by Polly Mann, WAMM

Last December's protests in Seattle reminded me of the 1968 National Democratic Convention, where I participated in protests. One of the differences between the issues involved--the U.S. war in Vietnam and the World Trade Organization (WTO) meeting in Seattle--was that most people know very little about the WTO. Whereas, during the years of the Vietnam War, scarcely a day passed in which the war was not covered by the corporate media.

My WTO information has come from the alternative media. There's just not enough drama to capture the interest of the corporate media in the policy and fairly complicated provisions of the four-year-old WTO. One certainly could find drama in the way WTO policies affect the well-being of people worldwide, but the cause-and-effect results have generally been ignored.

The tremendous protests in Seattle will definitely impact the WTO's future. They have already, I believe, educated hundreds of thousands of people about this 134-member international organization--the most powerful system of global governance on the planet.

The WTO was formed to create a global market free of restrictions designed to protect the environment, working conditions and public health and safety. It is a nonelective body that meets in secret and can invalidate laws created by sovereign members. While individual countries can challenge the WTO, cases are heard by three trade bureaucrats, usually corporate lawyers. There are no rules concerning conflicts of interest. Judges meet in secret at undisclosed locations and times. Documents are kept confidential, closed to public scrutiny. There is no appeal to anyone outside the WTO.

As Ralph Nader's Public Citizen states: "At the request of transnational corporations, the WTO can and will repeal any nation's environmental protections, public health or safety regulations."

In Rachel's Environment & Health Weekly, editor Peter Montague cites the promotion and sale of infant formula as an example typical of how the WTO functions. In many countries, manufacturers advertise infant formula as better and more "modern" than breast-feeding. UNICEF says that, chiefly because of this false advertising, 1.5 million infants die each year because their mothers unwittingly prepare infant formula with contaminated water. In some instances, free formula samples have been supplied new mothers in sufficient quantity to guarantee that when the supply is gone, their breast milk will have dried up.

In 1968, Guatemala passed legislation prohibiting false advertising. All foreign and domestic manufacturers of infant formula and baby food complied, with the exception of Gerber's, who fought the legislation until 1993, when all legal appeals were exhausted. But the company argued that Guatemalan law was illegal under international statutes because the law was really an "expropriation of Gerber's trademark." In 1995, at the creation of the WTO, Guatemala--realizing it was up against an unbeatable foe--gave up the struggle.

This example also illustrates the ease with which small, poor countries can be intimidated by transnational corporations into "opening their markets." US and European pharmaceutical corporations learned an important lesson from Gerber's victory. They have launched a campaign of threats against countries that are trying to make medicines more affordable and accessible to their citizens.

WTO provisions can and do nullify US laws designed to protect the environment. While the U.S. Congress ratified the WTO, this was done without public understanding and approval. What right has the Congress to give to an international body the power to make invalid legislation enacted to protect US citizens, whether those laws concern the environment, the rights of labor, or the health of the American people?

There has been no legal challenge to declare membership in the WTO unconstitutional or illegal, but the WTO poses an enormous threat to the health of the planet and its people. The WTO must be challenged.