Almost half a century ago Malcolm X reminded us not to fear the face of our oppressors. “Power takes a step back only in the face of more power,” he said; only when we ourselves are in a position of power will our demands be met. These words have proven prophetic for the movement for economic justice and in our demands for 100% debt cancellation.

As the Bush administration touts its rhetoric of freedom and liberation, the IMF and World Bank are busily “liberating” Iraq’s resources – oil and labor – and “freeing” Iraq’s markets.

The G8 Summit in Scotland has come and gone. The Live 8 concerts have come and gone. The announcement of a debt deal by the G8 finance ministers on June 11th has come and gone. But the immediate material conditions of impoverished people around the world have not changed.

After the December 2004 tsunami struck, devastating the countries of South and Southeast Asia, the Sri Lankan government moved quickly to announce the launch of a grand plan not just to rehabilitate the affected areas but to rebuild the whole country. They have since gathered commitments of over $3 billion from the international financial institutions and foreign governments to carry this out.

An announcement by International Monetary Fund (IMF) Managing Director Rodrigo Rato at the annual meeting of the African Development Bank in Abuja, Nigeria in May signaled the inauguration of a new tool for ensuring IMF – and by extension, U.S. and G8 – control of national economic policies in Global South countries. After going through several low-key proposals and different names, a paper defining the Policy Support Instrument (PSI) has been completed – and leaked to civil society (“Policy Support & Signaling in Low-Income Countries,” IMF Policy Development and Review Department, June 10, 2005).

Climate change and anti-war activists have the opportunity to come together at these protests to show the connections between war and climate change, and advance the U.S. movement against global warming and global war.

The West Africa Gas Pipeline Project (WAGP) exemplifies the reemerging trend at the World Bank of big, high-risk projects that are purported to be big solutions to poverty reduction and income generation. The World Bank seems set on returning to a formula that has already been proven a failure: large scale projects that risk being destructive to the local populations the World Bank professes to help, the investors whom the World Bank continues to encourage, and to the environment.

On July 2nd, a group of musicians and celebrities organized the Live 8 converts around the banner of “making poverty history.” Yet these concerts may have set the global justice movement back more than they helped by convincing the public that simply by attending a free rock concert, donning a white wristband, and perhaps donating some money to charity, they had a hand in ending poverty in Africa.