STOP MAI

MEDIA RELEASE -Embargoed for release, 11 July, 2001 Authorised by the STOP-MAI Campaign Coalition (WA) Website http://members.iinet.net.au/~jenks/fair.html Affiliated with the Australian Fair Trade and Investment Network (AFTInet) and with the World Social Forum (WSF)

New study casts doubt on
benefits of globalisation

An international economic study has determined that two decades of economic globalisation have brought substantially less progress for developing countries than was achieved in the preceding twenty years.

"The data provide no evidence that the policies associated with globalisation have improved outcomes for developing countries," conclude economists Mark Weisbrot and Dean Baker, co-directors of the (US) Center for Economic and Policy Research (CEPR).

The analysis of data for a forty-year period challenges economists and policy makers who cite globalisation as an engine of growth while pressing for policies to strengthen the trend. It also demolishes World Trade Organisation (WTO) claims that unbridled liberalisation of trade is of benefit to developing nations.

Using standard measures of economic growth, health outcomes, education and literacy, the CEPR study compares progress achieved during the period preceding globalisation (1960-80) with the period from 1980 to 2000, which saw reduction of tariff and non-tariff barriers to trade, the removal of restrictions on international investment flows, and increasing intervention by the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank on a wide range of economic and policy issues.

Weisbrot and Baker observe that while this evidence does not prove that the policies associated with globalisation were responsible for the deterioration in economic performance, "it does present a very strong prima facie case that some structural and policy changes implemented during the last two decades are at least partly responsible for these declines."

Publication of their report is being timed to coincide with release of the United Nations Development Program's Human Development Report on July 11.

Requests for interviews or copies of the study should be directed to Mark Weisbrot at the Center for Economic and Policy Research, Washington DC, from Monday, July 2 through Wednesday, July 11th. Phone +1 (202) 423-6762; 293-5380 ext. 228

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[NOTE: Embargoed for release on Monday, 11 July 2001]

POSTSCRIPT: See the report at http://www.cepr.net/globalization/scorecard_on_globalization.htm