Mending our Global Relationships

I was inspired by listening to Doreen Massey last week - especially by her approach to positive globalisation and her ability to make space and distance seem exciting rather than threatening.

One of her key themes was restitution. She raised the troubling issue of people's seeming need to apologise for things they had nothing to do with. An example is the apology by the contemporary citizens of Liverpool for the slave trade. Interesting, isn't it, how this phrase is so rarely used now - usually substituted for 'slavery'. Of course we wouldn't want to think of all trade as slavery would we?

But back to my theme of pointless apologies, I am left wondering what it is we think we are achieving by this. Is it any more than wearing a badge of postmodern right-on-ness, much as we used to wear lapel badges and as many still do where a rainbow of ribbons? How does it help that they tell us they know that breast cancer is a horrible disease?

But to action. Doreen drew my attention to an interesting piece of research from Medact which discusses the perverse subsidy that poor countries make to rich countries when health-care workers who have been trained at the public expense become the sorts of economic migrants we are happy to accept. Medact have designed a plan for genuine restitution: a reverse transfer to balance the subsidy.

This is similar to schemes proposed under the Contraction and Convergence framework for emissions trading and technology transfer. To balance the negative effects of our fossil greed, and the unfair share of the global climate commons we in the richer countries consume, the plan is that we should share sustainable technologies and expertise, as well as paying cash.

According to a letter to the BMJ from Robin Stott, vice-chair of Medact, 'Evidence from Mozambique suggests that this money will help trigger the latent entrepreneurial skills of the recipients. Given the likely market value of a tonne of carbon dioxide, it will more than provide the $110 dollars/person/year that the UN millennium project believes necessary to reach the millennium development goals in Africa.'


Doreen also mentioned a project to create a map of the Niger Delta-- in London, in other words raising awareness of the exploitation of people in this oil-rich African country that is necessary to feed our oil addiction. And also bringing this home to the City of London, which provides the finance for most of the world's trade-based enterprises.

Her final example was of the link being forged between Caracas, Venezuela and London--another form of local-to-local exchange and perhaps 'a form of alternative globalisation' cooked up by two ageing Marxists: Hugo Chavez and Ken Livingstone. Caracas is sending us cheap diesel, which fuels London's public transport and allows concessionary fares for the poor. Our contribution is more intangible-- sharing 'the capital's expertise in policing, tourism, transport, housing and waste disposal'--but it is a gesture in the right direction.


I wonder how long it took the Liberal Democrats in London to regret their comment that 'It makes us feel like a Third World country'! Tweet

My Vineyard has been Turned into a Shopping Centre

One of the most beautiful things encountered in Lisbon during my recent trip was the of range citrus trees growing right in the heart of the city. Making cities productive - what is sometimes referred to as 'edible estates' or, in a more rural setting, 'edible landscapes' - will be key to our survival once peak oil begins to bite. Much as happened in Havana when food imports became too expensive we will be growing vegetables on verges and waste-ground.

As part of the Transition Towns initiative activists in Totnes have been planting nut-trees on spare ground, and Stroud's mayor has agreed that in future urban tree-planting will focus on fruit-bearing trees. Sweet chestnut is a particular favourite, since it is leafy and gorgeous, produces useful tasty food, and its wood is durable and excellent for a variety of uses.

Sadly, elsewhere Lisbon is not so friendly to urban production. Campo Pequeno and Campo Grande are areas of the city that were once wine-growing fields, small and large, and are now concrete oases and tube stations. My hotel was near Campo Pequeno, where I began to notice eerie echoes of an earlier post. Not only does it have a bull-ring (in this case the genuine article) but underneath it is another shopping centre. In contrast to Birmingham, the shoppers are underground, the sports' fans in the fresh air.

I also began to understand the true meaning of the theory of comparative advantage, a bogus economic justification for free trade that was originally outlined by David Ricardo in terms of trade between the UK and Portugal - we make woollen cloth and export it in exchange for Portuguese wine. Our climate favours one and theirs the other. Since the theory is about justifying trade in goods when one country is always more efficient it isn't really a very good example.

Except that I discovered from my guidebook that the reason there was free trade between these two countries is that it was bought some 50 years early at the barrel of a gun, or rather to allow Portugal to avoid the barrels of Spain's guns. Britain offered military protection under the Methuen Treaty but in exchange Portugal had to agree to let UK cloth in cheap, undercutting domestic production and putting thousands of textile workers out of jobs.

It is astonishing in how many corners of the world you encounter examples of our brazen, pro-capitalist, tread-on-your-face mentality in operation. No wonder my daughter says 'We are bastards aren't we mum?' Except that it wasn't the impoverished factory workers of Lancashire who benefited from this. But it does make us slightly more responsible for sorting the mess out. Tweet

Trading on the Yin

It says something about the relentless pressure of capitalism that I feel a need to apologise for having taken the whole month of August off work, and mainly offline and away from computers. I am torn between celebrating this and recommending to others that they live their principles in this way, and feeling guilty that I have dared to step off the treadmill.



It has been an interesting few months of talks, rest, reading and festivals. I know that most of the original and creative work I do happens during what is officially labelled as 'holiday' and that most of my good ideas come when I'm sitting on a bus or lying in bed. Strange, then, that I value the hours spent here, staring into a luminscent screen, giving myself RSI so much more.



Of the many things I've learned over the summer the most exciting is about Country Markets. As part of a commitment to encouraging local trading we developed a concept of 'fayre trade'. This takes as read the principles of fair trade, but supplements them by a commitment to reducing consumption and substituting local production and exchange for involvement in the globalised market wherever possible. However, having learned about Country Markets I am beginning to think we may have been reinventing the wheel.



My own product is face cream, based on my own need for something to deal with my arid skin which splits and re-splits throughout the winter. Producing it to a standard I'm happy with is surprisingly easy. I'm using organic ingredients and recycled jars collected from friends, and trying to keep inputs as simple and local as possible. The energy embodied in conventional, petroleum based skincare products is shocking, not to mention the unpleasantness of smearing paraffin on your skin.



Creating a market for such products is more of a problem. Legislation is widespread and intimidating and probably devised by the corporate-dominated EU mandarins to deter the small trader. But Country Markets, formerly part of the WI but now hived off, has found ways around this, including fighting the notorious Jam Law through the House of Commons in the early 1980s. Their local markets offer the opportunity for the small, local producer or enthusiast to trade at minimal cost. Despite the traditional jam and cakes image of the WI market, produce is not limited to food. It costs only five pence to join and is genuinely co-operative. For more see http://www.country-markets.co.uk/content.php Tweet

The Just Price

I did a delightful piece of shopping today. I bought a mohair and wool shawl from a local trader at Nailsworth market. Ok, it was so hot that I could hardly bear to touch it, never mind try it on, but I know I will feel the benefit by October, and besides it was purple.


Having rushed back to my friends with my purchase I faced a difficult situation when Odi, who had recommended I buy it, commented on the excellent price of £5. This was the price she had been offered; I had paid £15. In fact I was prepared to offer £20.


I felt quite happy with the £15 I had paid, but realising that Odi had been offered only £5 made me ask various questions. In fact, I didn't feel I had been cheated. I felt that £15 was the right price. I wondered whether the trader had assessed the relative incomes of Odi and myself and decide the price to ask. Or whether she just thought Odi might be a better haggler--as she herself confirmed.


I never haggle. I decide what I am prepared to pay and if the price is too high I move on. If the price quoted is too low I feel a little uncomfortable but buy the thing if I want it. But I am beginning to think that haggling may be a way of balancing the needs of the buyer and the seller. So when we pay far over the odds for tat during our foreign holidays we may justify this as redistributing wealth, and the traders may have their suspicions that we have more money than sense amply confirmed.


So what is the meaning of a price in the global market? The price is fixed by all sorts of factors beyond our control and enforced by the corporate storeholder. It doesn't respond to the needs or situation of the buyer or seller, as might be enabled by haggling. And what is a bargain? Is it really any more than the exercise of their superior power by the person who has been allocated more money in the unjust global system?


In Medieval times the price of most goods was actually fixed in a pseudo-religious fashion. It was considered unGodly to charge too much for something. The guilds controlled production and they also controlled price. Most of the methods used to make money today, including buying when something is plentiful and selling when it is in shortage, or buying in one market and selling more expensively elsewhere were outlawed by the guild. If you committed these crimes or sins you were thrown out of the guild, which meant the end of your livelihood.


I know I'm going to enjoy wearing my shawl, but I'm still left wondering whether I would enjoy it more or less if I had paid £5 for it. Tweet

What is trade really for?

If we think our way back to the earliest historical example of trade we can recall, the Vikings or the Hanseatic League, perhaps, the first thing you notice is that the trade was an exchange of exotic items that were not available in the locality. The Vikings brought Baltic amber to the Dark Age Britons, who sent back tin or gold in return. If the traders had had nothing we could not find at home we would not have involved ourselves with them. How simple life was in the happy days before capitalist exchange!

The early economists also theorised trade as an exchange of goods that could not be produced locally. In Ricardo’s theory British woollen goods are exchanged for Portuguese wine. The sleight of hand that underpins the ‘Trade is Good’ mantra is his theory of comparative advantage. It is clear that if you have a British climate, you cannot have an absolute advantage in the production of wine. There are inevitably going to be countries where the sun shines for more of the year whose citizens can produce better wine more cheaply. But what of the situation facing a country that is less efficient in the production of all goods than its neighbours? According to the theory of comparative advantage it will still gain from trade if it focuses on producing the goods it can produce most efficiently with its own resources.

The reason this is a sleight of hand is that there are assumptions built into the concept of ‘efficiency’ that are not politically neutral. For one, the trade that takes place is denominated in a currency, and that currency is owned and controlled by a nation-state which can therefore use it to gain advantage in the trade. This explains why the East Asian tigers and now China are benefiting far less from their trade with the USA than are that country’s citizens. It also explains why the USA is so keen to open up trade with the poor countries and persuade them that this is their best route out of poverty, rather than self-sufficiency.

The gains from trade, whatever one’s degree of productive efficiency, are determined by the terms of trade, which are always dependent on the relative levels of political or military power. The Vikings were traders, but they were also thieves. Some of their trading was always carried out in terms of offers people found it very difficult to refuse. The sorts of negotiation conducted today at the WTO are little different. The USA and EU use their political and military influence to achieve trade settlements that suit their interests, limiting the prices paid for the sorts of goods—raw materials and textiles—which the poorer countries have to offer.

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Trading Futures

In spite of the breaking out of civil war in Lebanon and the deaths of many innocent people, the fire aboard the Cutty Sark topped the news agenda earlier this week. Can this be because we have a nostalgic yearning for the days when Britain ruled the waves? We were the original maritime globalisers with merchant ships like Cutty Sark providing the wealth to support the British Empire.


Perhaps we still long for the certainty of those days, when we sang confidently that our nation had arisen at heaven's command from out the azure main, as hundreds still do every year at the last night of the proms. The role the sailing ships played in the Slave Trade and in the stealing of resources are less prominent.

On the same day that the Cutty Sark burned the government announced the centralisation of planning and the removal of the right of local people to have a democratic say over what is constructed in their neighbourhood. The Empire spirit lives on, at least in the sense that nothing shall be allowed to stand in the way of economic growth. Although these changes are of general application it can be no coincidence that two days later we are told that nuclear energy is the response to climate change. Since nobody wants that in their backyard the link is clear.

So how we would we organise trade in our green economy of the future? The need for exchange is obvious once you move beyond the survivalist position of trying to make everything yourself. For goods that can be made with local materials the only problem is establishing a fair price. And for those that need to travel the world the Cutty Sark may have something to teach us. One local man in Stroud has a long-term plan to buy a sailing vessel and use it to trade with low carbon impact. Discussions are being had about the possibility of using sailing barges to bring goods along the canal to Stroud.

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