After Seattle: Globalisation and its discontents

Contributors: Bernard Crick, Meghnad Desai, John Edmonds, Larry Elliott, William Keegan, Doreen Massey, George Monbiot, Hilary Wainwright.

Edited by Barbara Gunnell and David Timms.

Catalyst book 1
Published: 18 April 2000
Paperback: 60 pages
ISBN: 0 9533224 5 9
Price: £5.95

How we trade in the 21st century, governed by what rules, will determine the health and wealth of every one of us. For hundreds of millions of the world’s poorest citizens it is a matter of life and death. Yet globalisation has been talked of as unassailable, almost beyond debate; the casualties of unfettered free trade have been seen as inevitable, if regrettable. This dogma was challenged by the dramatic collapse of the World Trade Organisation talks in Seattle in December 1999 and by the angry demonstrations on the streets outside. But how can the global trade straitjacket be made to fit the widely differing needs of different nations? How can the environment and the rights of workers be protected in a global trade regime?

This collection of essays by some of Britain's foremost commentators on globalisation and trade, all of whom are members of Catalyst’s Editorial Board, attempts to tackle these questions and start the most urgent debate of the century. The WTO claims to be listening.

Bernard Crick (Emeritus Professor of Politics, Birkbeck)
What shall we tell the children?

Meghnad Desai (Professor of Economics, LSE)
Seattle – a tragi comedy

John Edmonds (General Secretary, GMB)
An agenda for the labour movement

Larry Elliott (Economics Editor, The Guardian)
Free trade, no choice

William Keegan (Economics Editor, The Observer)
Free trade: battered not beaten

Doreen Massey (Professor of Geography, Open University)
The geography of power

George Monbiot (The Guardian)
Lies, trade and democracy

Hilary Wainwright (Editor, Red Pepper)
Reinventing democracy


'The world desperately needs a rules-based trading system, but one which renders corporations subservient to democracy, rather than democracy subservient to corporations' George Monbiot

'The rich will use any excuse to hang on to their privileges – even anti-capitalism' Meghnad Desai

'Why have nations been more effective in enforcing global policies on trade and tariffs than in enforcing the environmental rules made at the Rio earth summit in 1992?' Bernard Crick

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