Contents

Foreword by John McMurtry

Introduction

1    Globalization then and now

      The colonial roots of globalization

      Expanding international trade

      The inefficient magic of the marketplace

      Enter the free-market fundamentalists

      The East Asian financial crisis

2    The Bretton Woods trio

      Learning the lessons of the Great Depression

      Keynesian economics

      The International Monetary Fund (IMF)

      The World Bank

      GATT and the World Trade Organization

3    Debt and structural adjustment

      The idea of a new international economic order

      The origins of the debt crisis

      Dictator kickbacks and ‘odious debt’

      Structural adjustment

      The limited scope of debt relief

4    The corporate century

      This KFC world: corporations and culture

      Corporate merger mania

      Pushing privatization

      The problem with foreign direct investment

      Impacts of NAFTA

      The dangers of overproduction

5    Global casino

      The explosion of foreign-exchange transactions

      Financial crises proliferate

      The Asian meltdown

      Why capital controls offer protection

      Latin American responses

6    Poverty, the environment and the market

      The price of ignoring the environment

      How boosting exports can backfire

      Spiralling inequality

      The tyranny of tax havens and the super-rich

      How globalization can derail development

7    Redesigning the global economy

      The cost of growth in China and India

      Another world is possible

      Abolish the Bretton Woods institutions

      Support a tax on financial speculation

      Control capital for the public good

Index