Majority excluded from global
decision-making
Ecumenical consultation on economic globalization
in central and eastern Europe
from World Council of Churches Office of Communication
29 June 2001 [published here on 7-2-01]
The positive connotations of globalization are difficult to see when the
majority of countries are excluded from global decision-making, says a
statement issued by a consultation on "Globalization in central and
eastern Europe - Responses to the ecological, economic and social
consequences". The consultation, sponsored by the World Council of
Churches (WCC), the Conference of European Churches (CEC), the World
Alliance of Reformed Churches (WARC) and its European Area Committee (EAC),
gathered almost a hundred participants and observers in Budapest,
Hungary, from 24-28 June.
Transformation
after the fall of communist rule, European integration, and
globalization are the three features that presently characterize the
central and eastern European region. Sharing his views at the
consultation, Slovakian professor Igor Kiss suggested that globalization
can either be a sword of Damocles over humankind or the sword with which
humankind will cut through the Gordian knot of world economic problems.
The world is at a crossroads. That is why the consultation sent a
message on globalization to the churches inside and outside the region,
as well as to governments and the wider public of the region itself.
"Communism
depended on unrestricted state planning. Consequently, the unrestrained
market mechanism was welcomed by many politicians and social leaders as
the path to a better future. They neglected to understand that a market
without a social, cultural and institutional framework is bound to fail
and destroy the social fabric of society," the message emphasizes.
Governments, it says, should prevent global finance from playing the
decisive role in national economies since economic globalization in its
present form threatens traditional values in the region. The message
asks churches in the west to persuade decision-makers to stop the
exploitation and exclusion of the majority of countries from
decision-making processes.
At the
consultation, a senior researcher from the Moscow-based Institute for
International Economic and Political Studies, Dr Robert McIntyre,
characterized the post-communism situation as "in many ways a
social and moral disaster". There is false optimism in these
countries connected to entry to the European Union (EU), he said.
"Countries like Poland, where 60 per cent of children suffer from
malnutrition, are not honestly welcomed in the EU," McIntyre
observed, adding that "the likely outcome of the process is
second-class status for the new entrants".
In 1989 about 14
million people in the former communist bloc lived on less than four
dollars a day; by the mid-1990s that number had risen to about 147
million. Nevertheless, as Dr Zlinszky Jáános, a Hungarian biologist,
pointed out, the situation is difficult to assess properly since all the
data may not be reliable. One thing is certain however: witnessing the
poverty of the majority of eastern European villages, it is no
exaggeration to say that the slide of tens of millions of Europeans into
poverty may end up costing the EU more in the long run than any war.
Reacting to this assessment, the consultation warned that churches
should educate their members to understand how the economy works, to
enable them to promote a just economy.
Consultation
participants noted that women especially are often excluded from the
benefits of society. The world-wide tendency of state
"shrinkage" is to the disadvantage of women; health and
education cuts, for instance, put additional burdens on their shoulders.
Thus what once was mainly characteristic of southern countries has now
become a global problem.
The discussions
revealed the differing cultural traditions, historical experiences and
economic development in the various central and eastern European
countries. But consultation participants agreed that in spite of the
differences, governments should promote genuine cooperation between
nations and opportunities for communication and common action - that is,
another face of globalization.
You can find this
report on the World
Council of Churches web site.
