Globalism, Corporatism and Open Source 633
To Soros, the current state of globalism -- capital is free but social concerns are underfunded -- represents a distortion of globalization, not its true promise.
Corporatism and globalism have become hopelessly confused in the public mind.The many excesses of valueless, greedy, proprietary and unrestrained multinational corporations have become enmeshed with tech-driven networked economies. It's difficult to even imagine what an effort it would take to separate one from another, sadly.
In his book George Soros on Globalization, the billionnaire asks for institutional reforms to address some of the many political concerns globalism raises:
l. Contain the instability of financial markets.
2. Complement the World Trade Organization (WTO),which is supposed to generate equitably-distributed global wealth, with equally powerful international organizations devoted to social goals, like reducing poverty and making necessary goods available all over the world.
3. Improve the quality of public life in countries suffering from corrupt, repressive or incompetent governments.
Free software advocates have argued for years now that open software could help create wealth and promote open societies in once-repressive, impoverished and technologically-primitive regimes. This idea is exciting. It attracted non-geeks like me to Open Source and Slashdot in the first place. That they are right is almost beside the point. How will proprietary software be curbed, and open software developed, in regimes that are corrupt and repressive? Why would these noxious governments support the use of software to develop an open society any more than they would encourage free speech or abandon censorship?
Legal scholars like Lawrence Lessig see the GPL as a major cornerstone of a vast, global "digital commons." So far, this vision has failed to materialize. In fact, new software is creating personalized, fragmented, narcissistic media in which screening and blocking (products, people, differing opinions) has become widely accepted, even epidemic.
In his terrific new biography of Richard Stallman, Free As In Freedom writer Sam Williams quotes Stallman: "What history says about the GNU project, twenty years from now, will depend on who wins the battle of freedom to use public knowledge. If we lose, we will be just a footnote. If we win, it is uncertain whether people will know the role of the GNU operating system -- if they think the system is 'Linux' they will build a false picture of what happened and why. But even if we win, what history people learn a hundred years from now is likely to depend on who dominates politically." So far, the big winners are the big corporations.
But Stallman, the Thomas Paine of the Net, is obviously right in some ways. To many people on Wall Street and in Silicon Valley, the GNU project is already a footnote. It remains the most vibrant and exciting political idea on the Net, whatever the obstacles. But it seems that corporatism is too deeply entrenched to really change, and who is going to make it change? Few governments in the world as as powerful as Microsoft or AOL-Time-Warner. The multi-nationals are, in a way, the new nation-states of globalism. In recent years, they have been the primary beneficiaries of globalism -- as Soros concedes -- and for much of the undeveloped world and many political activists, they are the spawn of globalism's first generation of existence.
Soros skirts some major obstacles to his proper and idealistic vision. He recognizes that the networked global economy is forcing market values into areas where they don't properly or historically belong, from copyright to publishing to medicine to the law. These intrusions also occur in foreign cultures where they are distinctly unwelcome. Anti-Americanism has become a staple of life in many parts of Europe, and even more virulently elsewhere, where the United States is equated with evil, greed, corruption and blasphemy.
One of the great -- and widely foreseen -- political consequences of the rise of the Net was a widening gap between developed and undeveloped countries, many of which simply lack the infrastructure to wire up their populations and economies. How can governments in places like Afghanistan embrace open software and an open society if they can't even bring electricity and telephones to most of their citizens?
There's already enormous opposition to ideas like the ones Soros proposes. Market fundamentalists and conservatives object to tinkering with the global marketplace. And the broad range of people who call themselves "antiglobalization activists" don't buy the idea that globalization could conceivably improve lives in impoverished parts of the world. Many don't believe meetings should even be held by governmental officials to discuss globalism.
Soros argues that the world's worst conditions aren't necessarily caused by globalism. It's bad governments that are responsible for exploitive working conditions, lack of social and economic capital, and political repression.
Soros's primary argument is that globalism could be used as a powerful social tool, one that could undermine or circumvent incompetent or repressive regimes. The increased wealth globalization produces, he maintains, could make up for the inequities and other shortcomings of networked, global economies. The problem is that the winners don't compensate the losers, says Soros. "There is no international equivalent of the political process that occurs within individual states. While markets have become global, politics remain firmly rooted in the sovereignty of the state."
The Net becomes a significant political factor in this evolution, because it is both individualistic and trans-national. It permits the rapid movement of capital and, if open source activists are correct, could also use free software and other technologies as a powerful tool for developing nations who want to join the globalization movement.
But it's difficult to see by what process this is going to occur. As a result of globalization, the divisions between the world's rich and the poor continues to widen. According to the United Nations Development Program, the richest one percent of the world's population receives as much income as the poorest 57 percent. More than a billion people live on less than a dollar a day; nearly a billion lack any access to clean water; 826 million suffer from malnutrition; 10 million die annually due to lack of basic health care. Some of these conditions pre-dated globalization, but the new economy has hardly improved matters. And it seems to be generating hatred of the United States, where contemporary notions of globalism were born and shaped.
Next: Getting specific about reforming globalism.
umm, what is Katz trying to say? (Score:5, Interesting)
So OSS had (has?) a chance to change the world, but is failing due to the cooperate-states that globaliazation has created?
Is that what Katz is saying? This isn't a big surprise to anyone. Multi-national corps. are the new big power. They work outside the realm of any governing body... they can pick and choose the laws & regulations they want to effect a specific activity by choice of location. And what they can't escape, they can easily buy now aday.
It seems that the trend is to remove the possibility of any significant number of people using 'free' software. I'm not saying it can be done away with all together, if nothing else OSS will move underground.
And I stuggle to find any a real way in which free software will help those who don't have the fundamentals in life: food, shelter, medicine, etc... who gives a damn about OSS if you're starving? I stuggle to see the connection between the too...
Re:umm, what is Katz trying to say? (Score:4, Interesting)
So true. Greenpeace, amongst others, are fighting the fight as it should be fought. Buying up stock in big companies in order to have a legal right to pose questions to the board and have a right to response.
Governments are all puppets controlled by big firms anyway. Clear as crystal.
Open Source is anti-commercial, and fights against this, by attempting to remove the power of big firms like Microsoft, who have more power across more countries than most people realise. HUGE amounts of development cash are going to Redmond in order to pay for NT and 2000 licences in Africa, because the braindead US-funded consultants don't know about Open Source, or can't "sell" it because THERE IS NO BOTTOM LINE... just "Linux: FREE" doesn't speak to accountants in the World Bank.
More development money could go directly to people ON THE GROUND in Africa and elsewhere if it wasn't paying Microsoft / Oracle / Informix / SAP people instead. That's where Open Source can aid development, although I'm sure we'll all agree that these socio-economic development efforts just help put infrastructures in place, but won't feed the starving unless people from the country itself wake up and become philanthropic (and too often they are just as greedy as the US coporations, since the American dream is all about money in your own pockets, rather than helping the fellow man, as far as most people I know are concerned).
The Painfully Obvious Shortcomings Of Globalism (Score:3, Interesting)
1. If defined as "using a common standard" globalism falls short for the same reason that monoculture crops, or everybody using the same e-mail program falls short: any failure in the system is exported everywhere.
2. If defined as "free trade", it falls short because of the hidden costs that don't make it into the accountant's ledgers. For example, allowing international shipping on the Great Lakes seems like the obvious choice until you realize that trout are disappearing because of pests transported from foreign waters [usda.gov]. From the Black Death of the middle ages, to the great flu epidemic of WWI, trade and travel has always brought these increased risks. These risks almost never appear on the balance sheet when free trade proponents make their arguments. The rational way to maintain the benefits of trade and ensure against such losses is to impose reasonable tarrifs. The proceeds of said tarrifs must be used to inspect imported goods, write regulations, etc. That is the only fair way to pay for such activities because the revenue collected will be proportional to trade. Pulling revenues out of the general fund won't work because the temptation to skimp on inspections is already too great. At the very least, import-export companies should pay into some sort of insurance fund to pay for ecological disasters and epidemics.
3. If defined as "world government" the problem is so painfully obvious that it almost lends credence to the conspiracy theorists who believe that globalism is a plot designed to start a world war and kill a few billion people. It's hard enough to keep Great Britain under one law. Can anyone seriously imagine bringing the entire world under one law without some serious butt-kicking? And for what? All because it looks so good on paper? And then when the government becomes evil where do you run? That brings us back to point 1--a monoculture government with no place for asylum seekers.
4. Some people have argued that "we have to expand free trade to help the economy". More painfully obvious fallacies. If we need to expand free trade to help the economy, then the economy is helpless because there is a finite world in which to expand.
5. If defined as "the UN" globalism is just a waste of time. Everybody has been marketed into believing that without the UN the world would sink into chaos. Bollox! Without the UN diplomats would continue to have ad-hoc meetings in times of crisis, and some left-leaning committees staffed by the wives of wealthy CEOs would no longer exist.
Yeah, George Soros thinks something is a great idea... whatever. These are the same kind of people who brought us Keynes and the "fine tuning" of the economy.
Re:Rich to get Richer? (Score:3, Interesting)
No, but it's often likely. Considering myself as an example - I make my employer's product easier to use.
Should I get all the money? No. I couldn't build that product myself, nor could I ship it, nor could I support it. So I get a portion of that money. It's called "wages".
Your point about patents is well-stated - just because someone invented the transistor, doesn't mean they should get a royalty on every transistor in every IC ever fabbed.
Those who invented the transistor were paid what they were worth (in both dollars and "fame" :) - if they hadn't been paid enough, they'd have done something else with their time.
As for OSS/FS - the notion of a software commons by the voluntary consent of those writing the software in the commons - is great! Because software (unlike transistors) costs nothing to reproduce, if I choose to write something cool with the intention of allowing others to copy it, then everybody has something cool.
Can I put food on the table that way? Probably not. I'm good at what I do, but I'm not that good. So I trade my labor for dollars, as do about 50-odd other people with whom I work. The guy who started the whole ball rolling (with little more than a good idea and some cash of his own) has made damn good money over the few years. He risked almost all he had, and has been rewarded commensurately ("$BIGNUM in the bank, $BIGHOUSE on the lot, and a fun place to work"). We have also been well-rewarded ("a good paying job in a fun place to work") in comparison with what we risked (which was almost nothing).
And as a result of his risk and effort (and his willingness to trade some of his dollars for our work - meeting with our willingness to trade our work for some of his dollars), we've created a product that people are willing to trade their dollars for. Most of those dollars (after the looters take 40%) go to the coffers of the company, as well they should. If and when the company cannot support its customer base or develop products its customers wants, it hires more employees by offering them some of those dollars in the form of wages. (Umm, and again, the looters take about 40% of those dollars, too. Funny thing about looters. There never seem to be enough dollars for them to loot, or enough ways for them to loot dollars.)
Can someone who's damn good at what he does put food on his table via open source/free software? Sure - so long as there's a geek in the bar, neither ESR nor RMS nor Linus will ever have to pay for beer again. :-)
(And the best part about open source / free software is that because no dollars change hands, there's nothing for the looters to grab!)
Re:Equate democracy with globalism (Score:2, Interesting)
Corruption: One of the big factors of success in Western economies is transparency and lack of bribary. While we're far from 100% free of these, we're doing a lot better than most of the world. Look at the Enron scandal - we agree that it's inapprpriate for an auditor to go easy on the audits in order to gain more consulting work. The richest heads of state in the world are in third world countries. While rich people often hold elected office in the US, they're typically poorer instead of richer after it's all done (elections are expensive!).
Opaque and bribary-ridden societies mean inefficient uses of resources. If funcionaries see a primary goal of their employment being to maximize graft, the net effect is that anything that involves government approval will take as much time and require as many participants as possible. It also increases the power of the well connected over the competant, so companies who tend to get government contracts tend to be lousy and them.
Clear title to assets: A lot of the land in poor countries has unclear title, which means they can't be used as assets for loans, sold, or otherwise be treated as a form of wealth. The reasons for these are often due to a combination of a corrupt government (too many bribes to get the paperwork), and well intentioned but misguided attempts to enforce a more communal rural economy.
Free trade: This is a problem in rich and poor countries, although rich countries tend to at lesat give lip service to free trade. If everyone is free to trade goods across national borders, the net effect is that everyone can do what they're most efficient at. Protectionism enables local producers to be less efficient, with the inevitable effect of empoverishing the many for the benefit of the few. For example, in the new US steel tariffs are estimated to cost at least three jobs in steel consuming and shipping industries for every steelworker job they save. Not only is it a bad thing for our trading partners, it's bad for ourselves. Everyone loses in protectionism.
Re:Corruption is the #1 threat to Democracy (Score:2, Interesting)
Here is an index of corruption [www.gwdg.de] compiled for nations around the world. Can't comment on its authoritativeness, but America is ranked as #16. Northern Europe is 'extra clean'.
We need a Minimum Global Wage (Score:2, Interesting)
With a Minimum Global Wage, I can support globalism
But currently what we have is partial Globalism, Globalism which only benifits the CEOs and other rich people, Why hire people from the US when you can hire people from other places?
WE need a GLOBAL minimum wage so that everyone can have a fair chance at getting the job.