Info, news & debate

Commons economy

My meeting with EU Trade Commissioner Cecilia Malmstrom and corporate representatives, and the rules they want to impose on us

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At the end of April, I went to a Trade Commission ‘civil society dialogue’ meeting Brussels in which Trade Commissioner Cecelia Malmstrom was seeking input on how to push forward the WTO globalisation agenda via the mechanism of the EU.

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stop-ttip

Ha Joon Chang: ‘increasing corporate power is at the heart of TTIP’

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Ha Joon Chang, author of 23 Things They Don’t Tell You About Capitalism and Economics: The User’s Guide explains that TTIP is not about ‘free trade’ – trade is already more-or-less free. TTIP is about helping corporations to sue countries if they dare to do anything – anything at all – that can be shown

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EU

More on the EU referendum from a low-impact perspective: is another Europe possible?

Is the European Union an empty vessel into which any political content may be poured? Can it accommodate not just neoliberal conservatism but also Keynesian social democracy, hard-line greenery and even pro-nationalisation democratic socialism?

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zombie-isds

Artists against TTIP, and how the new ICS differs from ISDS (spoiler – not much)

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‘Corporate interests have got to stop coming first’ – well said, Juliet Stevenson. A group of artists including actors Ruth Wilson, Andrew Scott and Juliet Stevenson and designer Vivienne Westwood are fronting a campaign (artistsagainstttip.org) to raise public awareness of the trade deal TTIP

Read more about Artists against TTIP, and how the new ICS differs from ISDS (spoiler – not much)

mutualism

Mutualism: a philosophy for changing society with a difference – it’s implementable

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There are lots of ideas for changing the world – from voting to demonstrations, petitions, lifestyle change, incremental change, revolutionary change, or more of the same, only harder. The problem with many of them is that they are either ineffective or not implementable.

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trade-secrets

‘Trade Secrets’ legislation: another little piece of the corporate takeover that most people won’t know about

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EU Trade Secrets legislation will criminalise whistleblowers and journalists who expose corporations and their products or services. It’s another in a long list of steps aiming to put corporations above the law, but the rest of us very much under it.

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ttip-reading-room

Read this German MP’s account of the TTIP reading room and decide what you think about TTIP ‘transparency’

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So, you all know about TTIP? Here’s a link if you don’t, plus see the posts to the right. It’s a proposed ‘trade deal’ that is designed to give more of our economy to the corporate sector. It’s supposed to be ‘transparent’, but of course it’s completely secret.

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NHS Chief Executive was a founder member of an organisation lobbying for health to be included in TTIP

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Just allow a few seconds for that to sink in. Simon Stevens was Vice President of UnitedHealth Group, the largest health insurer in the US. He was in charge of global expansion of their business. Now he’s Chief Executive of the NHS.

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ecology-economics

The discipline of economics presupposes corporate capitalism and perpetual growth, which renders it invalid

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Economics is not an unbiased academic discipline, it’s an ideology. Furthermore, economics is based on the false premise that perpetual growth is achievable. It is not, and the reason most people can’t see this is

Read more about The discipline of economics presupposes corporate capitalism and perpetual growth, which renders it invalid