Elena Rodriguez
Global Trade Debate

Global Trade Debate

Why do people love chocolate so much? Is it the smell, the taste, the texture or something more? Do people know what it is the truth hidden in the chocolate business? Do they know that the main ingredient it is child slavery? Thankfully, I can said that I don’t like chocolate, so I don’t feel guilty for consume it. However, should I feel comfortable? Or should I think about what I am consuming that its production leads into harm our people, our animals and our planet? After I watched the “Global Trade Video”, I started to think deeper about the damage that consumerism is doing to innocent people.
Based upon this DVD, I tend to see it from a Marxist perspective because it talks about how the rich people are getting richer at expense of poor people that are getting poorer, “the class struggle”. Personally y agree with the Video, and my position is against globalization, but I can’t be 100% in opposition because there are some points that make it positive; for this reason, I will explain what are the pros and the cons of globalization from my opinion.
One positive side of globalization is that it promotes global economic growth, creates jobs, makes companies more competitive and lowers prices for the consumer; thus, countries can balance their inflation. Also, there is a worldwide market for the consumers that can access to products from different countries without live their houses.
In addition, with the advance of technology the world is more integrated, and there is more influx of communication between countries. For example, with Skype we can communicate across countries with our family and friends; even more, we can make conference calls with people located in different countries. Also, mass communications and quick dissemination of information through the Internet are benefits of globalization.
Another point in favor is that with a free trade economy countries tend to cooperate each other using the principle of reciprocity, and this leads into interdependence; thus the risk of starting a war is reduced to cero. Additionally, in the European Union, people can travel across countries without the requisite of a Visa, and they can find jobs in a host country without needing a license for work.
However, I consider that globalization has more disadvantages than benefits, and its consequences generate a negative impact in humans, animals and our planet as it was discussed in the video.
“In Prague, as elsewhere, the mob targets McDonald’s. A collective wrath is unleashed against a company that symbolizes globalization run riot.” The first point discussed in the video is about the multination corporation McDonald’s. Even though transnational helps to improve the economy of many countries by creating jobs, paying taxes, and selling cheap fast food, it harm more because it provides to the consumers junk food, which is saturated fat and sodium. Undoubtedly, consumption above recommended levels harms the arteries, increases blood pressure, the risk of stroke, heart disease and obesity.
In addition, McDonald’s create jobs, but they explode people providing low wages, and the pressure to keep profits high and wage costs low results in understaffing. Thus staff has to work harder and faster. The majority of employees are people who have few job options, and so are forced to accept this exploitation. In the same way as McDonald’s, there are many multinational corporations, like Wal-Mart, Nike, Adidas, Disney and Gap, which explode their workers. They also affect the domestic industries that can’t compete with their low prices, so they put them out of business.
Further more, McDonald’s and other food transnationals, are harming the environment thanks to the growing meat’s international demand. The high demand of cheap meat is increasing deforestation in the Amazon. According to Greenpeace, McDonald's Corp. was fueling the destruction of the Amazon rainforest by using soybeans grown in the region as feed for chickens that end up served in the fast-food chain's European restaurants. Certainly, deforestation reduces the area's rich biodiversity and contributes to global warming.
“One billion people live on or near the coast. Their land may literally go under water as global warming continues.” The global climate-warming problem was also discussed in the video. Not only food transnational harms the environment; the sources of air pollutant are fuel combustion, industrial process and transportation-- most of all. A variety of air contaminants are emitted throughout the oil and gas development process. Carbon dioxide and certain trace gases are accumulate in the atmosphere as a result of human activity; global climate change occurs because these gases absorb infrared radiation (heat). This absorption slows the natural flux of heat into space, warming the lower atmosphere. The combustion of fossil fuels, especially coal, are responsible for most of these emissions. The top three industrial sources of toxic air pollutants are the chemical industry, the metals industry, and the paper industry. Certainly we can say, that mostly all multinational corporations are helping to increase drastically pollution and global climate warming. If atmospheric changes are ignored, the climate warming will drastically increase; ice will melt (between other effects) and millions of people will migrate toward a safer area. “Where’s the peck of pickled peppers Peter Piper picked?” Another point discussed in the video is about the company services businesses in the US and Britain where operators are located in India. In the same way as Britain lost its textile and steel industries to cheap competition from Asia, it happened to the customer service industry. With the advance of technology and globalization boundaries and barriers are disappearing, so it is easier for multinational corporations to hire cheap labor. Thus, the educated people from India can profit the high tech revolution and be comfortable in the middle class where they belong. But, in poorest countries with uneducated people, this situation is not the same. Poor people don’t travel at work in a chauffeured company vehicle. On the contrary, they work in the most deplorable and hazardous conditions. As I have said, multinational corporations take advantage of globalization and hire people from poor countries, so they paid low salaries. But, there isn’t in off profit for these big transnationals, they want to accumulate even more wealth; for this purpose they hire children paying to them slave wages and making them work in inhuman conditions. The International Labour Organization estimates there are 250 million children in work. Many of the goods made by these kids end up in foreign shops. Child labor not only has minimal payment, they are also exposed to chemicals that pollute in their body. Worse of all, thousands of Africa’s children, particularly in Côte d’Ivoire, are forced to labour in the production of cocoa. They are modern-day slaves, bonded to their employers and forced against their will to work in hazardous and heartbreaking conditions. They are denied to the access of basic education and medical care; these children have no voice and little hope for the future. Many chocolate companies, including Hershey (the largest in North America), use cocoa beans from the Ivory Coast to make their products. The Ivory Coast of Africa is the largest cocoa-producing area in the world, but unfortunately it is so at the extent of child labor exploitation. “We’re buying products that we don’t need... Because we have adverts all around us and beautiful bright signs that make us think that that’s the things that we need to consume.” The last point discussed in the video talk about the homogenization of the global culture based on the western values of consumerism “Materialism”. The values and institutions of Western ways of life are being distributed across the world via globalization, which sources are multinational corporations, communication media, trade, investment, transportation, tourism, and alliances. For example, Western fast foods, clothing styles and entertainment that carries cultural communications about morality, identity, and life priorities. Socialization now is shaped via media, and advertising, and it occurs in movie theaters, shopping malls, nightclubs, and traffic jams. Advertising confuses needs and wants; and celebrities are used to convince consumers to buy and prefer certain brands of beer, cigarettes, automobiles, clothes, foods, and appliances -- especially Western products.
The World Trade Organization, International Monetary Found and World Bank have been major counterparts in the creation and management of the modern world economy. Their activities are endorsed by economically dominant governments and corporations who favor neoliberal policies and free-market solutions of debt-based finance and international trade. Together these institutions encourage market liberalization in emerging markets. Within the competitive global framework, developing countries are left with little choice other than to comply with the neoliberal agenda. As a result these countries are often left with enormous debts and a fragile economy. Meanwhile, foreign investors and multinational corporations gain control of a significant portion of the world’s resources, finance, services, technology and knowledge. Thus, the rich get richer and the poor get poorer.
Humans are the most significant agent of environmental change on our planet; we are overpowering the planet with our burgeoning population, destroying forests to meet our needs and desires and consuming our finites hearth resources. Moreover, human-induced climate change is putting the environment in risk. On the other hand, there are many people that can live without using technology, like tribes in developing countries, no to far- in this country- there are the Amish that sustain a viable autarky. So, we can start by being more moderate in our consumerism avoiding buying unnecessary things. However, the big problems are the multinational corporations that only care about make profit without consider the environment, the poor people, the children and the future of our planet. Moreover, the WTO, IMF and the World Bank support these transnationals; thus the rich get richer and the poor get poorer. But, the worse of all is that, as the realists said, “humans are selfish.”