Editor,
In his own words, Lobo columnist Craig Butler describes his analysis of globalization as "simply put."
It's a little too simple, though, in light of the facts. Let me take the opportunity to fill in a few overlooked details.
Butler presents the period of time from the 1700s to the early 20th century as a sort of heyday for globalization. That it was, but his rosy analysis is a little short on facts. Other people might remember this period in history as the era of slave trade and other murderous forms of imperialism.
Much of the world was being colonized by armed European invaders, but Butler would like us to recall these days as an era of "fair trade."
He chooses to euphemize colonization and the slave trade as a time when "there were.no limits on immigration."
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This sort of soft peddling revisionism - or is it just ignorance? - disrespects the memory of all those who bled and suffered to line the pockets of Butler's "British investors."
Butler claims that in this time, European wealth "began spreading to the rest of the world."
Wouldn't it be a bit more accurate to say that the wealth of Asia, Africa, and the Americas was being stolen away from these lands?
Would Mr. Butler care to show us how the indigenous peoples (murdered by the hundreds of thousands) benefited from this sort of "trade?"
Europe wasn't spreading wealth to these continents; it was exporting misery.
And as for the "backlash" against these trade practices in the early part of the 20th century, again, Mr. Butler has his dates right, but misses the bigger picture by just as far. Many Americans will remember the turn of the 20th century as a period of landmark victories for workers' rights, women's suffrage, the abolition of child labor and, soon after, the founding of the middle class.
The lesson is that democracy and protest by dedicated citizens were required to humanize an unchecked system of worker abuse.
We find ourselves now at the turning of a new century, the new era of NAFTA and unrestricted global trade. And we should hardly be surprised to find that we face the same issues of colonial destruction and abuse.
We need to be just as assertive of our democratic rights as those heroes of previous eras were in preserving the rights of citizens and workers against limitless and unscrupulous corporate greed.
Butler draws a rather unconvincing conclusion when, with a bit of a shoulder shrug, when the columnist says, "(Globalization) may have its problems, but it's a lot better than anything else we've tried so far."
Mr. Butler needs a reminder of just how well democracy can work when it is allowed to work.
We needn't put blind trust in evil mega-corporations; we need to get corporations and their money out of politics.
Butler may be nostalgic for child labor and the 14-hour workday, but I'll be holding out for some real campaign finance reform.
Glenn Damiani
Daily Lobo reader
