WSSD: GLOBAL GOVERANCE PERPETUATES CORRUPTION

WSSD: GLOBAL GOVERANCE PERPETUATES CORRUPTION

Patrick Burnett
Fahamu
JOHANNESBURG - Naomi Ngwira cannot understand why the whole of Africa can’t survive without Coca-Cola. Speaking at a meeting to discuss global governance and corruption at the Global People’s Forum, a parallel event held at the same time as the World Summit on Sustainable Development, Ngwira asked why more concerted action wasn’t taken against the United States, International Monetary Fund and World Bank over their harmful policies. “Is it really the case that we can’t do anything about the US, IMF and World Bank?” she asked, “Can’t we begin to impose sanctions on the United States?”
Ngwira, from the Economics Department at the University of Malawi, said Africa could easily shun the United States because most of their products were not essential to survival. “If they keep on looking for places to bomb we can tell them we will shun their products,” she said, adding: “Do you think we can’t survive without Coke? We can do something and exclude the US.”
Expanding on the concept of corruption, Ngwira said corruption was not only about ways of action but also took place through acts of omission.
An example was the situation where Malawi had been forced to sell maize to Kenya at a low price in order to raise money. “The IMF have denied this but they did do it. Malawi now has no maize,” she said.
Mohau Pheko, from Gender Trade Network Africa, said the notion of good governance had emerged in the development vocabulary of the 1980s under the influence of powerful multi-lateral institutions. “Whose norms are used in defining what we mean by good governance?”
Pheko said governance was conceptualised by international institutions and rooted in a consensus about global governance.
“In terms of the African context, these donors have a derogatory attitude towards Africa without reflecting how we conceptualise government and so they blame faults on poor governance and turn it into a managerial issue.”
She said the quest for transparency and accountability should be based on larger concerns about how capacity was built in order to bring in “our own ideas” on how to manage institutions.
Pheko stressed the critical role of people’s governance in sustainable development. “People's identification is critical because today governance is done without recognising peoples norms. When we look at global inequalities and the policies used to fast-track the diminishing role of the state it is clear that people’s power is vital.”
She said people’s governance demanded a strong state that could consult with its people and contained mechanisms for people to participate and define society.
“There is a role for the state, but not to adopt the dogma of the World Bank, but a new state that brings people into the process.”
Antonio Tujan, from the IBON foundation and the International Institute on Corruption and Governance (IICG), said corruption took away resources that prevented proper development in countries.
“We say what is happening is not under development but twisted development. This happens a lot because of the kind of governance that exists.”
He said global governance needed to be looked at from the community level. Public power could be used to serve narrow interests and therefore no longer became democratic.
“When that happens then corruption becomes sustainable and it is not democracy that is sustainable but corruption.”
He said countries contained structures to ensure that corruption would take place.
“What we want is open, democratic governance. That should be managed in a system of governance that is essentially democratic.”
Much of the situation had colonial roots. “We are now in neo-colonial times when trans-national corporations, global and multilateral institutions combine to create a system of global governance that ensures that corruption exists. It is a system that perpetuates corruption.”
Tujan said if systems were based on democratic principles then globalisation could be a liberating process that should seek to free the enslaved. “However, globalisation now is of a neo-liberal nature that is inherently unjust, immoral and corrupt.”
He said trans-nationals were using the issue to further their neo-liberal policies. “Corruption has become a political byword to dismantle state institutions. By pushing the issue of corruption it covers up the reality that global governance mechanisms are expanding corporate power to greater heights and also expanding corruption.”
He said: “A global governance mechanism must end the International Monetary Fund and World Bank conditions and start the process of reforming, if not replacing, these institutions. The World Trade Organisation must be transformed into another body founded on the principles of human rights and people’s governance.” - ENDS