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8 THE RURAL VOICE
Keith Roulston
World government needed
I have been a Canadian nationalist
at least since I was nine years old.
That was when I first remember
being proud of the may country
because of the role Lester B. Pearson
played at the
United Nations
in forming the
Middle East
peace keeping
force.
One of my
few acts of
rebellion in the
rebellious 60s
was taking part
in a sit-down
strike at our high
school, refusing
to stand for God
Save the Queen
as our national
anthem. One of the proudest
moments of my young life was that
cold February day we shivered
around the flag pole while the new
Canadian flag was raised.
Nearly 30 years later, perhaps it's
not only impossible to save this
country, but even undesirable. Maybe
it's time to take a giant leap toward a
world government, one government
to set the rules for the whole globe.
I reluctantly say this because the
pace of change has overcome efforts
to let people have a democratic say in
the running of their own lives. Glob-
alization and free trade have created a
new form of government: the trans-
national super company that answers
to no one but the company board of
directors. As border controls are
wiped out, attempts by the people of
one country to get some kind of
power over these huge businesses,
many of which have annual incomes
larger than some countries, become
futile.
This situation first became evident
in Europe prior to January 1, 1992
when the move was on to erase all
national borders to trade. As the
deadline approached, the companies
were ready. The bureaucrats in
Brussels, Belgium, headquarters of
the European Community, were
ready, but the democratic structure to
control the companies and the
bureaucrats wasn't there. The
European parliament had little power
with most of the former nation states
holding decision-making back home
in London or Paris or Berlin. There
was a power vacuum.
Take a look at the will of the late
K. C. Irving. Irving made one of the
world's largest fortunes in tiny New
Brunswick, yet his greed was such he
hid his income by taking all the
profits out to a Caribbean tax haven.
Canadian companies bought from
Caribbean subsidiaries at high cost,
and sold back for a low price so they
made very little profit while the Car-
ibbean shell companies made huge
profits. In his will, Irving decreed his
sons could only inherit the company
if they lived outside of Canada.
Similarly, trans -national
companies can avoid attempts to
legislate them to clean up the
environment or treat workers fairly.
Any country that wants to legislate
controls may find the companies have
moved to a country with a more
"favourable" business climate.
Unless we come up with a world
government from which these
companies can't hide, we're inviting
a world of lawless giants plundering
the earth. We could choose to naively
believe these companies will behave
morally and ethically without the
threat of legislation to keep them in
check but it would be ignoring the
basic tenet of capitalism: profit
comes first. The prisons in the U.S.
were filled during the 1980s with
business people who felt making
money was all that counted.
The problem is, how do we get a
world government? We can't even
get 10 provinces with a more -or -less
common history to agree to reform
their government so how can we
expect to get all these national
governments to yield power? The
squabbling can go on for decades
while we're giving uncontrollable
businesses power over our lives.
Sadly, the sense of pride in
country we've tried to build in the
last three decades, the sense of
control, may be irrelevant.°
Keith Roulston is editor and
publisher of The Rural Voice as well
as being a playwright. He lives near
Blyth, ON.