The Globalization Game: What's at Play at the WTO

The WTO in Hong Kong

By MARK ENGLER

Although much is at stake at the World Trade Organization Ministerial in Hong Kong this week, the success of the talks will largely hinge on one issue: the willingness of the U.S., Japan, and the European Union to live up to their own "free trade" rhetoric and to substantially cut their agricultural subsidies. By providing nearly $1 billion dollars a day in subsidies for their own farmers, the world's wealthiest countries, which regularly preach the virtues of open markets for poorer nations, are guilty of the rankest hypocrisy.

Be that as it may, a key question remains for critics of corporate globalization based both in the first world and in the global South: Is market access really the answer to poverty?

Governments of developing nations, coming off of their victory in resisting a one-sided trade deal in Cancun in 2003, will be pushing hard in Hong Kong for countries like the U.S. to scale back their agricultural supports, something the Bush administration has thus far proved unwilling to do. Such institutions as the World Bank and The New York Times editorial board will lend their support to the poorer countries by arguing that first world market access is a cornerstone for development and poverty reduction.

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