almost double due to IMF-mandated budget cutbacks.

Intellectual Doubt
Regardless of whether recession crosses U.S. shores, the failure of the free trade model of globalization is painfully evident. Even the strongest proponents of this model are feeling defensive: the Washington Post titled one of its editorials, "Don’t Quit on Capitalism Yet" (September 7, 1998). Meanwhile some of its well-known supporters are articulating the limits of liberalization. For example, in a widely cited article in the journal Foreign Affairs, prominent free trade proponent and Columbia University economist Jagdish Bhagwati stated that "in the aftermath of the Asian financial crisis, the prevalent myth is that […] a world of full capitalmobility continues to be inevitable and immensely desirable. […] But the weight of evidence and force of logic points toward restraint on capital flows." For progressives -- those groups and individuals interested in preserving our planet for the next generation, promoting a more equitable division of the fruits of development and instituting participatory means of governance -- the time is ripe for action. It is in the context of this crisis and this opportunity that the conference participants met in Washington.

The Conference
The conference brought together over seventy activists, academics and U.S. congressional staff to a hotel in Washington DC for meetings spanning December 9 and 10. The participants sought to clarify a progressive agenda for international finance and investment in an effort to contrast the approach of labor and environmental advocates to solving problems of the global economy with that of official efforts such as in parliaments, the U.S. Treasury, the IMF and the G-7. Participants contributed to one of three working groups: Control of International Finance; Regulation and Mechanisms for Corporate Accountability; and Public Participation in International Economic Decision- Making. Under a set of general principles each working group developed specific principles and proposals in its area of concern and then discussed
citizen strategies for realizing these goals. These are presented in detail in the declaration on the next pages.

By outlining areas of agreement and disagreement through the conference discussions, the participants hoped to contribute to and advance the debate for reform of the global economy among progressives in both the North and the South. The draft declaration aspired, then, to serve as a point of departure for that discussion by establishing a foundation of common concerns and analysis, and then by describing some of the discussion concerning more contentious subjects.

Coming out of the conference, several groups committed to pursuing strategies based on the discussions. Participants are pursuing these
strategies in their own countries and through international cooperation within the broad framework established at the conference. In particular, a eb site serving as a central resource on progressive international finance is being set-up as well as an international network of progressive activists interested in financial reform. In addition, several groups, such as the Halifax Initiative in Canada, are working on campaigns to bring about specific policy changes such as the "Tobin Tax" on speculative currency transactions. That effort met with notable success when, on March 23, the Canadian Parliament approved, by an unexpectedly wide margin, a resolution calling on the government to promote the Tobin Tax internationally.

Please contact Matt Siegel at Friends of the Earth-US (1025 Vermont Ave.,
NW, Washington, DC 20005, (202)783-7400, msiegel@foe.org) if your
organization is interested in signing on to the declaration [see following
pages]or if you have any questions concerning the conference. Conference
materials can be found on the web at http://www.foe.org/progressive-economy/.