The uneven benefits of globalization are creating a growing divide between rich and poor countries, as well as within countries, according to a two-year study by the UN's labor organization.
The report found that the opening of borders, new trade agreements and the establishment of the WTO after the end of the Cold War failed to speed the growth of global gross national product, which lagged behind the economic performance of previous decades.
Entitled A Fair Globalization, the study was commissioned by the International Labor Organization (ILO) and prepared by 20 officials and experts, including Joseph Stiglitz, the American economist who won the 2001 Nobel Prize in economic science.
The underlying premise was that "the potential of the global market economy for good is immense and has demonstrated great productive capacity for hundreds of millions of people."
The authors were asked to describe the social and economic dimensions of globalization that have spawned the growing antagonism toward trade in hopes of finding a way to reduce the pain and point to ways to regulate trade and development.
Echoing sentiments heard during the current Democratic campaign for president, the report's two co-chairmen, Tarja Halonen, the president of Finland, and Benjamin William Mkapa, the president of Tanzania, wrote: "Currently, globalization is a divisive subject. It verges on a dialogue of the deaf, both nationally and internationally. Yet the future of our countries, and the destiny of our globe, demands that we all rethink globalization."
The report, released Tuesday in London, found that 188 million people are unemployed worldwide, or 6.2 percent of the labor force; that the gap between rich and poor nations has widened, with countries representing 14 percent of the world's population accounting for half the world's trade and foreign investment; and that in the developing world, women have been harmed more than men by globalization.
The report also said that women's traditional livelihoods as subsistence farmers or small producers have been undermined by foreign subsidized agriculture or foreign imports but, as women, they face cultural barriers when looking for alternative occupations.
Within some rich nations -- the US, Britain and Canada -- the gap between rich and poor has grown wider as well. The US posted the greatest gap, with the top 1 percent earning 17 percent of the gross income, "a level last seen in the 1920s."
Globalization has also affected the rate of taxes collected by countries, the report said. In the world's 30 wealthiest nations, the average level of corporate tax fell from 37.6 percent in 1996 to 30.8 percent last year.
The report did note two bright spots: China and India, the two Asian nations with a third of the world's population.
While the number of people living in absolute poverty worldwide declined from 1.2 billion in 1990 to 1.1 billion in 2000, most of the improvement was in China and India.
The report argues that globalization is at a turning point and international institutions need to address social inequities as well as other consequences of open borders.
Globalization's "volatility threatens both rich and poor," the report said. "Open societies are threatened by global terrorism, and the future of open markets is increasingly in question."
Among the suggestions offered to expand the benefits of globalization were: improved international governance, more transparency in trade laws, better protection for people
and goods crossing borders,
increasing development
assistance to poorer nations
and better enforcement of international labor standards and immigration rights.
Arguing that globalization has its most direct effect on people through their work and employment, the report called for the enforcement of the four core international labor standards. They are the right to organize and bargain collectively, the elimination of compulsory labor, the abolition of child labor and the ending of discrimination in employment.
Both leading candidates for the Democratic nomination for US president -- Senator John Kerry and Senator John Edwards -- have made the enforcement of those labor standards part of their trade agendas.
In trade agreements, the Bush administration calls on countries to enforce their labor laws. Most nations subscribe to these standards.
The report said, however, that these standards are often ignored and pointed to an estimated 246 million child laborers worldwide, as well as continued forced labor in agriculture, the military and sex work.
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