Surviving Capitalism (Not) : TTIP: covert attacks on democracy and regulation

We’ve lived so long under the spell of hierarchy—from god-kings to feudal lords to party bosses—that only recently have we awakened to see not only that “regular” citizens have the capacity for self-governance, but that without their engagement our huge global crises cannot be addressed. The changes needed for human society simply to survive, let alone thrive, are so profound that the only way we will move toward them is if we ourselves, regular citizens, feel meaningful ownership of solutions through direct engagement. Our problems are too big, interrelated, and pervasive to yield to directives from on high.
—Frances Moore Lappé, excerpt from Time for Progressives to Grow Up

Saturday, October 11, 2014

TTIP: covert attacks on democracy and regulation

Click here to access article from the Corporate Europe Observatory.

This is an introduction to a beginners guide to the kind of "regulatory cooperation" that the European Commission and corporation-serving negotiators of the US have in mind to subvert national control over environmental, health and safety regulations. To be sure, national control usually mean local elites control to a considerable extent. Yet nation-based regulations usually have far more ordinary citizen input than what we will have under these multi-national trade agreements. We have seen the future with NAFTA.