The People’s Book Project has been ongoing for some time now. I recently attempted a fundraising campaign (aimed at raising $2,000) to support work on the Book Project for March and April. I never met the funding goal, but came very close, due to the extremely generous support of readers.

That support has led to significant progress on the project: no new chapters are being started currently. Rather, I am now focusing on finishing the existing chapters and beginning the process of editing together the first volume of the People’s Book Project, focused on issues related to the global economic crisis: the food crisis, land grabs, global poverty, slums, trade, so-called “free trade” agreements, corporate power, bank domination and profits, austerity policies, debt crises, and resistance to economic and corporate tyranny.

Over the next two months, the first volume of the book project should be nearing the first complete edit. But for that to happen, I need to again ask for support from readers to contribute to making this project a reality.

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Please consider being a contributor and patron to The People’s Book Project. I am aiming to reach the fundraising goal of $2,000 to support the remaining research, writing, and editing for the first volume of the ‘global economic order.’

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Andrew Gavin Marshall

By: Andrew Gavin Marshall

Photograph: Mido Ahmed/AFP/Getty Images

The following is a first draft sample from a chapter currently being written for The People’s Book Project. Read more about The People’s Book Project here, and please consider donating to help the Project continue.

The American imperial system incorporates much more than supporting the occasional coup or undertaking the occasional war. Coups, wars, assassinations and other forms of overt and covert violence and destabilization, while relatively common and consistent for the United States – compared to other major powers – are secondary to the general maintenance of a system of imperial patronage. A “stable” system is what is desired most by strategic planners and policy-makers, but this has a technical definition. Stability means that the populations of subject nations and regions are under “control” – whether crushed by force or made passive by consent, while Western corporate and financial interests have and maintain unhindered access to the “markets” and resources of those nations and regions. Since the 19^th century development of America’s overseas empire, this has been referred to as the “Open Door” policy: as in, the door opens for American and other Western economic interests to have access to and undertake exploitation of resources and labour.

As the only global imperial power, and by far the world’s largest military power, America does not merely rely upon the “goodwill” of smaller nations or the threat of force against them in order to maintain its dominance, it has established, over time, a large and complex network of imperial patronage: supplying economic aid, military aid (to allow its favoured regimes to control their own populations or engage in proxy-warfare), military and police training, among many other programs. These programs are largely coordinated by and between the Defense Department, State Department, and the United States Agency for International Development (USAID).

Arms sales are a major method through which the United States – and other powerful nations – are able to exert their hegemony, by arming and strengthening their key allies, directly or indirectly fueling civil wars and conflicts, and funneling money into the world’s major weapons manufacturers. The global economic crisis had “significantly pushed down purchases of weapons” over 2009 to the lowest level since 2005. In 2009, worldwide arms deals amounted to $57.5 billion, dropping 8.5% from the previous year. The United States maintained its esteemed role as the main arms dealer in the world, accounting for $22.6 billion – or 39% of the global market. In 2008, the U.S. contribution to global arms sales was significantly higher, at $38.1 billion, up from $25.7 billion in 2007. In 2009, the second-largest arms dealer in the world was Russia at $10.4 billion, then France at $7.4 billion, followed by Germany, Italy, China and Britain.[1]

There are two official ways in which arms are sold to foreign nations: either through Foreign Military Sales (FMS), in which the Pentagon negotiates an agreement between the U.S. government and a foreign government for the sale and purchase of arms, and through Direct Commercial Sales (DCS), in which arms manufacturers (multinational corporations) negotiate directly with foreign governments for the sale and purchase of arms, having to apply for a license from the State Department.

Between 2005 and 2009, U.S. arms sales totaled roughly $101 billion, with direct commercial sales (DCS) accounting for more than half of the total value, at $59.86 billion, and Foreign Military Sales (FMS) accounting for $40.85 billion. The top seven recipients of U.S. arms sales between 2005 and 2009 were: Japan at $13.14 billion, the United Kingdom at $8.32 billion, Israel at $8 billion, South Korea at $6.53 billion, Australia at $4.17 billion, Egypt at $4.07 billion, and the United Arab Emirates (UAE) at $3.98 billion.[2]

The United States experienced a slight decline in global arms sales over 2009, though it maintained its position as the world’s number one arms dealer, holding 30% of the global market. However, the Obama administration in 2010 decided to change certain “export control regulations” in order to make arms deals easier and increase the U.S. share of the global market. The stated reason for the legal change was “to simplify the sale of weapons to U.S. allies,” though it had the added benefit of “generating business for the U.S. defense industry.” The U.S. National Security Advisor at the time, General James Jones, claimed that without the changes, the existing system of arms sales “poses a potential national security risk based on the fact that its structure is overly complicated.”[3]

In early 2010, the Obama administration began pressuring Saudi Arabia and other Gulf dictatorships (aka: “allies”) to increase their purchases of U.S. arms, upgrade their defense of oil installations and threaten Iran with overwhelming military superiority. In the lead were Saudi Arabia and the UAE in undertaking a regional “military buildup” – or arms race – resulting in more than $25 billion in U.S. arms sales to the region over the previous two years. A senior U.S. official in the Obama administration commented: “We’re developing a truly regional defensive capability, with missile systems, air defense and a hardening up of critical infrastructure… All of these have progressed significantly over the past year.” Another senior official stated, “It’s a tough neighborhood, and we have to make sure we are protected,” adding that Iran was the “number one threat in the region.”[4]

Of course, Iran is actually a nation that exists within the region, and thus has the right to defend itself, whereas the United States cannot “defend” itself in a region in which it does not exist. But then, geographical trivialities have never been a concern to imperialists who believe that the world belongs to them and it was a mere accident of history that all the resources exist outside of the empire’s home country. Therefore, with such a rationalization, the United States – and the West more broadly – have a “right” to “defend” themselves (and their economic and political interests) everywhere in the world, and against everyone in the world. Any other nation which poses a challenge to Western domination of the world and its resources is thus a “threat” to whichever region it belongs, as well as to U.S. “national security.”

Iran is of course not the only competition for the United States and the West in its unhindered access to and control of the world, but China is another and arguably much more significant threat (though not an officially sanctioned U.S. enemy, as of yet). Around the same time the U.S. was pushing for increased arms sales to the Persian Gulf dictatorships (no doubt, to advance the causes of “democracy” and “peace”), the Obama administration secured an arms deal with Taiwan worth over $6 billion, incurring the frustration of China. The deal included the sale of 114 Patriot missiles, 60 Black Hawk helicopters, and communications equipment for Taiwan’s fleet of F-16s, with the possibility of future sales of F-16 fighter jets.[5]

The Chinese vice foreign minister expressed “indignation” to the U.S. State Department in response to the arms deal, adding: “We believe this move endangers China’s national security and harms China’s peaceful reunification efforts [with Taiwan]… It will harm China-U.S. relations and bring about a serious and active impact on bilateral communication and cooperation.” In response, the U.S. National Security Advisor General James Jones stated that the announcement shouldn’t “come as a surprise to our Chinese friends.”[6]

In September of 2010, the Obama administration announced the intention to undertake the largest arms deal in U.S. history, the sale of advanced aircraft to Saudi Arabia worth up to $60 billion for fighter jets and helicopters (84 F-15s, 70 Apaches, 72 Black Hawks, and 36 Little Birds), as well as engaging “in talks with the [Saudi] kingdom about potential naval and missile-defense upgrades that could be worth tens of billions of dollars more,” according to the Wall Street Journal, with “a potential $30 billion package to upgrade Saudi Arabia’s naval forces.” The stated objective was to counter the role of Iran in the region, though no agreement had been initially reached. The U.S. was selling the idea to Congress as a means of creating “jobs,” a political euphemism for corporate profits. One official involved in the talks noted, “It’s a big economic sale for the U.S. and the argument is that it is better to create jobs here than in Europe.”[7]

The arms deal would purchase equipment and technology from Lockheed Martin, Raytheon, Boeing, and United Technologies. In recent years, Saudi Arabia had been purchasing more European and Russian-made arms from companies like BAE Systems. U.S. officials were also attempting to ease the fears of Israel while massively building up the arsenal of a close neighbor, ensuring that the planes sold to the Kingdom wouldn’t have long-range weapons systems and further, that the Israelis would purchase the more advanced F-35 jet fighters. The Israeli ambassador to the United States, Michael Oren, commented, “We appreciate the administration’s efforts to maintain Israel’s qualitative military edge.” The potential $60 billion arms deal with the Saudis would be stretched out over several years, though there was talk that the Saudis might only guarantee a purchase of at least $30 billion, at least, initially.[8]

The Financial Times reported that the Arab dictatorships in the Gulf “have embarked on one of the largest re-armament exercises in peacetime history, ordering US weapons worth some $123 billion as they seek to counter Iran’s military power.” Saudi Arabia’s $60 billion was the largest, with the United Arab Emirates (UAE) signing arms deals worth between $35 and $40 billion in purchases of a “high altitude missile defence system” known as THAAD, developed by Lockheed Martin, as well as purchasing upgrades of its Patriot missile defense systems, produced by Raytheon. Oman was expected to purchase $12 billion and Kuwait $7 billion in arms and military technology. The CEO of Blenheim Capital Partners, a consultancy firm which helps arrange arms deals, noted that Middle Eastern and Southeast Asian countries were replacing Western European nations as the largest arms purchasers, adding: “They are the big buyers.”[9]

Anthony Cordesman from the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) said that the United States was seeking to create a “new post-Iraq war security structure that can secure the flow of energy exports to the global economy.” These massive arms sales would then “reinforce the level of regional deterrence” – or in other words, expand American hegemony over the region through local proxy powers and dictatorships – and thus, “help reduce the size of forces the US must deploy in the region.” As a Saudi defense analyst noted, “[t]he Saudi aim is to send a message especially to the Iranians – that we have complete aerial superiority over them.”[10]

According to three of four members of an ‘Expert Roundup’ published by the Council on Foreign Relations, the $123 billion arms deals with the Arab dictatorships are “a good idea for the United States and the Middle East.” One of the “experts” is Anthony Cordesman, the Arleigh A. Burke Chair in Strategy at CSIS, former director of intelligence assessment in the Office of the Secretary of Defense, as well as having served in several other State Department and NATO staffs, and has been a regular consultant to the Afghan and Iraqi occupation commands, U.S. embassies, and was a member of the Strategic Assessment Group which advised General Stanley McChrystal in developing a new strategy in Afghanistan for 2009. He also regularly consults with the U.S. State and Defense Departments and the intelligence community. Cordesman wrote that the US “shares critical strategic interests with Saudi Arabia,” notably the control of oil for “the health” of the global economy.[11]

Cordesman also emphasized the role of pliant dictatorships in carrying out U.S imperial objectives in the region, writing that the U.S. “needs allies that have interoperable forces that can both fight effectively alongside the United States and ease the U.S. burden by defending themselves,” meaning, to defend America’s interests, which then become the interests of America’s proxies – or “allies.” The arms sales would be a helpful counter to Iran in the region, and secure a strong relationship between “the current Saudi government as well as Saudi governments for the next fifteen to twenty years,” the suggested timeline for delivery of all purchases, providing Saudi Arabia with a “strong incentive to work with the United States” over the long-term.[12]

Loren B. Thompson, the Chief Operating Officer of the Lexington Institute, also participated in the Council on Foreign Relations ‘Roundup’ report, writing that the arms deal “appears to be a careful reconciliation of Saudi requirements with Israeli fears, while also offering a strategic balance against Iran.” Whatever the differences between Saudi Arabia and the United States, he wrote, casting aside the fact that the Kingdom is one of the most brutal and dictatorial regimes in the world, “the Saudis have been reliable allies of America for decades and have exercised a moderating influence on the behavior of other oil-producing states.” Helping the Saudis, Thompson wrote, “means helping ourselves.”[13]

F. Gregory Gause III, Professor and Chair of the Political Science Department at the University of Vermont wrote that the arms deal “will not buy much security in the long run in the Persian Gulf,” but, he added, “there are no good reasons not to sell the Saudis those weapons, and there are some potentially positive results (besides the economic benefits to the US),” such as opposing the “Iranian regional challenge,” with which he included Hezbollah in Lebanon, Hamas in the Occupied Territories of Palestine, “various Iraqi parties,” Syria, and “Shia activists in the Gulf monarchies.” One could not object to the arms sale on the basis of supporting a regime with a horrible record on democracy, women’s rights, Islam, and human rights, Gause wrote, adding: “Moral purity would be purchased at the price of reduced American regional influence.” In other words, it’s a terrible regime, but it’s America’s terrible regime, and thus, challenging or changing the nature of the regime could undermine and erode America’s influence through the dictatorship and over the region.[14]

William Hartung, the director of the Arms and Security Initiative at the New America Foundation, was another “expert” in the Council on Foreign Relations ‘Roundup’ report, providing the one “cautionary note” on the arms deal on the basis that it could amount to fueling an arms race in the region, building up the forces of Saudi Arabia, the Gulf monarchs, and Israel, thus providing pressure on Iran “to ratchet up its own military capabilities.” The Saudi deal “consists primary of offensive weapons,” though it is stated to be for defensive purposes, and if Saudi Arabia were to undertake aggressive military actions in the region, such as in Yemen (as it has), it would more likely “inflame passions” against Saudi Arabia instead of solving security problems.[15]

The United States has for years dominated the arms market of the Persian Gulf, supplying military equipment to Saudi Arabia, UAE, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar and Bahrain, all members of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC), a regional governance association. A Middle East “defense analyst” with Forecast International, stated: “The U.S. arms sales to these countries are meant to improve the defense capabilities of the recipient nations, reinforce the sense of U.S. solidarity with its GCC partners and, finally, create a semblance of interoperability with American forces.” After the United States, the largest arms dealers to the region are France, Russia, Britain and China. Russian and Chinese arms mostly went to Iran, while Israel received $2.78 billion in U.S. military aid in 2010.[16]

In October of 2010, the United States assistant secretary of state for political-military affairs, Andrew Shapiro, formally announced the intended Saudi arms deal for the U.S. Congress to approve for a program to last from 15 to 20 years. Shapiro stated that, “This is not solely about Iran… It’s about helping the Saudis with their legitimate security needs… they live in a dangerous neighbourhood and we are helping them preserve and protect their security.”[17]

For an average of $13 billion per year in arms sales between 1995 and 2005, the Department of Defense announced in 2010 that it intended to sell up to $103 billion, though presumably achieving a lower number, such as $50 billion, over the course of the year. A defense industry consultant, Loren Thompson, stated that, “Obama is much more favorably disposed to arms exports than any of the previous Democratic administrations.” Jeff Abramson of the Arms Control Association stated that there was “an Obama arms bazaar going on.” While the discussion about the massive arms sales in most of the press and political discourse was focused upon supporting 200,000 workers in the ‘defense’ industry, industry consultant Thompson was less ambiguous: “It’s about U.S. allies, it’s about maintaining jobs, and it’s about America’s broader role in the world – and what you have to do to maintain that role;” the role being – of course – that of the global imperial hegemon.[18]

Military contractors spread their factories and workforce out across several U.S. states in order to use their leverage as “major employers” with the U.S. Congress and other political powers. Boeing has facilities in over 20 U.S. states, and the corporation’s head of business development for military aircraft, Lt. Gen. Jeffrey Kohler, was previously responsible for overseeing arms exports for the Pentagon. The entire industry of military contractors is entirely dependent upon massive state subsidies to survive, doing 80-90% of their business with the Pentagon. And, as CNN Money reported, “business recently has been good,” with the U.S. more than doubling its military spending since 2001 to roughly $700 billion, nearly as much as the rest of the entire world spends combined.[19]

Congress agreed in December of 2010 to spend $725 billion on ‘defense’ for 2011. Military contractors were largely seeking “growth” – a euphemism for exploitation and profit – by turning to foreign arms sales. The military contractor EADS sought to establish a headquarters in Asia, Honeywell created a new “international sales” division, and Lockheed Martin was planning to increase its revenue share acquired outside the United States from 14 to 20% by 2012, Boeing aimed to increase international sales from 17-25%, and Raytheon had the largest percentage of revenue from overseas at 23%. But sadly, for the arms dealers, it’s not so easy to sell weapons to foreign governments, since each deal requires a license from the U.S. State Department, a pesky barrier to “growth.” The countries with the “biggest appetite for U.S weapons” are “oil-rich nations in the Middle East,” with roughly 50% of foreign military sales by U.S. contractors between 2006 and 2009 being sold to countries in the region, with Boeing reaping the most overall profits. Mark Kronenberg, the head of Boeing’s international business development, noted: “The last time we had a period like this in the Middle East was the early ‘90s,” during the lead up to and aftermath of the first Gulf War, adding, “Here we are, 20 years later, and they’re recapitalizing.”[20]

A report prepared by the U.S. Congressional Research Service and published in December of 2011 detailed Foreign Military Sales (FMS) agreements between the United States and other nations for the period of 2003 to 2010. Between 2003 and 2006, the top ten largest recipients of U.S. arms through FMS (and excluding Direct Commercial Sales and Foreign Military Aid programs) were: Egypt ($4.5 billion), Saudi Arabia ($4.2 billion), Poland ($4.1 billion), followed by Australia, Japan, Greece, South Korea, Kuwait, Turkey, and Israel. For the years 2007 to 2010, the top ten recipients were: Saudi Arabia ($13.8 billion), UAE ($10.4 billion), Egypt ($7.8 billion), followed by Taiwan, Australia, Iraq, Pakistan, UK, Turkey, and South Korea. In 2010, the top ten purchases of U.S. arms were: Taiwan ($2.7 billion), Egypt ($1.8 billion), Saudi Arabia ($1.5 billion), followed by Australia, UK, Israel, Iraq, Jordan, South Korea, and Singapore.[21]

In April of 2011, Leslie H. Gelb, the President Emeritus of the Council on Foreign Relations, wrote that in light of “the possible consequences of the new popular awakenings” across the Middle East, and the fact that as dictatorships increasingly “crack down even harder against the protesters… enabled by Western arms,” Americans “don’t like thinking of themselves or having others think of them as merchants of death.” The “nightmares” of Western policy-makers “comes from their hopes for Arab democracy” – that is, the emergence of “stable democracies over time” – and “their fears that fledgling Arab democracies will go awry.”[22] So naturally, arms deals are a good means to secure U.S. interests in the region.

In May of 2011, Andrew Shapiro, the Assistant Secretary of State for Political-Military Affairs, spoke to the U.S. Department of State’s Defense Trade Advisory Group, at which he said the “demand” for U.S. arms and military technology “will remain strong because the U.S. has longstanding defense commitments to allies around the world,” and “we will remain very busy no matter the fluctuations of the global market.” The “dynamic nature of the geopolitical landscape” would require the U.S. “to adapt to changing situations.” Shapiro stated that, “we are witnessing another geopolitical shift, which may have broad implications for U.S. foreign policy,” referencing the popular uprisings across the Middle East as “perhaps the most significant geopolitical development since the end of the Cold War.” In his speech, Shapiro praised his audience at the Defense Trade Advisory Group (DTAG) as “valuable” in “giving us a formal channel to the private sector,” enabling the State Department “to better evaluate U.S. laws and regulations, especially during times of immense change.”[23]

The members of the DTAG included top executives and officials from such companies as BAE Systems, ITT Defense, Boeing, Booz Allen Hamilton, EADS North America, Intel, General Electric, General Dynamics, United Technologies, Tyco, Northrop Grumman, Honeywell International, Raytheon, and Lockheed Martin, among a total of 45 individuals.[24] According to its website, the DTAG advises the State Department Bureau of Political-Military Affairs “on its support for and regulation of defense trade to help ensure that impediments to legitimate exports are reduced while the foreign policy and national security interests of the U.S. continue to be protected and advanced.”

Shapiro told these corporate representatives that, “It is important to emphasize that arms transfers are a tool to advance U.S. foreign policy. And therefore when U.S. foreign policy interests, goals, and objectives shift, evolve, and transform over time, so will our arms transfer policy.” As always, stated Shapiro, “we urge you to provide your thoughts and ideas over how we should move forward.” Foreign military sales – especially to the Middle East – will continue as “a critical foreign policy instrument” allowing the U.S. to “gain influence and leverage, which can be used to help advance our foreign policy goals and objectives.”[25]

As an example, the United States approved $200 million in military sales from U.S. corporations to the government of Bahrain in 2010, just months before pro-democracy protests erupted in the country, resulting in “a harsh crackdown on protesters,” killing at least 30 and injuring hundreds of more people in a matter of months.[26]

In December of 2011, Andrew Shapiro announced the formal signing with Saudi Arabia to sell the dictatorship $30 billion in F-15 fighter jets to be delivered by 2015, as well as other plans to sell $11 billion in arms to Iraq. The Saudi deal was the result of extensive lobbying efforts by top government officials, including Obama making several phone calls to Saudi King Abdullah, and the U.S. National Security Advisor, Thomas E. Donilon, twice traveling to Riyadh while Vice President Joe Biden led a “high-level delegation” to a funeral for a Saudi Prince in October of 2011.[27]

Embracing the World with Open “Arms”

In 2009, worldwide arms sales stood at $65.2 billion, dropping by 38% to $40.4 billion in 2010, the lowest number since 2003, with the United States contributing $21.4 billion – or 52.7% – of the global arms deals, Russia in second place at $7.8 billion over 2010, followed by France, Britain, China, Germany and Italy, according to a report by the Congressional Research Service. Over 75% of global arms sales in 2010 were for ‘developing’ countries, with India in top place at $5.8 billion in arms deals, followed by Taiwan at $2.7 billion, Saudi Arabia at $2.2 billion, Egypt, Israel, Algeria, Syria, South Korea, Singapore and Jordan.[28]

This relative decline in global arms sales over 2010 was not to be repeated for 2011, with the number skyrocketing to $85.3 billion, with the U.S. contribution tripling to $66.3 billion, accounting for more than three-quarters of global arms deals.[29] Russia stood in a distant second place with $4.8 billion in arms sales.[30] While the United States controls roughly 75% of the global arms trade, it would be wrong to ignore the role of the other major players, though they are far from even competing with the U.S.

The Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI) reported that the rise in arms sales had increased by 60% in real terms since 2002, with the total sales of the top 100 arms companies reaching $411.1 billion in 2010. The arms industry is “increasingly concentrated” to the point where the top ten firms account for 56% of all sales, with Lockheed Martin at the top with sales of $35.7 billion in 2010, followed by Britain’s BAE Systems at $32.8 billion, Boeing at $31.3 billion, and Northrop Grumman at $28.5 billion.[31] Other major companies on the top 100 list of arms manufacturers include: General Dynamics, Raytheon, EADS, L-3 Communications, United Technologies, Thales, SAIC, Honeywell, Rolls-Royce, General Electric, KBR, Hewlett-Packard, and DynCorp.[32]

Following the beginning of the Arab Spring and the toppling of the Western-backed dictators in Tunisia and Egypt, British Prime Minister David Cameron continued with a pre-planned tour of the Middle East in February of 2011, leading what the British Green Party leader called a “delegation of arms traders,” with almost 75% of the businessmen accompanying the Prime Minister on his trip to the region representing the defense and aerospace industries.[33] As the first Western leader to visit Egypt following the fall of Mubarak, Cameron praised the pro-democracy movement: “Meeting the young people and the representatives of the groups in Tahrir Square [in Cairo] was genuinely inspiring,” adding: “These are people who have risked a huge amount for what they believe in.” Immediately after praising Egypt’s revolution and expressing his own ‘beliefs’ in democracy, Cameron flew to Kuwait with his arms dealer delegation to sell weapons to other Arab dictatorships. When criticized for the excessive hypocrisy of his democracy-praising and dictatorship arms-dealing tour of the Middle East, Cameron simply asserted that Britain had “nothing to be ashamed of,” as there was nothing wrong with such transactions.[34]

As dictators across the region were becoming increasingly belligerent toward protesters, seeking to violently crush resistance after the successful examples of Tunisians and Egyptians toppling their long-standing dictators, increasing arms shipments to the region’s despots seemed to be only natural for Western imperial powers seeking stability and control. Kevan Jones, the British Shadow Defence Minister noted: “The defence industry is crucially important to Britain but many people will be surprised that the prime minister in this week of all weeks may be considering bolstering arms sales to the Middle East.” Accompanying David Cameron on his trip were 36 corporate representatives, including Ian King, the CEO of BAE Systems, as well as Victor Chavez of Thales UK, Alastair Bisset of Qinetiq, and Rob Watson of Rolls Royce. When questioned about his ‘arms dealer delegation,’ Cameron stated: “I have got a range of business people on the aeroplane, people involved in infrastructure and people involved in the arts and cultural exchanges. Yes, we have defence manufacturers as well. Britain does have a range of defence relationships with countries in the region. I seem to remember that we spent a lot of effort and indeed life in helping to defend Kuwait. So it is quite right to have defence relationships with some of these countries.”[35]

As Cameron was hopping around the region selling weapons, the largest arms fair in the Middle East – the Index 2011 – was taking place in Abu Dhabi, bringing thousands of arms dealers to an exhibition hall with fighter jets flying overhead, tanks in the sand, with Predator drones and assault rifles on display, models fully dressed in the latest riot police outfits, and all choreographed to a hip-hop soundtrack. Meanwhile, not very far from the booming arms fair, protesters in Bahrain were being violently repressed by a dictatorship armed and supported by the West. The British delegation to the arms fair was led by the Defence Minister, Gerald Howarth, helping represent British companies which were displaying and selling their latest tools for ‘crowd control,’ showcasing teargas grenades, stun grenades, and rubber bullets.[36]

A British officer from the government’s Trade and Industry stand at the arms fair was explaining the benefits of a particular fragmentation bomb to a top military official from the Algerian dictatorship. Howarth explained, “I am here as the minister for national security strategy, supporting this important exhibition.” While in 2011 the British had to revoke export licenses to Bahrain and Libya following the violence erupting in both countries, over the previous year the British issued 20 licenses for exports of “riot control weapons,” such as teargas, smoke and stun grenades, to Bahrain, Qatar, the United Arab Emirates, and Oman, as well as nearly 200 million pounds in “crowd control ammunition” to the government of Libya.[37]

Weapons manufacturers stated that they felt the increased criticism inflicted upon their industry following the start of the Arab Spring had left them “battered and bruised.” One arms trader, commenting less than two weeks after Mubarak was toppled, stated that, “[t]he Middle East was a growing market until a few weeks ago,” while a representative from BAE agreed that the market for arms was insecure: “It is too early to say where it will end up… Given what is going on at the moment, nobody is likely to be talking about how to spend their defence procurement budget.” When a representative for the British arms exporter Chemring was questioned about selling CS gas shotgun cartridges and stun grenades, he explained, “we have an ethnical policy in place and look closely at the countries we are considering exporting to and see if they fit that.” A representative for Primetake, a British firm selling rubber ball shot, teargas, and rubber baton rounds, defended his firm: “We are a very respectable organization and we take very careful advice from the Ministry of Defense and the business department.”[38]

Between October of 2009 and October of 2010, the British exported arms and military equipment to multiple countries in the Middle East and North Africa, including over 270 million pounds in materials to Algeria, including combat helicopters, roughly 6.4 million pounds in arms deals with Bahrain, nearly 17 million pounds with Egypt, 477 million pounds with Iraq, 27 million pounds with Israel, 21 million pounds with Jordan, 14.5 million pounds with Kuwait, 6.2 million pounds with Lebanon, 215 million pounds with Libya, 2.2 million pounds with Morocco, 14 million pounds with Oman, 13 million pounds with Qatar, 140 million pounds with Saudi Arabia, 2.6 million pounds with Syria, 4.5 million pounds to Tunisia, and 210 million pounds to the UAE. These sales included assault rifles, tear gas, ammunition, bombs, missiles, body armour, gun parts, gas mask filters, signaling and radar equipment, armoured vehicles, anti-riot shields, patrol boats, military software, shotguns, “crowd-control equipment,” tank parts, military cargo vehicles, air surveillance equipment, armoured personnel carriers, small arms ammunition, heavy machine guns, and a plethora of other products, almost exclusively delivered to dictatorships (with the exception of Israel).[39]

Germany, which stood as the world’s third-largest arms exporter in previous years (after the US and Russia), had doubled its share of the global arms trade over the previous decade to 11%, totaling roughly 6 billion euros in arms deals for 2008 alone, with companies like EADS, Rheinmetall and Heckler & Koch leading the way. Even Russia was becoming a big customer for German military equipment, purchasing armoured plating and tanks.[40]

In 2009, the European Union had established new export rules for arms and military technology, much-praised as preventing the export of arms that “might be used for undesirable purposes such as internal repression or international aggression or contribut[ing] to regional instability.” With the EU rules in place, member countries were free to completely disregard them. A European Commission study leaked to Der Spiegel in 2012 revealed that combined exports from EU nations made the European Union “the world’s largest exporter of weapons” to Saudi Arabia, delivering at least $4.34 billion in equipment in 2010 alone. Sweden helped the Saudi dictatorship build a missile factory, Finland delivered grenade launchers, Germany sold tanks and Britain provided fighter jets. The arms exporters were unfazed by the fact that equipment such as the tanks were used by Saudi Arabia in its “invitation” to invade Bahrain and help the Bahraini dictatorship crush the pro-democracy movement in early 2011. An official with the Swedish Peace and Arbitration Society noted that the Swedish support for building a missile factory in Saudi Arabia has meant that, “we are legitimizing one of the most brutal regimes in the world.” Pakistan had meanwhile become China’s biggest customer for arms exports, while India purchased 10% of the world’s arms exports in 2010 “to defend itself against neighbor and arch enemy Pakistan.”[41]

When German Chancellor Angela Merkel spoke at the Munich Security Conference in 2011, she mentioned the “obligation to pursue value-based foreign policy,” and has often argued that “no compromises” can be made on issues of human rights. As part of Merkel’s respect for “human rights” and “value-based foreign policy,” weapons sales have increased as a significant factor in Germany’s foreign policy strategy, quietly changing the rules for arms exports to increase weapons sales to “crisis regions” as “a major pillar of the country’s security policy.” The objective would be to strengthen countries within “crisis regions” and therefore reduce the possibility that the German military would itself have to participate in “international missions.”[42]

The German publication Der Spiegel referred to this as the “Merkel doctrine” of “tanks instead of soldiers.” Among the key countries to support, identified by Merkel and eight other ministers who met behind closed doors under the aegis of the Federal Security Council, were Saudi Arabia, Indonesia, Qatar, India, and Angola. Merkel explained her doctrine in a speech at an event in Berlin in September of 2011 where she stated that if the West lacks the will and ability to undertake direct military intervention, “then it’s generally not enough to send other countries and organizations words of encouragement. We must also provide the necessary means to those nations that are prepared to get involved. I’ll say it clearly: This includes arms exports.” This, of course, Merkel added, would nicely manifest as a foreign policy “that is aligned with respect for human rights.”[43]

As part of the “Merkel doctrine” of engaging in a “value-based foreign policy” with “respect for human rights,” Germany increased its arms sales to the Algerian dictatorship from 20 million euros in 2010 to nearly 400 million euros in 2012, with German military manufacturer Rheinmetall planning to produce 1,200 armored personnel carriers for Algeria over the next ten years.[44] According to published European Union documents, over 2011, the top five arms exporting countries in the EU were France, the U.K., Germany, Italy, and Spain, collectively exporting over 80% of 37.5 billion euros in arms from EU countries. The European Union, winner of the 2012 Nobel Peace Prize, increased its arms exports by 18.3% since the previous year, with an increase in export licenses to Asia, the Middle East, and sub-Saharan Africa. There were arms licenses issued to Libya, Tunisia, Algeria, Morocco, and over 300-million euros-worth of arms for Egypt. The EU increased its arms exports to “areas of tension,” including India, Pakistan, and a record 465 million euros in arms to Afghanistan, “a country still under partial arms embargo.”[45] However, ‘partial’ is apparently debatable.

With the United States reaching a record-breaking $60 billion in arms deals over 2011, Andrew Shapiro at the State Department stated that 2012 was set to be an equally – if not larger – bonanza for arms dealers. Revealing the role of diplomats and top government officials as glorified lobbyists and corporate representatives, Shapiro told a group of defense writers in the Summer of 2012: “We’ve really upped our game in terms of advocating on behalf of U.S. companies,” adding, “I’ve got the frequent-flyer miles to prove it.” Shapiro had traveled to more than 11 countries over 2012 promoting arms deals, noting that sales were at a record level for the third quarter of 2012, already passing $50 billion. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton had made “advocacy” for arms dealers “a key priority” for U.S. diplomats and State Department officials who “were now expected to undertake such efforts on all trips abroad.” Shapiro and others had been lobbying for American military contractors in deals ranging from Japan’s $10 billion purchase of aircraft from Lockheed Martin to India’s increased arms purchases, where Shapiro saw “tremendous potential” for U.S. arms sales, and to Brazil, where Boeing was competing with France’s Dassault company for a multibillion-dollar defense contract, of which Shapiro stated, “We’re eager to make the best possible case for the Boeing aircraft, and we’re hopeful that it will be selected.”[46]

By March of 2013, the world’s five largest arms exporters were the U.S., Russia, Germany, France, and China overtook the UK for the first time in fifth place, having increased its arms exports by 162% between 2008 and 2012, increasing its share of the global arms trade from 2 to 5%, over 50% of which are delivered to Pakistan, with other large recipients being Myanmar, Bangladesh, Algeria, Venezuela and Morocco.[47] Li Hong, the secretary-general of the China Arms Control and Disarmament Association noted: “Military exports are one way for China to increase its international status,” explaining that, “China needs to increase its influence in regional affairs and from that perspective it needs to increase weapons exports further.” As China increased its own military budget in recent years, it had turned to developing its own weapons industries, thus moving from being the world’s number one arms importer (of conventional weapons) between 2003-2007 to taking second place behind India in the 2008-2012 period, acquiring roughly 69% of its arms imports from Russia.[48]

British Prime Minister David Cameron again traveled to the Middle East, accompanied by his Defense Secretary Philip Hammond and another delegation of arms dealers in 2012, seeking to sell up to 100 Eurofighter Typhoon jets to Saudi Arabia and the UAE, built by EADS and marketed by BAE, competing with France’s cheaper Rafale strike jet made by Dassault Aviation. The increased – and increasingly profitable – arms race in the Middle East was largely facilitated by America’s policies toward Iran. William Cohen is a former U.S. Secretary of Defense in the Clinton administration, current Counselor and Trustee to the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), former member of the board of directors of the Council on Foreign Relations from 1989 to 1997, current Vice Chairman of the U.S.-China Business Council, on the board of directors of CBS Corporation, and is Chairman and CEO of The Cohen Group, an international business consulting firm. Commenting on the growing arms race in the Middle East, Cohen repeated the usual American propaganda, stating that there was “A very legitimate concern about Iran being a revolutionary country,” though also adding that terrorism, cyberattack threats, and “the implications of the Arab Spring” spurred each country in the region “to make sure it’s protected against that.” Cohen added that military contractors, information technology firms and other corporations “have an enormous opportunity” in the region.[49]

When British Defense Secretary Philip Hammond traveled to Indonesia to promote arms deals for British military contractors like BAE Systems and Rolls-Royce, he explained that increasing military ties with notoriously corrupt Indonesia, posed “manageable” risks. He commented: “From the companies I have talked to, they recognize that there is a challenge but they think that it is manageable, and they can operate here successfully while observing the UK and US legal requirements to address anti-corruption issues.” This statement came amid accusations of Rolls-Royce engaging in bribery to acquire business in China, Indonesia, and elsewhere. Hammond noted that in light of the U.S. “pivot” to Asia, Britain was “looking east in a way we have not done before.” Indonesia had recently purchased F-16 fighter jets and Apache helicopters from the U.S., Sukhoi fighters from Russia, missile systems from China, anti-aircraft missiles, Hawk jets and small arms from British companies.[50] Prime Minister David Cameron defended arms sales to oppressive regimes such as Saudi Arabia, declaring it to be “completely legitimate and right.”[51]

The International Institute for Strategic Studies (IISS), a major think tank, projected that defense spending in Asia would overtake that of Europe for the first time in 2012, noting that Asia was in the midst of an arms race between China and other states in the region. The expenditure of European members of NATO on defense spending over 2011 was just under $270 billion, whereas in Asia it had reached $262 billion (excluding Australia and New Zealand). As China announced increased defense spending, the United States announced a “shift in military strategy” which treats the Asia-Pacific region “as one of the Pentagon’s priorities at a time when forces in Europe are being sharply cut.” Secretary of State Hillary Clinton stated that large and rising powers like China “have a special obligation to demonstrate in concrete ways that they are going to pursue a constructive path.” Leon Panetta, the U.S. Defense Secretary, noted that America’s “military posture in Asia will be increased.”[52]

Indeed, in 2012, Asian defense spending surpassed that of Europe for the first time, reaching a record level of $287.4 billion, though the United States continued to account for 45.3% of total global military spending, meaning that the United States spends almost as much on military expenditures than the rest of the entire world combined.[53] The United States, as part of its Pacific ‘pivot’ in military strategy, increased its arms sales to countries neighbouring China and North Korea. Fred Downey, vice president of the U.S. trade group, Aerospace Industries Association, which includes top U.S. military contractors, noted that the Pacific pivot “will result in growing opportunities for our industry to help equip our friends.” U.S. arms sales to the region increased to $13.7 billion in 2012, up more than 5% from the previous year. There were 65 individual notifications to the U.S. Congress over the previous year regarding total foreign military sales brokered by the Pentagon with a collective value exceeding $63 billion. The State Department, responsible for issuing licenses for direct commercial sales between military contractors and foreign governments, noted that 2012 saw a new record increase with more than 85,000 license requests.[54]

As Obama set a new record for arms sales to the Middle East in 2012, Assistant Secretary of State Andrew Shapiro noted, “If countries view the United States unfavorably, they will be less willing to cooperate on security matters,” and for this reason, “the current administration has sought to revitalize U.S. diplomatic engagement, especially relating to security assistance and defense trade.” The growth in arms sales, noted Shapiro, speaking to the Defense Trade Advisory Group in November of 2012, “has been truly remarkable,” that in spite of the global economic crisis, “demand for U.S. defense sales abroad remains robust” with “significant growth both in direct commercial sales and in foreign military sales.”[55]

As part of America’s Pacific ‘pivot,’ the United States announced a $5.9 billion arms deal with Taiwan in 2011, upgrading the country’s fleet of 145 F-16 fighter jets. Zhang Zhijun, a Chinese Vice-Foreign Minister, commented: “The wrongdoing by the US side will inevitably undermine bilateral relations as well as exchanges and co-operation in military and security areas.” Upon the announcement of the arms deal, Zhijun summoned the U.S. ambassador to China, Gary Locke, and informed him that, “China strongly urges the US to be fully aware of the high sensitivity and serious harm of the issue, [to] seriously treat the solemn stance of China, honour its commitment and immediately cancel the wrong decision.” A top Obama administration official replied, “We believe that our contribution to the legitimate defense needs of Taiwan will contribute to stability across the Taiwan Strait.”[56] The Chinese Ministry of Defense warned that the arms deal “will create a serious obstacle to developing normal exchanges between the two militaries” and that the “U.S. has ignored China’s firm opposition and insisted on selling arms to Taiwan.”[57] Obviously, there are different definitions of “stability” at play.

In April of 2012, the Pentagon announced an arms deal with Japan of four F-35 Joint Strike Fighter aircraft with an option to purchase an additional 38 F-35 jets from Lockheed Martin at an estimated cost of $10 billion.[58] In late 2011, Japan announced its intention to relax a ban on weapons exports which dated back to 1967, which, the Financial Times reported, could open “the way for Japanese companies to participate in the international development and manufacture of advanced weapon systems.” Japan’s largest business lobby, the Keidanren, praised the move as “epoch-making.”[59] Following the “relaxing” of controls, Japan and Britain announced that they would jointly develop weaponry, the first time that Japan would work with another country (apart from the United States) on constructing military equipment.[60]

In October of 2012, the United States announced an arms deal in which South Korea would get longer-range missiles capable of striking anywhere in North Korea, “altering” (or violating) a 2001 accord which barred the U.S. “from developing and deploying ballistic missiles with a range of more than 300km (186 miles),” in order to avert a regional arms race. Obviously, a decision was made to create a regional arms race, so the accord was “altered” and the US agreed to sell South Korea missiles with a range of 800km. South Korea’s defense ministry praised the new deal, stating that they would then be able to “strike all of North Korea, even from southern areas.” The 2001 accord also ensured that the U.S. would not deploy or develop missiles for the South with a payload of more than 500 kg (1,100lbs), since the “heavier a payload is, the more destructive power it can have.” So obviously, that pesky restriction also had to be “altered,” and while long-range missiles maintain the 1,100lb payload, missiles with shorter ranges will be permitted to hold much more. South Korea will also be able to operate U.S.-supplied drones, permitted to hold payloads up to 5,510lb with a range of more than 300km, and no payload restrictions on drones with a flying distance less than 300km. South Korea can also acquire cruise missiles with unlimited range, and some media reports suggested that South Korea had already deployed cruise missiles with a range of more than 1,000km, though officials “refused to confirm” if that were true. The South Korean Defense Ministry reported that North Korea had missiles that could reach South Korea, Japan, and Guam, a Pacific territory of the United States.[61] Thus, the United States intends to counter the “threat” of North Korea by instigating a massive arms race in the region.

Arms Trade Diplomacy: “Chief Commercial Officer” or Ambassador?

As the massive release of diplomatic cables from Wikileaks revealed, U.S. and other diplomats are often little more than glorified lobbyists and salesmen for the Western arms industry. Lockheed Martin got help from the U.S. State Department in selling C-130 military transport planes to the government in Chad starting in 2007. The U.S. Embassy in Chad noted that the government likely could not afford the aircraft, not to mention that it would probably use the aircraft “to defend the regime against a backlash provoked by its refusal so far to open its political system and provide for a peaceful democratic transition.” In other words, the government of Chad wanted to use the military equipment to crush a pro-democracy movement. Nevertheless, noted the U.S. Embassy, we “would concur in allowing the sale to go forward.”[62]

With Chad’s air force chief, its ambassador to the U.S. and a representative from Lockheed Martin promoting the deal with the State Department, the Embassy noted that the sale “would provide a healthy boost to U.S. exports to Chad” and “strengthen U.S. military cooperation.” While Chad told the State Department that it wanted the aircraft “to go after terrorists or help refugees,” the U.S. Embassy noted that in reality, “it needs them to support combat operations against the armed rebellion in eastern Chad,” and commented: “A decision to approve the sale would be met with dismay by many Chadian supporters of peaceful democratic change.” Our conclusion, noted a U.S. Embassy cable, “is that, like it or not, our interests line up in favor of allowing the sale in some form to go forward.” However, the U.S. would have to promote the sale with full knowledge of how Chadians will perceive it, and will have to undertake “a strategy to counter these perceptions.”[63]

Ben Berkowitz wrote for Reuters that Wikileaks cables painted “a picture of foreign service officers and political appointees willing to go to great lengths to sell American products and services,” where, “in some cases, the efforts were so strenuous they raise the question of where if anywhere the line is being drawn between diplomacy and salesmanship.” A State Department spokesperson said in response that the U.S. government “has broad, though not unlimited, discretion to promote and assist U.S. commercial interests abroad.” Such practice became official policy shortly after the end of the Cold War when U.S. Secretary of State Lawrence Eagleburger introduced a bill which gave corporations a direct role in foreign policy. One former U.S. diplomat in Asia noted, “Until (then), U.S. diplomats were not particularly encouraged to help U.S. business. They were busy fighting the Cold War.” Suddenly, he noted, “we were given new direction: if a single U.S. company is looking for business, we should advocate for them by name; if more than one U.S. company was in the mix, stress buying the American product.” The former diplomat added: “It was great to see how influential the right word from the U.S. ambassador was.”[64]

Former Spanish Prime Minister Jose Luis Zapatero had informed the U.S. Embassy, “to let him know if there was something important to the (U.S. government) and he would take care of it,” according to a 2009 diplomatic cable. The embassy took up the offer when General Electric was bidding against Rolls-Royce to sell helicopters to the Spanish Ministry of Defense (MOD), with GE informing the U.S. Embassy that if it did not get the contract, it would close part of its business in Spain. The U.S. Embassy passed the information along to Zapatero’s economic adviser, and, although there was “considerable” evidence that the government was going to award the contract to Rolls Royce, the Zapatero’s office “overturned the decision and it was announced that GE had won the bid,” and the U.S. Ambassador was “convinced that Zapatero personally intervened in the case in favor of GE.”[65]

The U.S. Embassy in the United Arab Emirates promoted the interests of Halliburton to participate in a joint venture with the Abu Dhabi National Oil Co. in 2003, a time at which Halliburton’s former CEO, Dick Cheney, was Vice President of the United States. The contract was eventually awarded to Halliburton. The U.S. Ambassador to the UAE at the time, Marcelle Wahba, noted, “I can’t think of a time when a month went by when a commercial issues wasn’t on my plate… Some administrations put more of an emphasis on it than others, but now I think, regardless of who’s in power you really find it’s become an integral part of the State Department mandate.”[66]

Tom Niles, a former U.S. ambassador to Canada, the European Union and Greece, as well as former president of the “pro-trade group” the U.S. Council for International Business, stated: “By the time I was retired from the Foreign Service, which was 1998, things had changed fundamentally and being an active participant in the commercial program and promoting trade using the prestige of the ambassador and receptions held at the ambassador’s residence was an important part of what I did.” Niles suggested that a U.S. ambassador was as much a “chief commercial officer” for corporations as a diplomat. “We might have been a little bit late to the game. The Europeans understood the crucial role of foreign trade in the growth and development of their economies before we did.” A former ambassador to the UAE noted: “Oftentimes European ambassadors, that’s all they’re there for.” Of course, that’s only logical, considering that European ambassadors do not have to be concerned with managing the world in the same way the United States does. Therefore, their interests are specific: economic.[67]

In the Arms of America

With all the flowery rhetoric of “democracy” and “freedom,” American – and the Western world’s – hypocrisy can easily be revealed with a brief look at the global arms trade: supporting ruthless and repressive dictatorships, as well as creating and supporting regional arms races which increase instability and the threat of war. The objective is simple, and from the imperial perspective, very practical: support regional proxy states to do our dirty work for us. If this happens to increase regional instability and even lead to war, well, such things are inevitable within and as a result of an imperial system. So long as the final result is that the United States and the West maintain their “access” to and control over regions, resources, and populations, the means are incidental.

To put it another way: if our nations were actually interested in concepts and ideas of “democracy” and “freedom” for all people, around the world, why do we sell billions of dollars in weapons and military technology to the countries which most enthusiastically crush democracy and prevent freedom?

The answer to that question reveals the true nature of our society.

Andrew Gavin Marshall is an independent researcher and writer based in Montreal, Canada, with a focus on studying the ideas, institutions, and individuals of power and resistance across a wide spectrum of social, political, economic, and historical spheres. He has been published in AlterNet, CounterPunch, Occupy.com, Truth-Out, RoarMag, and a number of other alternative media groups, and regularly does radio, Internet, and television interviews with both alternative and mainstream news outlets. He is Project Manager of The People’s Book Project, Research Director of Occupy.com’s Global Power Project, and has a weekly podcast show with BoilingFrogsPost.

Notes

[1]       Thom Shanker, “Bad Economy Drives Down American Arms Sales,” The New York Times, 12 September 2010:

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/09/13/world/13weapons.html

[2]       Matt Sugrue, “GAO Report on U.S. Arms Sales, 2005-2009,” Arms Control Now, 29 September 2010:

http://armscontrolnow.org/2010/09/29/gao-report-on-u-s-arms-sales-2005-2009/

[3]       Maggie Bridgeman, “Obama seeks to expand arms exports by trimming approval process,” McClatchy, 29 July 2010:

http://www.mcclatchydc.com/2010/07/29/98337/obama-seeks-to-expand-arms-exports.html

[4]       Joby Warrick, “U.S. steps up weapon sales to Mideast allies,” The Washington Post, 31 January 2010:

http://articles.washingtonpost.com/2010-01-31/world/36894203_1_gulf-states-obama-administration-united-arab-emirates

[5]       Helene Cooper, “U.S. Approval of Taiwan Arms Sales Angers China,” The New York Times, 29 January 2010:

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/01/30/world/asia/30arms.html

[6]       Ibid.

[7]       Adam Entous, “Saudi Arms Deal Advances,” The Wall Street Journal, 12 September 2010:

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704621204575488361149625050.html

[8]       Ibid.

[9]       Roula Khalaf and James Drummond, “Gulf states in $123bn US arms spree,” The Financial Times, 20 September 2010:

http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/ffd73210-c4ef-11df-9134-00144feab49a.html#axzz2O8uMZ7cn

[10]     Ibid.

[11]     Anthony H. Cordesman, et. al, “Is Big Saudi Arms Sale a Good Idea?” Expert Roundup, the Council on Foreign Relations, 27 September 2010:

http://www.cfr.org/defensehomeland-security/big-saudi-arms-sale-good-idea/p23019

[12 – 15]         Ibid.

[16]     “U.S. dominates Middle East arms market,” UPI, 28 December 2010:

http://www.upi.com/Business_News/Security-Industry/2010/12/28/US-dominates-Middle-East-arms-market/UPI-52831293559959/

[17]     “US confirms $60bn Saudi arms deal,” Al-Jazeera, 20 October 2010:

http://www.aljazeera.com/news/middleeast/2010/10/20101020173353178622.html

[18]     Mina Kimes, “America’s hottest export: Weapons – Full version,” CNN money, 24 February 2011:

http://money.cnn.com/2011/02/10/news/international/america_exports_weapons_full.fortune/index.htm

[19]     Ibid.

[20]     Ibid.

[21]     Richard F. Grimmett, “U.S. Arms Sales: Agreements with and Deliveries to Major Clients, 2003-2010,” U.S. Congressional Research Service, 16 December 2011, page 3.

[22]     Leslie H. Gelb, “Mideast Arms Sales Not So Bad,” The Daily Beat, 12 April 2011:

http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2011/04/12/mideast-arms-sales-soar-but-the-west-isnt-worried-for-now.html

[23]     Andrew J. Shapiro, “Remarks: Defense Trade Advisory Group Plenary,” Dean Acheson Auditorium, U.S. Department of State, 3 May 2011:

http://www.state.gov/t/pm/rls/rm/162479.htm

[24]     DTAG Activity 2010, “2010-2012 Membership,” The Defense Trade Advisory Group (DTAG), U.S. Department of State:

http://www.pmddtc.state.gov/dtag/index.html

[25]     Andrew J. Shapiro, “Remarks: Defense Trade Advisory Group Plenary,” Dean Acheson Auditorium, U.S. Department of State, 3 May 2011:

http://www.state.gov/t/pm/rls/rm/162479.htm

[26]     Agencies, “US arms sales to Bahrain surged in 2010,” Al-Jazeera, 11 June 2011:

http://www.aljazeera.com/news/middleeast/2011/06/2011611144528164171.html

[27]     Mark Landler and Steven Myers, “With $30 Billion Arms Deal, U.S. Bolsters Saudi Ties,” The New York Times, 29 December 2011:

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/12/30/world/middleeast/with-30-billion-arms-deal-united-states-bolsters-ties-to-saudi-arabia.html

[28]     Thom Shanker, “Global Arms Sales Dropped Sharply in 2010, Study Finds,” The New York Times, 23 September 2011:

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/09/24/world/global-arms-sales-dropped-sharply-in-2010-study-finds.html

[29]     Harry Bradford, “U.S. Arms Sales Tripled In 2011 To $66.3 Billion: Report,” The Huffington Post, 27 August 2012:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/08/27/us-arms-sales-2011_n_1833602.html

[30]     Thom Shanker, “U.S. Arms Sales Make Up Most of Global Market,” The New York Times, 26 August 2012:

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/08/27/world/middleeast/us-foreign-arms-sales-reach-66-3-billion-in-2011.html?_r=0

[31]     Richard Northon-Taylor, “Arms sales rise during downturn to more than $400bn, report reveals,” The Guardian, 29 February 2012:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2012/feb/29/arms-sales-rise-downturn-military

[32]     Ami Sedghi, “Arms sales: who are the world’s 100 top arms producers?,” The Guardian Data Blog, 2 March 2012:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/news/datablog/2012/mar/02/arms-sales-top-100-producers

[33]     “Cameron Middle East visit ‘morally obscene’ says Lucas,” BBC News, 23 February 2011:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-12582723

[34]     Benjamin Bidder and Clemens Hoges, “Democracy or Dollars?: Weapons Sales to the Arab World under Scrutiny,” Der Spiegel, 1 April 2011:

http://www.spiegel.de/international/world/democracy-or-dollars-weapons-sales-to-the-arab-world-under-scrutiny-a-754224.html

[35]     Nicholas Watt and Robert Booth, “David Cameron’s Cairo visit overshadowed by defence tour,” The Guardian, 21 February 2011:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2011/feb/21/cameron-cairo-visit-defence-trade

[36]     Robert Booth, “Abu Dhabi arms fair: Tanks, guns, teargas and trade at Index 2011,” The Guardian, 21 February 2011:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/feb/21/abu-dhabi-arms-fair-idex-2011

[37]     Ibid.

[38]     Ibid.

[39]     Simon Rogers, “UK arms sales to the Middle East and North Africa: who do we sell to, how much is military and how much just ‘controlled’?” The Guardian, 22 February 2011:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/news/datablog/2011/feb/22/uk-arms-sales-middle-east-north-africa

[40]     Benjamin Bidder and Clemens Hoges, “Democracy or Dollars?: Weapons Sales to the Arab World under Scrutiny,” Der Spiegel, 1 April 2011:

http://www.spiegel.de/international/world/democracy-or-dollars-weapons-sales-to-the-arab-world-under-scrutiny-a-754224.html

[41]     “Weapons Exports: EU Nations Sell the Most Arms to Saudi Arabia,” Der Spiegel, 19 March 2012:

http://www.spiegel.de/international/europe/eu-makes-controversial-weapons-sales-to-saudi-arabia-a-822288.html

[42]     Ulrike Demmer, Ralf Neukirch and Holger Stark, “Arming the World for Peace: Merkel’s Risky Weapons Exports,” Der Spiegel, 30 July 2012:

http://www.spiegel.de/international/germany/merkel-s-risky-weapons-sales-signal-change-in-german-foreign-policy-a-847137.html

[43]     Ibid.

[44]     “Tanks in the Desert: Germany Plans Extensive Arms Deal with Algeria,” Der Spiegel, 12 November 2012:

http://www.spiegel.de/international/germany/german-arms-sales-to-algeria-have-increased-dramatically-a-866690.html

[45]     Press Release, “Large increase in EU arms exports revealed,” Campaign Against Arms Trade, 10 January 2013:

http://www.caat.org.uk/press/press-release.php?url=20130110prs

[46]     Andrea Shalal-Esa, “U.S. government advocacy said boosting foreign arms sales,” Reuters, 27 July 2012:

http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/07/27/us-defense-exports-idUSBRE86Q1FL20120727

[47]     Michael Martina, “World’s Top 5 Arms Exporters: China Replaces UK In Weapons Trade,” Reuters, 18 March 2013:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/03/18/worlds-top-5-arms-exporters_n_2899052.html

[48]     Jamil Anderlini and Victor Mallet, “China joins top five arms exporters,” The Financial Times, 18 March 2013:

http://www.ft.com/intl/cms/s/0/c7215936-8f64-11e2-a39b-00144feabdc0.html#axzz2O8uMZ7cn

[49]     “Defense contest over major gulf arms buys,” UPI, 20 November 2012:

http://www.upi.com/Business_News/Security-Industry/2012/11/20/Defense-contest-over-major-gulf-arms-buys/UPI-49931353436670/

[50]     Ben Bland, “UK defence minister bullish on arms sales,” The Financial Times, 16 January 2013:

http://www.ft.com/intl/cms/s/0/5377e148-5fb8-11e2-8d8d-00144feab49a.html#axzz2OOPsqPsh

[51]     “David Cameron defends arms deals with Gulf states,” The Telegraph, 5 November 2012:

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/newsbysector/industry/defence/9656393/David-Cameron-defends-arms-deals-with-Gulf-states.html

[52]     FT Reporters, “Asia defence spending to overtake Europe,” The Financial Times, 7 March 2012:

http://www.ft.com/intl/cms/s/0/0aab435c-6846-11e1-a6cc-00144feabdc0.html#axzz2O8uMZ7cn

[53]     Myra MacDonald, “Asia’s defense spending overtakes Europe’s: IISS,” Reuters, 14 March 2013:

http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/03/14/us-security-military-iiss-idUSBRE92D0EL20130314

[54]     “US Arms Sales to Asia Set to Boom on Pacific ‘Pivot’,” Reuters, 2 January 2013:

http://www.cnbc.com/id/100347792

[55]     “Obama set record in 2012 for Mideast defense exports,” World Tribune, 4 December 2012:

http://www.worldtribune.com/2012/12/04/obama-set-record-in-2012-for-mideast-defense-exports/

[56]     Richard McGregor, “US agrees $5.9bn arms deal with Taiwan,” The Financial Times, 21 September 2011:

http://www.ft.com/intl/cms/s/0/55a1c47c-e488-11e0-92a3-00144feabdc0.html#axzz2O8uMZ7cn

[57]     Kathrin Hille, “China hits at US over Taiwan arms deal,” The Financial Times, 22 September 2011:

http://www.ft.com/intl/cms/s/0/2ae01e5c-e4f4-11e0-9aa8-00144feabdc0.html#axzz2O8uMZ7cn

[58]     “U.S. Government Says Japan’s Cost to Buy 42 F-35s Around $10 Billion,” Ottawa Citizen, 2 May 2012:

http://blogs.ottawacitizen.com/2012/05/02/u-s-government-says-japans-cost-to-buy-42-f-35s-around-10-billion/

[59]     Mure Dickie, “Japan relaxes weapons export ban,” The Financial Times, 27 December 2011:

http://www.ft.com/intl/cms/s/0/ab812ee0-3079-11e1-b96f-00144feabdc0.html#axzz2O8uMZ7cn

[60]     Reuters, “Japan and Britain ‘set to agree arms deal’,” The Telegraph, 4 April 2012:

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/defence/9185080/Japan-and-Britain-set-to-agree-arms-deal.html

[61]     AP, “South Korea to get longer-range missiles under new deal with US,” The Guardian, 7 October 2012:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2012/oct/07/south-korea-longer-range-missiles

[62]     07NDJAMENA43, “C-130’s for Chad?”, 12 January 2007, Wikileaks Diplomatic Cables:

http://wikileaks.org/cable/2007/01/07NDJAMENA43.html

[63]     Ibid.

[64]     Ben Berkowitz, “Wikileaks reveals extent of State Department’s involvement in arms sales, oil deals,” Reuters, 4 March 2011:

http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2011/03/04/wikileaks_reveals_extent_of_state_department_involvement_in_arms_sales/

[65-67]   Ibid.

By: Andrew Gavin Marshall

Are you wondering why, since we are told we are in an “economic recovery,” you do not feel as if you are in an economic recovery? Did you know that the United States has bombed the Philippines using a drone? Have you heard that France recently went to war in the West African country of Mali? Remember when we bombed Libya in 2011? And how we invaded and occupied Afghanistan for over a decade… and counting? Remember how Iraq was destroyed? Corporations, banks, drug cartels, the arms industry and oil, energy, mining conglomerates are all making record profits; how are you doing?

Have you heard of the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP), potentially the largest “free trade” agreement ever, being negotiated with 11 countries and over 600 corporations “in secret” for several years? Did you know that Obama runs an “international assassination” campaign with military drones, bombing countries all over the world, targeting those selected for an official “kill list”? Did you know that the FBI considered ‘Occupy Wall Street’ activists to be “potential terrorists”? Did you know that there is a war against whistleblowers and civil liberties, reaching far beyond what George Bush ever attempted?

Have you heard about large protests in Greece, Spain, Italy, Portugal, and across Europe? Have you ever wondered what’s going on there? Are you curious how the situation in Greece affects you here, wherever you are? Remember when there was talk of an “Arab Spring”, as people in far-away places like Tunisia and Egypt rose up against dictators whose names and state repression we never knew before? What happened with those ‘revolutions’? What’s going on in Syria? Did you hear that China is the next “rising” power in the world?

What does that mean to us, to our future?

We, who sit relatively comfortably within North America, or the West more generally, hear and see images of famine, war, death, disease and destruction all over the world. Is this really the way the ‘rest’ of the world is, or are we involved in making it that way?

Are you curious about the world, about contemplating and understanding the world? Well, I am! That’s why I have spent the past year and a half working on a book project, doing seemingly endless research and writing, to try to piece together what information I can, in a way that I am able to contemplate it, and pass it along to others in an approachable, well-documented, and understandable way. I am not saying I have “the answers”, but through time, energy, and research, I have collected enough information to begin to put pieces together, provide a general framework, for looking at the world and coming to your own conclusions.

I want to understand the world as best as I can, the way it really works, the way society, the economy, politics, war, corporations, banks, governments and international organizations really function. I want to understand the people who are in power, what they believe, what they think, say, and do. I want to know the ways in which populations all over the world react to or resist those in power. And I want to be able to convey the information I come across, the research I do, by writing it in such a way that it is understandable to as many people as possible.

I am not writing an ‘academic’ book, nor do I have any use for ‘academic language’, apart from noting its inability to communicate with others. I am certainly not writing a book for ‘policy-makers’, to “advise” governments on proper initiatives and programs to “better the world”. I have spent several years of my life, off and on, in the university system, attempting to (slowly) get a degree in Political Science and History. Degrees, I was told, provide legitimacy. And so while I began researching and writing for most of my time, some six years ago, I would also be periodically in school, getting an “education”.

I was, of course, fortunate enough to have found a few great professors along the way, from whom I learned a great deal and was exposed to different ideas and perspectives. But these were sadly the exceptions of a “good” education; the most enlightening and inspiring were the most rare, and frequently, were punished by the school – and faculties – for being such. What does that say about our “education” system?

Among the real benefits of a modern education is the access to information it provides, through classes and professors, certainly, but primarily through access to libraries and journals. The amount of information which exists in the world is immense, and constantly growing by large leaps and bounds. With information being digitized and shared through the Internet, more people have more access to more information than ever before in human history. If one truly wants an “education” the likes of which only the modern world can provide, look to that access, not the guardians of information from past eras, who so very often are called “professors” and “academics”.

For that reason, I took the skills and access of an “academic” education to truly begin my own personal education. I took a two-to-three year “hiatus” from school to focus on my own work, having landed a job as a paid researcher and writer. I left that job to pursue my book and, in doing so, subjected myself to the “market forces” of attempting to live as an independent researcher and writer, not connected to any institution, and dependent upon the donations and support of others, around the world.

It amazes me to this day – and every day – how I have been able to get where I am, doing what I am doing, all because of the support of people around the world, most of whom I have never met or known personally.

This was the start of The People’s Book Project, a year and a half ago.

In that time, I have undertaken extensive research and writing: one book became a long book, then many books, and seemingly had no end in sight. The process, while very rewarding, has been quite often terrifying, worrying and stressful. I even returned to school, in part to bring some structure into my life, and in part to pursue the degree I had not finished, worried about my own future on my present path. I returned to take one class, still focusing on the book as my priority, and then the students at my school went on strike. I paid little attention at first, as I barely considered myself a student. I was only physically at the school two days a week for an hour each time. And after a few years of pursuing research on my own, I found it exceedingly difficult to adapt to the more structured process of a “classroom,” with an itinerary of what I am “supposed” to read, and by which date it must be read.

Suddenly, I began to acknowledge what was going on around me, with students taking to the streets to fight a tuition increase, being beaten by riot police and arrested. I clearly wasn’t the only person who had a problem with the educational system. So I began to look closely at the situation here in Quebec, and I began to write about it, participate in the protests, and lend whatever support I could to the movement in the best way I know how: through doing the research and writing the results.

I had never before had such a surprising reception to what I was writing: my articles were going viral through social media and being referenced in newspapers and media across the country, and I was doing multiple radio and television interviews. I was afraid my ego or arrogance would get ahead of me, but I truly felt inspired by a social movement flourishing all around me. Everywhere you went and the people you interacted with – the student movement was becoming a wider social movement. And regardless of what people were saying or how the media portrayed it, everyone was talking about it. You could see it everywhere you went. Months prior, I would occasionally meet up with friends in a bar, but now I was meeting up with friends in protests and marches: these were the new forums for social interaction and engagement with others in my own generation. It was inspiring and drove me to write and work with a new dedication and purpose.

What came out of the experience was the necessity of not simply focusing (in the book and in life) on the problems of the world, on those in power, on power structures, on oppression and war and empire but – more importantly – on that which opposes (and those who resist) power and the problems of the world.

This radically changed the evolving nature of the book: resistance was a requirement.

And this pushed me to study Europe, the debt crisis, and the reactions of populations in Greece, Spain and beyond. In turn, I began to look more closely at the ‘Arab Spring’ and the unfinished and emerging revolutions across much of the world.

As the research for this book has moved forward, and the writing has progressed in kind, it has been a constant struggle in determining how best to present the information, understand and explain the results – deciding what to include, what to leave out, what chapter to go where, what chapters there should be, how I will break up the subjects, chronological or regional? If I break up the ‘war and empire’ section from the ‘corporate and economic’ section, does this re-enforce a superficial divide between these sectors? The questions and concerns go on and on.

When one is attempting to study a deeply interdependent world in which all matters interact and engage with each other, how can one legitimately and constructively break up these sections and still provide a realistic analysis? These questions have been constantly in mind and have led to frequent re-organization of the structure of the book, while the actual research and writing continues unabated by the whims of my own inability to create or adapt to a more rigid ‘structure’

But guidance and goals have also served a profound purpose: they have focused the work more, expanded the understanding, but limited the objective. I have been able to narrow into specific subjects as the focus of this, the first volume, in what I intend to be a series of books. I am still working a great deal on the first volume, adding only to that which I had already planned to research.

A great deal of the research and writing done over the past year and a half will not be included in the first volume. I have written varying amounts of what could amount to multiple books but each, on its own, would require significant work in order to complete. For that reason, I have intended to focus the first book in the series on that which I have written on the most: what is going on in the world today and in recent years? The research I have done in past years contributes to my understanding of the present world, and so it will inform the first volume; thus the efforts done so far in the book project will not be for nothing.

Perhaps not coincidentally, when the student movement in Quebec faded – as a new government came to power, promising to resolve the issues through ‘formal’ political channels – I chose not to return to school. Instead, I chose to focus exclusively on the book. After all, there seemed an odd feeling of hypocrisy in writing about subjects such as the failure of the modern educational system to provide a better understanding of the world, and yet simultaneously seeking to acquire a piece of paper which declared my own understanding to be “legitimate”. I do not seek to join that world of academics, where the more “educated” I am, the more incapable of communicating knowledge to others I become.

When once asked what the “science” aspect of Political Science was, my only reply was that it was “the science of B.S.”  – how to speak as if you know what you’re talking about, to talk about what you know nothing about, to ‘talk’ while saying nothing and think without feeling anything. There is a reason why Political Science produces politicians and policy-makers. A well-trained ‘political scientist’ can B.S. their way through most situations and justify any circumstance.

I spent several years getting this type of “education”, speaking this type of language and understanding these types of concepts. I do not seek to join that world of politicians and policy-makers. As I often tell friends and family: if I ever run for office, don’t vote for me.

It is a challenging thing to attempt to try to understand the world by detaching from some of its more prominent institutions. I do not seek to separate from the world, but to find a connection to the world which holds substance and meaning for me. I see this in people, in protests, in resistance, creativity and revolution; I see it in the potential for people. It’s something to which I feel is worth dedicating my life and work. Unfortunately, it is not something made easy to acquire, and less so to sustain. I have attempted to undertake a project with a large purview and limited resources, independent of institutional support and direction.

I won’t lie – it’s been a constant struggle, but worth every moment and all the effort.

There have been ups and downs, successes and failures, and lessons learned. There have been times where I felt lost, frustrated and incapable of proceeding. There have been times where I felt focused, dedicated and incapable of stopping. This is one of those times.

In the past few months, I have been getting work writing commissioned articles for other sites, even recently beginning a research project with Occupy.com. It has been a relief to develop other sources of income, and rewarding to make new connections and reach new audiences. But still, I must find the time and energy to focus on my book. Commissioned work is good, but it alone does not pay the bills, nor does it provide enough time to work on the book. Thus, I must come to find and establish a better balance in my work, also as I begin to work with new organizations, and even begin the planning process with a friend and associate to start our own.

Thanks to the recent donations to The People’s Book Project, I have been able to throw myself back into the book this last week. My focus, dedication and determination are as strong as ever, and my intention to finish the first volume in the book in the near future appears closer than before.

In the province of Quebec and the city of Montreal, the students are back on the streets, protesting and getting arrested, struggling against the state which stabbed them in the back (as governments tend to do), and my focus is back on the book, progressing and nearing completion. I do not have any illusions that it will take a significant amount of time and effort on my part to do so, but if the ability to do so exists, the inevitability of doing so will persist… and persevere.

I have a goal. I am narrowing my focus and strengthening my efforts. But as always, I need your help to get there.

Are you curious about trying to understand the world? Well, so am I.

The information and resources exist to build up a good capacity of understanding, though it must be in a constant state of adaptation and self-reflection as you come across new information, subjects, ideas and perspectives. I look at the views I have, the ones I’ve changed and how I got to where I am, and it seems clear that my own understanding is constantly changing. Therefore, whatever “understanding” I offer to others – at whatever time I offer it – is never going to be complete; there is always more information, there are always other perspectives, and there is always much more to learn than can ever be known.

So I do not propose that I “know” more than others, or that I have some sort of monopoly on defining “reality”. Instead, I only propose that as I have spent the past six years doing research and writing, and the past year and a half working on this book, I have developed and refined skills at utilizing the access and information that has been made available to me. This is simply a result of practice. The more you do it, the more you learn how to do it better. The more you research, the more you learn. The more you write, the more you communicate. I do not expect everyone to undertake the same research as myself, for all must live their own lives and follow their own passions, but I do think this information is necessary for all people, for as many people who want access to it.

Think of The People’s Book Project as a way to “outsource” your own research to me. I’ll put in the effort, and attempt to summarize the results in easily readable, understandable language, but not dumbed-down or made superficial.

I want to write a book with academic standards of research, but approachable to anyone. I think that the first major requirement for any progress to solving the multiplicity of problems in the world is to first start by engaging in open, direct and honest communication about the world we live in. This, I believe, can be reflected in one’s own individual life – though not without its problems – of learning to engage and interact with others on the basis of this same open, direct and honest communication. It’s easier said than done, both in personal life and the wider world. But I think it’s necessary, at all levels and capacities.

In the past year and a half, as I have made this book the central focus of my energy and efforts, often at the expense of other areas of my life, it has become as much a result of my own ideas and actions as my own beliefs and actions have resulted from it. In short, I am a product of this book as much as it is a product of me. For that reason, I intended to provide some information here about my own process, interest and evolution through the People’s Book Project, so that you may better understand the Project, itself.

I have attempted to be open, direct and honest with you here in assessing my progress, explaining my process and in asking for help with this purpose. Everything that has been done thus far is only because of the support I have received from others. Everything I continue to do will be equally derived from similar support. Nothing that has been – or will be – done with this Project would be possible without the support of many people, in many places, all over the world. And that is exactly the point: it is, after all, the People’s Book Project, made possible by – and for the benefit of – the people, not simply myself.

So, I thank all of you who have – at one or many times over – supported The People’s Book Project in any and every capacity. Thank you for the opportunity, the means and the possibility to do this. And now I ask you to continue helping, to continue your support and to continue spreading the word, for the more people who know and talk about The People’s Book project, the more potential sources of support would exist, and perhaps the less annoying I will have to be in asking for support.

Outsource to me your research, and I’ll provide to you results: a crash course in contemplating the world.

Sincerely,

Andrew Gavin Marshall

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So where is the money going? Primarily, the money goes to covering my general living expenses so that my time can be dedicated to the Book Project, but there are also specific costs associated with monthly subscriptions to news services (such as the Financial Times, Wall Street Journal, New York Times) which, unfortunately, are necessary to provide the resources for research. Online news sites typically have a maximum amount of articles which can be read for free on their sites (usually around 5-8 per month), and thus, without these subscriptions, research can be heavily curtailed, as they are valuable resources, specifically depending upon the subject matter of focus.

And on that note, what subjects will the current donations be going towards doing research on, as well as writing chapters from? Currently, the focus is on finishing the chapters introducing the subject and mechanisms of imperialism in the modern world, specifically that of the United States: the main planning bodies of empire within government (Pentagon, CIA, National Security Council, State Department), as well as outside, at think tanks and foundations (Council on Foreign Relations, Brookings Institution, Carnegie Endowment, Center for Strategic and International Studies), and the main players in the American Empire over the past 60 years (Henry Kissinger, Zbigniew Brzezinski, Brent Scowcroft, Madeleine Albright, etc.). I will be examining the specific imperial strategies, in their own words, and briefly look at some of their plans in action.

In the chapter on Empire in the Age of Obama, I will be examining the transition from the “War on Terror” to the Obama’s administration’s “overseas contingency operations” (as it was renamed), and the specific strategies, plans, and actions of empire under the current President: drone wars, destabilization campaigns, counter-insurgency in Afghanistan, maintenance of vassal states, support for dictators and human rights abuses, arms trade, more recent wars in Yemen, Libya, Mali, and elsewhere, coups (such as that in Honduras), military bases and expansion, AFRICOM and the militarization of foreign policy in Africa, the relationship between natural resources and imperial policy, and looking at the human costs of empire around the world.

I have also started the chapter on the Arab Spring, focusing thus far on Tunisia, but which will include Egypt and Bahrain, as well as the lesser-known protests and reactions in Algeria, Morocco, and Jordan, among others.

On top of this new research and writing, I will be aiming to complete past chapters already begun, on issues of the food crisis, global land grabs, environmental devastation, and indigenous resistance. I am also hoping to begin editing previously written chapters to start putting together the first draft of the first volume of The People’s Book Project, so that the editing process can proceed in line with the research and writing itself.

These are some hefty goals for the next two months, but if I have the funds, I can dedicate the time and energy to the work. My ultimate goal is to have the first draft completed by the Summer, at which point I will begin the process of final edits and publishing.

So, please consider donating to the People’s Book Project to help this objective be realized. Thank you to all who have contributed, past and presently, and to those who will do so in the future.

Sincerely,

Andrew Gavin Marshall

To continue researching and writing the first volume of The People’s Book Project, I am undertaking a fundraising effort aiming at raising $2,000 to sustain the Project over the next couple months. Thus far, $300 has been raised, and to the donors, a great deal of appreciation is warranted. But that leaves another $1,700 to raise. Please consider making a donation below, and take a look at a brief summary of SOME of the topics that will be discussed in the first volume!

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So what is contained within the first volume?

- A general introduction to the ‘Sociopathic Society’: what is sociopathic and psychopathic behaviour, and how is it reflected in the ideas, institutions, and individuals of power within our society?

- The Culture of Criminality: prisons are full, but of the wrong people. In the upper echelons of power, whether locally or globally, criminal behaviour is rampant (and profitable), from arms dealing to the drug trade, human trafficking, sex trafficking, terrorist financing and the like, some of the world’s most powerful banks, corporations and individuals have their hands all over these dirty trades of misery-profit. I examine these trades and some of the key players within them.

- An Introduction to Institutions: what are the dominant institutions within society, how do they function, whose interests do they serve, and what forms of power do they wield? This will be a very brief introduction to the nature and role of specific institutions within our modern society, from banks and corporations to foundations, think tanks, universities, and the state itself.

- American Empire, Inc.: This section will briefly examine some of the recent history of the American/Western imperial system, looking at the state apparatus of empire (Pentagon, CIA, State Department, National Security Council, etc.), the ideologies and “doctrines” of empire (what are the actual stated goals of foreign policy according to those who dictate the policy?), and who are the key players? Enmeshed in a world of think tanks, corporations, and government officials, key players like Henry Kissinger, Zbigniew Brzezinski, Madeleine Albright, Brent Scowcroft and others, emerge as constant guiding figures for imperial planning.

- The Global Economic Crisis: What are the structural and ideological causes of the global economic crisis which began in 2008? Who are the key players? What are the role of the big banks, central banks, government agencies, corporations? Who profits? What is the result of the crisis for those in power, the middle class, and the poor? What are the “solutions” that were enacted? Will they make things worse? have they already?

- Food, Land, and Poverty: looking at the current state of global poverty, where roughly half the world’s 7 billion people live on less than $2.50/day, where over one billion live in slums, where tens of millions die from poverty-related causes each year. The food crisis of 2007 and beyond have pushed tens of millions more into poverty and hunger, and the subsequent global land grabs are fast becoming the world’s number one economic, social, and environmental crisis, as international investors push peasant and small farming populations off their land (and into hunger, poverty, and slums).

- Empire in the Age of Obama: What have Obama’s policies in foreign affairs been representative of? The “change” he promised or the continuity of past presidents? From expanding the war in Afghanistan into Pakistan, to waging global drone wars, new wars in Libya, Mali, a rapid militarization of Africa, coups and regime change, Empire in the Age of Obama is as vicious as ever. This looks at the function of the modern imperial system, the relationship between the United States and the world, the maintenance of “vassal” states, and human rights abuses.

- The Arab Spring: From Tunisia, to Egypt, Bahrain, and beyond, this examines the causes, evolution and consequences of the so-called Arab Spring revolts which began in 2010 and have continued to present day. What have been the responses from the Western imperial powers? How have the revolutionary movements changed and evolved?

- Europe in Crisis: this examines the causes of the European debt crisis, the key players and institutions, the evolution of the crisis in Greece, Spain, and Italy, as well as the massive social movements which have erupted in response to the programs of “austerity” and “adjustment” (read: impoverishment and exploitation), from anarchists in Greece, to the Indignados in Spain, protests in Italy, and new regional and global movements which have emerged in response to the crisis.

- Students in the Streets: education is in crisis, with more graduates, less jobs, and enormous debt. Students have been protesting and going on strike and revolt from Greece, to the UK, Chile, Quebec, and Mexico. This section looks at the causes of this crisis, the reactions to it, and the future of education itself.

- Police State America: Over the past decade, the United States – and many of its Western allies – have become “homeland security” states, with increased surveillance, militarization of domestic space, destruction of civil liberties, and are fast tracking down the road to “technological tyrannies.” With the emergence of social movements, such as Occupy Wall Street, we see the actual purpose of “Homeland Security”: to protect the powerful from the people.

- Environmental Destruction and Indigenous Resistance: this section examines global environmental crises with a focus on the direct interaction between modern human society and the environment, with pollution, deforestation, resource extraction, climate change, toxic waste dumping and other activities threatening the survival of the human species. The causes of the global environmental crisis are systemic: the institutions, ideologies, and structures of power thrive on environmental destruction, and on the front lines of its consequences – as well as resistance against it – are indigenous peoples all over the world: from Africa, to Central and South America, and in Canada with ‘Idle No More’, Indigenous peoples are showing the path forward in addressing issues of environmental devastation, and that we must all begin to act as if we are ‘Indigenous to the Earth.’

- Global Governance, the Future of Power: ideologies, institutions and individuals of power are increasingly global in scope, and are rapidly seeking to globalize in structure. Regional governance structures, such as the EU, which are devastating their own populations, are held up as models for the rest of the world to follow. Banking, corporations, trade, and the monetary system are increasingly global in scope. So-called “free trade agreements” are making corporations more powerful than governments, as new structures of global governance emerge, remaking the world in the ‘corporate image’, increasingly totalitarian, exploitative, and destructive.

- The Prospect of Global Revolution: as power globalizes, so too is resistance. The global movements of resistance, from Egypt and Tunisia, to Greece, Spain, Chile, Mexico, Ecuador, to Canada and the United States, may be taking place in specific circumstances, and with specific demands, but they represent a change taking place in the world: the population of the world is rising up in resistance, slowly but surely. What are the common factors driving this? What are areas of mutual co-operation? What is the potential for future evolution into making meaningful change?

This is not meant to be an exact outline, but is meant to be a general look at the subjects which the first volume of The People’s Book Project is attempting to examine.

Please help this Project continue by donating today!

Thank you,

Andrew Gavin Marshall

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This will help provide the time and resources necessary to complete several chapters of the first volume of The People’s Book Project. The goal is to finish the first volume as soon as possible, at which time it will begin the editing and publishing process.

So what is contained within the first volume?

- A general introduction to the ‘Sociopathic Society’: what is sociopathic and psychopathic behaviour, and how is it reflected in the ideas, institutions, and individuals of power within our society?

- The Culture of Criminality: prisons are full, but of the wrong people. In the upper echelons of power, whether locally or globally, criminal behaviour is rampant (and profitable), from arms dealing to the drug trade, human trafficking, sex trafficking, terrorist financing and the like, some of the world’s most powerful banks, corporations and individuals have their hands all over these dirty trades of misery-profit. I examine these trades and some of the key players within them.

- An Introduction to Institutions: what are the dominant institutions within society, how do they function, whose interests do they serve, and what forms of power do they wield? This will be a very brief introduction to the nature and role of specific institutions within our modern society, from banks and corporations to foundations, think tanks, universities, and the state itself.

- American Empire, Inc.: This section will briefly examine some of the recent history of the American/Western imperial system, looking at the state apparatus of empire (Pentagon, CIA, State Department, National Security Council, etc.), the ideologies and “doctrines” of empire (what are the actual stated goals of foreign policy according to those who dictate the policy?), and who are the key players? Enmeshed in a world of think tanks, corporations, and government officials, key players like Henry Kissinger, Zbigniew Brzezinski, Madeleine Albright, Brent Scowcroft and others, emerge as constant guiding figures for imperial planning.

- The Global Economic Crisis: What are the structural and ideological causes of the global economic crisis which began in 2008? Who are the key players? What are the role of the big banks, central banks, government agencies, corporations? Who profits? What is the result of the crisis for those in power, the middle class, and the poor? What are the “solutions” that were enacted? Will they make things worse? have they already?

- Food, Land, and Poverty: looking at the current state of global poverty, where roughly half the world’s 7 billion people live on less than $2.50/day, where over one billion live in slums, where tens of millions die from poverty-related causes each year. The food crisis of 2007 and beyond have pushed tens of millions more into poverty and hunger, and the subsequent global land grabs are fast becoming the world’s number one economic, social, and environmental crisis, as international investors push peasant and small farming populations off their land (and into hunger, poverty, and slums).

- Empire in the Age of Obama: What have Obama’s policies in foreign affairs been representative of? The “change” he promised or the continuity of past presidents? From expanding the war in Afghanistan into Pakistan, to waging global drone wars, new wars in Libya, Mali, a rapid militarization of Africa, coups and regime change, Empire in the Age of Obama is as vicious as ever. This looks at the function of the modern imperial system, the relationship between the United States and the world, the maintenance of “vassal” states, and human rights abuses.

- The Arab Spring: From Tunisia, to Egypt, Bahrain, and beyond, this examines the causes, evolution and consequences of the so-called Arab Spring revolts which began in 2010 and have continued to present day. What have been the responses from the Western imperial powers? How have the revolutionary movements changed and evolved?

- Europe in Crisis: this examines the causes of the European debt crisis, the key players and institutions, the evolution of the crisis in Greece, Spain, and Italy, as well as the massive social movements which have erupted in response to the programs of “austerity” and “adjustment” (read: impoverishment and exploitation), from anarchists in Greece, to the Indignados in Spain, protests in Italy, and new regional and global movements which have emerged in response to the crisis.

- Students in the Streets: education is in crisis, with more graduates, less jobs, and enormous debt. Students have been protesting and going on strike and revolt from Greece, to the UK, Chile, Quebec, and Mexico. This section looks at the causes of this crisis, the reactions to it, and the future of education itself.

- Police State America: Over the past decade, the United States – and many of its Western allies – have become “homeland security” states, with increased surveillance, militarization of domestic space, destruction of civil liberties, and are fast tracking down the road to “technological tyrannies.” With the emergence of social movements, such as Occupy Wall Street, we see the actual purpose of “Homeland Security”: to protect the powerful from the people.

- Environmental Destruction and Indigenous Resistance: this section examines global environmental crises with a focus on the direct interaction between modern human society and the environment, with pollution, deforestation, resource extraction, climate change, toxic waste dumping and other activities threatening the survival of the human species. The causes of the global environmental crisis are systemic: the institutions, ideologies, and structures of power thrive on environmental destruction, and on the front lines of its consequences – as well as resistance against it – are indigenous peoples all over the world: from Africa, to Central and South America, and in Canada with ‘Idle No More’, Indigenous peoples are showing the path forward in addressing issues of environmental devastation, and that we must all begin to act as if we are ‘Indigenous to the Earth.’

- Global Governance, the Future of Power: ideologies, institutions and individuals of power are increasingly global in scope, and are rapidly seeking to globalize in structure. Regional governance structures, such as the EU, which are devastating their own populations, are held up as models for the rest of the world to follow. Banking, corporations, trade, and the monetary system are increasingly global in scope. So-called “free trade agreements” are making corporations more powerful than governments, as new structures of global governance emerge, remaking the world in the ‘corporate image’, increasingly totalitarian, exploitative, and destructive.

- The Prospect of Global Revolution: as power globalizes, so too is resistance. The global movements of resistance, from Egypt and Tunisia, to Greece, Spain, Chile, Mexico, Ecuador, to Canada and the United States, may be taking place in specific circumstances, and with specific demands, but they represent a change taking place in the world: the population of the world is rising up in resistance, slowly but surely. What are the common factors driving this? What are areas of mutual co-operation? What is the potential for future evolution into making meaningful change?

This is not meant to be an exact outline, but is meant to be a general look at the subjects which the first volume of The People’s Book Project is attempting to examine.

Please help this Project continue by donating today!

Thank you,

Andrew Gavin Marshall

Andrew Gavin Marshall is an independent researcher and writer based in Montreal, Canada, with a focus on studying the ideas, institutions, and individuals of power and resistance across a wide spectrum of social, political, economic, and historical spheres. He has been published in AlterNet, CounterPunch, Occupy.com, Truth-Out, RoarMag, and a number of other alternative media groups, and regularly does radio, Internet, and television interviews with both alternative and mainstream news outlets. He is Project Manager of The People’s Book Project and has a weekly podcast show with BoilingFrogsPost.

The People’s Book Project is a crowd-funded initiative to support the research and writing of a series of books studying ideas, institutions, and individuals of power… and resistance. The Project has been going for roughly a year and a half, and has yielded an immense amount of research and writing, all thanks to the generous donations of supporters, as well as readers who have shared and promoted the Project and articles.

While a great deal of work has been produced, I have focused my attention on finishing the first volume as soon as possible, with an emphasis on looking at the world in present day, at social, economic, and political institutions, ideas, and individuals who dominate and resist the current world order, asking the question: what is the nature of our society? In seeking to answer this question, I have set the focus of the first volume on the subjects of the global economic and financial crisis, the debt crisis in Europe, imperialism in the ‘age of Obama,’ poverty, exploitation, corporate power, environmental destruction, the encroaching police state, global governance, and conversely, resistance to all these areas: anti-austerity movements, student movements, indigenous movements, revolutions in the Arab world and beyond, Occupy, and the emergence of a global revolutionary impetus.

This book is intended to be an ‘introduction’ to the ideas and institutions of world power, to provide the reader with a better understanding of the nature of power, moving beyond mythology and rhetoric and closer toward reality: how does power actually function? Future volumes of the Book Project will aim to provide a far more comprehensive examination of our global system, its history, and the plethora of institutions which dominate, as well as the history of revolutionary ideas and actions.

It is essential, however, that the first volume focuses on present day issues, and further, that it is finished soon. In the past month or so, I have attempted to avoid overt fundraising activities, since it is very often the same generous individuals who consistently give to the Book Project, and I have instead been doing an increasing amount of work in getting commissioned articles and research projects for others, so that I may become more independently funded. While this is certainly a welcome change in my own life (getting paid to do what I love!), it adds a great deal to my plate, as time and energy spent researching and writing commissioned pieces is not spent on the book.

Nevertheless, I have been making time and putting in effort to moving as far ahead in the Book Project as possible. In the past couple months, I have written a great deal for chapters related to the global food crisis, land grabbing, global poverty, corporate and financial power, as well as imperialism (so far focusing on imperialism in Africa and the Arab world), and I have also completed a good deal of research for other chapters and areas. Progress is the name of the game, though the pace of such progress tends to sway according to financial imperatives. For this reason, I am asking for your support, dear readers, to donate to The People’s Book Project so that more time may be dedicated toward finishing the first volume in the next couple months.

I would also like to briefly touch on some ideas and plans as to where the Project may lead, since it is not merely dedicated to my own research and writing, but has a much wider objective: to help do my part in trying to change the paradigm of thought and action, to infuse individuals with information and arm them with knowledge so that they can use their own creative potential to change the world for the better. This Project is also dedicated toward the establishment of a new organizing, which is currently in the planning stages: The People’s Foundation. It’s objective would be similar, though it’s means would be much greater. It would be dedicated to research, open-source education, new media, bringing activists together, establishing exchanges and building bridges to similar organizations around the world. The People’s Book Project itself helps lay the groundwork of research upon which The People’s Foundation could be built and how it aims to function, what it hopes to achieve. Both projects are in the works, and aim to be a continuing and evolving process. One could say that it is an attempt to ‘walk the walk’ instead of merely ‘talking the talk.’ Research and writing have their place, but action is essential. My objective with the People’s Book Project is to help advance understanding and action.

These objectives are not possible without the generous support of readers, and that support is needed once again. I will continue to be providing samples from the Project as the work progresses, and am hoping to get out some pieces on the subjects of imperialism, war, and land grabbing in the very near future.

So thank you, dear readers, for your consistent and continuing support. None of this would be possible without you, and that is exactly the point: it’s called the PEOPLE’S Book Project because it does not result merely from my own research and effort, but only from what is made possible by the efforts of many, and for the purpose of benefit not merely to myself, but to many. Implicit in both the conclusions of my research and the function of the Project itself, is that nothing is possible without the combined efforts of many: the ‘individual’ is only made possible by the understanding that it is part of a collective, that the individual cannot exist without the group, without the many; the person cannot exist without the people. That is where the world’s solutions stand: in collective organization, initiative, and action, so that true individuality may flourish from the support of the many, so that the creative capacity of groups can outweigh the creative limits of single units.

The future is an exciting place. So please consider helping The People’s Book Project get there!

Sincerely,

Andrew Gavin Marshall

Andrew Gavin Marshall is an independent researcher and writer based in Montreal, Canada, with a focus on studying the ideas, institutions, and individuals of power and resistance across a wide spectrum of social, political, economic, and historical spheres. He has been published in AlterNet, CounterPunch, Occupy.com, Truth-Out, RoarMag, and a number of other alternative media groups, and regularly does radio, Internet, and television interviews with both alternative and mainstream news outlets. He is Project Manager of The People’s Book Project and has a weekly podcast show with BoilingFrogsPost.

By: Andrew Gavin Marshall

Photo from EcoNews, 13 August 2012

The following is a brief excerpt from a chapter of The People’s Book Project, covering issues related to food, water, land grabs, environmental destruction, hunger and poverty. This excerpt examines the global food crisis.

There are a few things upon which humanity is entirely dependent for survival: food, water, land and the environment. One of the central questions with which humanity currently has to address its part, past and present, is the ways in which we, as a species, interact with our environment. When it comes to environmental issues, the primary focus is placed upon the issue of climate change, and while this is indeed an important issue, it could be said that this focus almost misses the forest for the trees. Climatic change is here to stay, it is an inevitability, and it is a requirement for humanity to begin the process of adaptation. However, climate change is not “the problem,” it is a symptom of the problems associated with the environment. The source of the problem is how human society – specifically Western state-capitalist society – interacts with the environment at the local and global level. When examining this question, the issues and concerns raised go far beyond climatic changes, though they all interact.

One cannot separate our interaction with the environment from the interaction between power structures and people, whether we are discussing large states, banks, corporations, international organizations, etc. In a global system in which people are themselves treated as commodities, where more than half the world’s population lives in abject poverty, with hunger and starvation increasing, with imperial powers destabilizing countries, bombing communities, supporting coups and waging wars, oppressing, impoverishing, and destroying, environmental issues are inseparable from social, political, and economic issues.

One need only look at the issue of militarization and war to see a clear relationship between these issues: wars are mostly waged by large states – whether directly or indirectly through proxies – against poor populations in weak ‘Third World’ states. Aside from the obvious destruction the physical war takes – through bombs and bullets – a nation’s infrastructure is destroyed, its people impoverished and oppressed. The American military system – by far the largest in the world – through the maintenance of aircraft carriers, ships, jets, equipment, transportation, weapons, with roughly one thousand military bases around the world, foreign occupations and operations, make this single institution known as the Pentagon “the largest institutional user of petroleum products and energy” in the world.[1] The United States wages wars to secure resources around the world, to dominate and oppress populations, and in doing so, exploits and plunders those very same resources, destroys the environment, spreads poverty, death, and destruction. Its purpose is to serve minute – yet powerful – interests. Yet, it is devastating for the world’s people and the environment.

If we are truly interested with answering the question of how we move forward as a species in dealing with environmental issues, we must ask the parallel questions of how we deal with issues of poverty, hunger, land, exploitation, oppression, war, empire, and power. It seemingly makes the task harder, but it also makes the answers more plausible, and, indeed, possible.

Again, looking at the issue of climate change, we have seen countless international conferences held by global plutocrats, governments, international organizations, banks and corporations and global NGOs and environmental organizations like the World Wildlife Fund and Conservation International, whose boards of directors are dominated by individuals from banks, corporations and oil conglomerates. And we phase surprise that nothing productive is done. The ‘solutions’ we are given for complex problems are based around ideas of carbon credits, carbon trading, carbon caps and carbon markets, effectively commodifying the entire atmosphere, turning pollution itself into a profitable enterprise, and thus, making the problems that much worse. We are told that there are ways to simply ‘Green’ the economy, to promote the interests of state-capitalism and the environment simultaneously. But in a system which has always subjugated the environment and the population at large to the powerful interests which dominate, we are fools to assume they have changed their interests.

A great deal of press was given to the 2009 Copenhagen Conference, and the fact that it ended in failure. The focus was on “who” screwed it up: it was China, it was America, it was Canada! Everyone was pointing the finger at one another. The reality, however, was far more revealing, not only of the failure of Copenhagen, but of the true intent and the result of pursuing environmental issues through the institutions of power which have created the environmental problems in the first place.

The Copenhagen conference was viewed by elites as a means to advancing their institutional power to a more global level, as internal UN documents revealed that the focus was on a “green economy,” noting: “moving towards a green economy would also provide an opportunity to re-examine national and global governance structures.”[2] The document stated that “linkages between environmental sustainability and the economy will emerge as a key focus for public policymaking and a determinant of future market opportunities,” and one top official stated that the environmental, food, and economic “crises provide a unique opportunity for fundamental restructuring of economies so that they encourage and sustain green energy, green growth and green jobs.”[3]

It sounds well enough, but its focus on “market opportunities” for the “green economy” ignores entirely the nature of “market opportunities” being one of the most significant factors in creating environmental crises in the first place. With a focus on advancing issues of “global governance” in order to address environmental issues, the role of dominant institutions in creating the environmental crisis is overlooked, and thus, the ‘solution’ is to enhance the power of those very same institutions to global levels, further removing power from populations and communities (where the real solutions to environmental issues lie). In short, if the issue of ‘power’ – and the global distribution of power between institutions and populations – is not addressed, the ‘solutions’ offered are, at best, little more than band-aids on broken arms.

China received a great deal of the blame for the failure of the Copenhagen talks, but there is more to this story. Perhaps the most significant factor was due to what was called the ‘Danish Text,’ a leaked Danish government document written in secret between the rich and powerful nations to serve as a framework for their actions and intentions at the conference. The agreement would have handed more power to the rich nations, and sideline the UN in any final agreement, as well as “setting unequal limits on per capita carbon emissions for developed and developing countries in 2050; meaning that people in rich countries would be permitted to emit nearly twice as much under the proposals.” In other words, with true Western cultural state-capitalist logic: find the problem, acknowledge the problem, then double the problem! The text was drafted by a select coterie of representatives from Denmark, the U.K. and the United States, and the draft “hands effective control of climate change finance to the World Bank; would abandon the Kyoto protocol – the only legally binding treaty that the world has on emissions reductions; and would make any money to help poor countries adapt to climate change dependent on them taking a range of actions.”[4]

Thus, one of the central institutions of world power – the World Bank – which has advanced the interests of Western banks and corporations across the ‘developing’ world, promoting privatization, deregulation, exploitation, resource extraction, and ultimately, environmental degradation, would then be given the responsibility of ‘solving’ the environmental crisis. And how would it do this? The World Bank would be given control over the dispersal of funds in the same way that it has handled the dispersal of loans in the past. Here’s a hint: it comes with “strings attached.”

A senior diplomat at the talks described the Danish Text as “a very dangerous document for developing countries.” Among the many points in the document were to “force developing countries to agree to specific emissions cuts and measures that were not part of the original UN agreement” and to “weaken the UN’s role in handling climate finance,” as well as aiming to “divide poor countries further.” Allowing for the rich countries to increase their emissions, while poor countries face severe restraints, overlooks the fact that the countries with most emissions already are those very same rich countries. Preventing poor countries from producing emissions would prevent them from developing their own resources as they see fit, instead allowing for the rich countries to move in and further dictate policies in their own interests.[5] Ultimately, it was a draft agreement to advance imperial domination of the rich world over the poor world, using the issue of “climate change” as the excuse.

When the Danish text was leaked, representatives of poor nations were “furious that it is being promoted by rich countries without their knowledge and without discussion in the negotiations.” One diplomat noted: “It is being done in secret. Clearly the intention is to get Obama and the leaders of other rich countries to muscle it through when they arrive next week. It effectively is the end of the UN process.” Further, “It proposes a green fund to be run by a board but the big risk is that it will be run by the World Bank and the Global Environment Facility,” a partnership of ten agencies including the World Bank and UN Environment Programme, thus bypassing more democratically accountable and representative institutions, such as the UN itself. This, stated one diplomat, “would be a step backwards, and it tries to put constraints on developing countries when none were negotiated in earlier UN climate talks.”[6] Since poor countries already suffer the greatest burden, not only of poverty, but of environmental devastation and climatic change (not to mention, war, imperialism, and oppression), the notion of the powerful countries exporting their responsibility to the poor and oppressed does not only fail to address the issues, but would inevitably make the problems much worse. We tend to call this “market logic.”

The release of the Danish text prompted the developing nations, represented by the G-77 (the vast majority of the world’s population) to suspend their participation in the negotiations.[7] Days following the conclusion of the Copenhagen conference, the UN’s climate chief wrote in a confidential internal memo that it was the ‘Danish Text’ that led to the ultimate failure of the talks, stating that, “the text was clearly advantageous to the US and the west, would have steamrollered the developing countries, and was presented to a few countries a week before the meeting officially started.”[8] Within days of the leaking of the ‘Danish Text’, developing nations were accusing the rich countries of engaging in “climate colonialism.” The Sudanese diplomat to the conference stated, “This is all based on the dominance and supremacy of developed countries. One could say the Empire has been doing this since the 16th Century, the Empire has always ruthlessly grabbed natural resources – the new resource is the global atmospheric space and carbon space.”[9] One activist and participant called the deal an act of “carbon colonialism.”[10]

The British delegation at Copenhagen further inflamed tensions and calls of colonialism when it suggested the creation of a “climate fund” by diverting western aid budgets from poverty reduction funds into climate change “adaptation.” Thus, “money earmarked for education or health would be diverted into projects such as solar panels and wind farms,” incurring anger from several developing nations.[11] As one commentator with the Guardian explained, Copenhagen was “a disaster for Africa,” the continent that contributes the least amount of carbon emissions in the world, and will disproportionately suffer the consequences more than any other. Several African nations were coerced into signing the final deal, even though they had walked out of negotiations following the Danish Text, with industrial rich nations threatening to withdraw foreign aid if the deal was not signed.[12]

Again, this is but one of many examples of how environmental issues are intimately related to those of poverty, economics, imperialism, and power, more generally. To address one with any substance, we must address all with perseverance. Or, we could just continue to push for international conferences met with the self-congratulations of global elites who pride themselves on having flown around the world on taxpayers’ dollars to stay in five-star hotels and eat gourmet meals while they discuss issues of poverty and environmental protection, amounting to little more than “agreements to agree” at some point in the future, while globally, business as usual, and more accurately, accelerated rates of exploitation and devastation, dominate the decisions and actions of the powerful.

The Financialization of Food and the Profitability of Poverty

The global food crisis hit international headlines in 2008, with “food riots” erupting in dozens of countries around the world, in Asia, Africa, and Latin America. By May of 2008, it was reported that food riots had hit roughly 37 countries, with some of the more dramatic taking place in Cameroon, Niger, Egypt, and Haiti. At that time, the Food and Agricultural Organization (FAO) warned: “Food is no longer the cheap commodity that it once was. Rising food prices are bound to worsen he already unacceptable level of food deprivation suffered by 854 million people… We are facing the risk that the number of hungry will increase by many more millions of people.”[13]

Governments and repressive regimes around the world were under threat from the rising tide of food price rebellions (commonly referred to as “food riots”), with the rapidly accelerating costs of life’s necessities driving people to desperation, and even pushing governments to the brink of collapse. A UN adviser and economist, Jeffrey Sachs, noted, “It’s the worst crisis of its kind in more than 30 years… It’s a big deal and it’s obviously threatening a lot of governments. There are a number of governments on the ropes, and I think there’s more political fallout to come.” El Salvador’s president, Elias Antonio Saca, told the World Economic Forum that it “is a perfect storm… How long can we withstand the situation? We have to feed our people, and commodities are becoming scarce. This scandalous storm might become a hurricane that could upset not only our economies but also the stability of our countries.” A former adviser to the Ministry of Agriculture in Indonesia added that “[t]he biggest concern is food riots… It has happened in the past and can happen again.” In Haiti, where roughly 75% of the population earn less than $2 per day, with one in five children chronically malnourished, hunger had become so extreme that one “booming” commodity had become “the selling of patties made of mud, oil and sugar, typically consumed only by the most destitute.”[14]

In Haiti, as protesters approached the presidential palace, United Nations “peacekeepers” fired rubber bullets on the hungry and starving, as well as using tear gas, and several protesters were reported to have been killed in the chaos. Food prices rose by an average of 40% since the middle of 2007, and with the price increases, came increased instability and social unrest. An adviser to the Haitian president commented: “I compare this situation to having a bucket full of gasoline and having some people around with a box of matches… As long as the two have a possibility to meet, you’re going to have trouble.”[15]

The American government scrambled to increase “food aid” to countries around the world, fearful for the stability of its protectorates and puppet governments. A U.S. Senator, Richard Durbin, noted: “This is the worst global food crisis in more than 30 years… It threatens not only the health and survival of millions of people around the world, many of them children, but it also is a threat to global security,” with over 36 countries “now facing food crises [and] requiring help from abroad.”[16]

An analyst at a major risk management agency told the Financial Times in November of 2008 that there had been “food protests in 25 countries in the past year,” adding: “In Indonesia the price of rice is directly correlated to the number of strikes or riots… A sharp increase in prices could cause production problems if there are strikes by workers and civil unrest could damage vital infrastructure like roads or telecoms or the government could impose a political crackdown.” The analyst provided advice for global corporations: “What global companies need to do is to avoid being seen as contributing to or being complicit with an issue. Some governments will blame rising food prices on the west, for example.” An analyst at an insurance conglomerate agreed: “Companies need to be aware of how they are perceived and seek to win hearts and minds.” In other words, what is needed is an excellent public relations campaign to ensure that western corporations do not get their deserved share of the blame for rising food prices. The advice was not to avoid contributing to the crisis, but to “avoid being seen as contributing,” after all.[17]

In the span of a year between 2007 and 2008, the global price of wheat rose by 130%, the price of rice – the staple food for the majority of the world’s population – rose by 74%, going up by more than 10% in one day alone. While rising food prices were causing riots, social unrest, and the instability of governments across the ‘Third World,’ the prices were noticeably increasing within the industrial nations themselves, though by no means to the same degree, or with the same dramatic and devastating effects. The FAO estimated that food prices were likely to remain high for at least a decade. Global droughts, climate change, environmental destruction, massive farm subsidies in the west, population growth, and the development of biofuels (food for fuel), have all contributed to the rising costs of food.[18] Of course, a number of other important factors were involved, such as the liberalization of food production and global markets, largely a staple of the neoliberal era, from the mid-1970s onward, and of enormous importance, the role of financial speculation, with banks, hedge funds, and investors speculating on food costs increasing, and thus, driving up the costs of food.

According to a confidential report by the World Bank in 2008 which was leaked to the Guardian, biofuels forced global food prices up by roughly 75%, contradicting the claims of the U.S. government, the main promoter and developer of biofuels, that their production led to a 3% price rise in the cost of food. Robert Bailey, a policy adviser at Oxfam stated: “Political leaders seem intent on suppressing and ignoring the strong evidence that biofuels are a major factor in recent food price rises… It is imperative that we have the full picture. While politicians concentrate on keeping industry lobbies happy, people in poor countries cannot afford enough to eat.” The World Bank estimated that the rising food prices pushed 100 million people worldwide below the poverty line, with government ministers at the G8 conference in Japan describing the food crisis as “the first real economic crisis of globalization.”[19]

The World Bank report contested that: “Rapid income growth in developing countries has not led to large increases in global grain consumption and was not a major factor responsible for the large price increases.” The major droughts in Australia and elsewhere, according to the World Bank report, did not have a significant impact on food prices, with the biggest cause being the US and European drive for biofuels. The report noted: “Without the increase in biofuels, global wheat and maize stocks would not have declined appreciably and price increases due to other factors would have been moderate,” adding that the higher costs of energy and fertilizer contributed to a 15% increase of food costs. Use of biofuels has diverted grain production away from food and toward fuel, with over one-third of U.S. corn used to produce ethanol, and roughly half of vegetable oils in the European Union used to produce biodiesel. Further, farmers have been encouraged to put aside land for use in the production of biofuels instead of food. Finally, and perhaps most importantly, the production of biofuels has encouraged financial speculation in food markets, as prices were expected to increase, and thus speculators were set to make enormous amounts of money if and when prices go up. Speculation, of course, is a self-fulfilling prophecy, as speculators betting that prices will go up inevitably pushes the prices up.[20]

The production of biofuels has been a major strategy by North American and European governments in order to reduce dependency on foreign oil and address climate change and environmental issues. A secret report conducted by the British government – the Gallagher Report – released in 2008, reported that the development of biofuels played a “significant” role in the food price increases. All petrol and diesel in Britain had to contain 2.5% of biofuels by 2008, and was aimed to meet a target of 5% by 2010, while the EU was itself contemplating a 10% target for 2020. Naturally, this would increase food prices accordingly, creating much larger and deeper food crises.[21]

For all the contributory factors, not least of which was the development of biofuels, which collectively account for moderate increases in the cost of food, the primary driver of the food prices was financial speculation. This has been made exceedingly evident as the food crisis was not ended in 2008, but has continued to reach new heights, and the crisis has become almost permanent.

At an emergency meeting on food price inflation in 2010, the UN’s special rapporteur on food, Olivier De Schutter, released a paper in which the increase of food prices was blamed on a “speculative bubble” created by pension funds, hedge funds, sovereign wealth funds, and big banks that speculate on commodity markets. The paper noted that beginning in 2001, “food commodities derivatives markets, and commodities indexes began to see an influx of non-traditional investors… The reason for this was because other markets dried up one by one: the dotcoms vanished at the end of 2001, the stock market soon after, and the US housing market in August 2007. As each bubble burst, these large institutional investors moved into other markets, each traditionally considered more stable than the last. Strong similarities can be seen between the price behaviour of food commodities and other refuge values, such as gold.” De Schutter further wrote: “A significant contributory cause of the price spike [was] speculation by institutional investors who did not have any expertise or interest in agricultural commodities, and who invested in commodities index funds or in order to hedge speculative bets.”[22]

As prices nearly doubled between 2007 and 2008, riots erupted in over 30 countries and 150 million more people were pushed into hunger, the majority of commodity prices in 2010 remained well over 50% of their pre-2007 figures, and were set to continue upwards: “Once again we find ourselves in a situation where basic food commodities are undergoing supply shocks. World wheat futures and spot prices climbed steadily until the beginning of August 2010, when Russia – faced with massive wildfires that destroyed its wheat harvest – imposed an export ban on that commodity. In addition, other markets such as sugar and oilseeds [were] witnessing significant price increases.” Gregory Barrow of the UN World Food Program noted: “What we have seen over the past few weeks is a period of volatility driven partly by the announcement from Russia of an export ban on grain food until next year, and this has driven prices up. They have fallen back again, but this has had an impact.” Food prices were rising by roughly 15% per year in India, Nepal, Latin America and China. A British Green Party MP stated: “Food has become a commodity to be traded. The only thing that matters under the current system is profit. Trading in food must not be treated as simply another form of business as usual: for many people it is a matter of life and death. We must insist on the complete removal of agriculture from the remit of the World Trade Organization.”[23]

In December of 2010, food prices reached a new record high, surpassing the 2008 levels, entering what an FAO economist referred to as “a danger territory,” adding that there was “still room for prices to go up much higher.”[24] As John Vidal wrote in the Guardian, “[t]he same banks, hedge funds and financiers whose speculation on the global money markets caused the sub-prime mortgage crisis are thought to be causing food prices to yo-yo and inflate,” as they have taken “advantage of the deregulation of global commodity markets” and are thus “making billions from speculating on food and causing misery around the world.” Food prices were even rising 10% per year in Britain and Europe, with the UN reporting that prices could be expected to rise at least another 40% within the following decade.[25]

In the mid-1990s, “following heavy lobbying by banks, hedge funds and free market politicians in the US and Britain, the regulations on commodity markets were steadily abolished.” What had previously been “contracts” between farmers and traders turned into “derivatives” which were to be bought and sold on international markets between global investors, “who had nothing to do with agriculture.” Thus, a global market of “food speculation” had been born, noted Vidal: “Cocoa, fruit juices, sugar, staples, meat and coffee are all now global commodities, along with oil, gold and metals.”[26] The same institutions which were responsible for creating the massive housing bubble which resulted in the economic crisis, with foreclosures on millions of homes, reacted to the bursting of that bubble by creating a new one in commodity markets, notably food. Except with this bubble, people don’t have to wait for it to burst in order to suffer, as people are driven deeper into poverty and hunger as it inflates, all the while the institutional “investors” make a killing, quite literally.

When banks and investors began moving billions out of the housing market and into new markets, food speculation became especially attractive. Mike Masters, the fund manager at Masters Capital Management testified in the US Senate in 2008 that, “We first became aware of this [food speculation] in 2006. It didn’t seem like a big factor then. But in 2007/08 it really spiked up… When you looked at the flows there was strong evidence. I know a lot of traders and they confirmed what was happening. Most of the business is now speculation – I would say 70-80%.” In other words, roughly 70-80% of the food price increases were determined by speculation, compared to the plethora of other given reasons, combined. Masters warned the Senate: “Let’s say news comes about bad crops and rain somewhere. Normally the price would rise about $1 [per bushel]. [However] when you have a 70-80% speculative market it goes up $2-3 to account for the extra costs. It adds to the volatility. It will end badly as all Wall Street fads do. It’s going to blow up.”[27]

The president of Strategic Investment Group in New York warned that this speculative market has only increased in size, and that “speculative demand for commodity futures has increased since 2008 by 40-80% in agriculture futures.” In 2010, one London-based hedge fund purchased more than 7% of the world’s stocks of cocoa beans, which drove the price of chocolate to its highest price in 33 years. The UN rapporteur on food, Olivier De Schutter agreed: “Prices of wheat, maize and rice have increased very significantly but this is not linked to low stock levels or harvests, but rather to traders reacting to information and speculating on the markets.” Deborah Doane of the World Development Movement noted: “People die from hunger while the banks make a killing from betting on food.”[28]

The World Development Movement (WDM) issued a report in the Summer of 2010 blaming the rising food prices on investors and speculators, just as cocoa spiked to its 33-year high after a London hedge fund purchased massive amounts of cocoa stock. The report noted that “risky and secretive” speculative bets on food prices were exacerbating the conditions of the world’s poor, as well as sparking social unrest. Deborah Doane, director of the WDM, noted: “Investment banks, like Goldman Sachs, are making huge profits by gambling on the price of everyday foods. But this is leaving people in the UK out of pocket, and risks the poorest people in the world starving.” She added: “Nobody benefits from this kind of reckless gambling except a few City [of London] wheeler-dealers. British consumers suffer because it pushes up inflation, because of unpredictable oil and raw material prices, and the world’s poorest people suffer because basic foods become unaffordable.” The WDM estimated that Goldman Sachs likely made a profit of $1 billion in 2009 through speculating on food prices, though Goldman Sachs stated that these profits from poverty and hunger were “ludicrously overstated.”[29]

Even in the establishment journal, Foreign Policy, ever an apologist and advocate for American imperialism and global hegemony, the food price increases were blamed on “Wall Street greed.” Perhaps not surprisingly, it was bankers at Goldman Sachs in 1991 that developed a derivative (speculative bet) based upon 24 raw materials, from metals and energy, to coffee, cocoa, cattle, corn, wheat and soy, known as the Goldman Sachs Commodity Index (GSCI). In 1999, when futures markets were deregulated, “bankers could take as large a position on grains as they liked, an opportunity which had, since the Great Depression, only been available to those who actually had something to do with the production of our food.” Other banks followed the lead of Goldman Sachs, and found that they too could reap enormous profits from speculating on food prices (and thereby causing mass poverty, hunger, and starvation), including Barclays, Deutsche Bank, Pimco, JP Morgan Chase, AIG, Bear Stearns, and Lehman Brothers. As Frederick Kaufman wrote: “The result of Wall Street’s venture into grain and feed and livestock has been a shock to the global food production and delivery system. Not only does the world’s food supply have to contend with constricted supply and increased demand for real grain, but investment bankers have engineered an artificial upward pull on the price of grain futures.” Speculation thus resulted in a situation where “imaginary wheat dominates the price of real wheat,” as “bankers and traders sit at the top of the food chain – the carnivores of the system, devouring everyone and everything below.”[30]

Alan Knuckman is an analyst with Agora Financials, a consulting firm specializing in commodity investments, which has Knuckman spending his time on the floor of the Chicago Board of Trade (CBOT), the world’s largest commodity futures exchange. Knuckman stated: “This is capitalism in its purest form… This is where millionaires are made.” One might add, however, that it’s also where millions more people in hunger are “made.” Knuckman explained: “I trade in anything you can get in and out of quickly… I’m here to make money.” And that’s what he does, and he does it well. Knuckman reflected the view of many in his field, stating: “I don’t believe in politics… I believe in the market, and the market is always right.” When asked if the soaring food prices were the result of financial speculation, something in which he is directly engaged, Knuckman replied: “I don’t see it.”[31]

One is reminded of a bad joke: two fish meet, one asks the other, “how’s the water today?” to which the other replies, “what’s water?” When one is entirely submerged in a specific universe, it requires a great deal of effort to remove one’s perspective to see a wider world view, and their place within it. Alan Knuckman is quite obviously far removed from the everyday struggles of most people, in his own country, let alone the rest of the world. When questioned by Der Spiegel about the high cost of food, he explained: “The age of cheap food is over… Most Americans eat too much, anyway.” While Americans spend roughly 13% of their disposable income, on average, on food, the world’s poor spend roughly 70% of their budget on food, and thus, high food prices for this population, with one billion people on earth classified as living in hunger, and with food prices hitting new record highs almost every passing year, pushing tens of millions more into poverty and hunger, these price-hikes are “life-threatening.” So what did Knuckman have to say about this? He contended that it amounted to “undesirable side effects of the market,” but of course, as he earlier stated, “the market is always right,” and thus, with that logic of thinking, there is nothing “wrong” with one billion people going hungry, nor with more being pushed into poverty and hunger, which are amounted to mere “undesirable side effects.” As he earlier explained, “I’m here to make money,” and obviously, everything else is incidental.[32]

The international food market, which “is always right,” is also incidentally dominated by major banking houses, and the speculative trade in food securities was created and inflated by the very same banks that created, inflated, and profited off of the housing boom in the United States, such as Goldman Sachs, Lehman Brothers, Bear Stearns, Morgan Stanley, and JP Morgan Chase. These banks, hedge funds, and other speculators are able to reap enormous profits as millions are pushed into hunger and poverty, and the brilliance of this scheme is that the investors don’t have to produce a single thing, and never even come into contact with the real food market, whether production or distribution. They trade in “futures,” betting that prices will go up (or possibly down) in the future, and the real prices of food follow the speculative increases and decreases, and when prices go up, the speculators make money. The World Bank estimated that an increase of 10% in worldwide food prices pushes roughly 10 million more people into poverty, and that while there is enough food to feed the world, “many die of hunger simply because they can no longer afford to pay for it.”[33]

In 2011, the annual meeting for Barclays faced protests by anti-poverty campaigners who were raising awareness about the role of Barclays in driving up food prices and profiting off of hunger, as the UK’s largest participant in food commodity trading, and one of the top three banks involved globally, according to information from the World Development Movement (WDM). The other top two banks in global commodity trading are Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley. Deborah Doane of the WDM noted: “First, it was sub-prime mortgages, now it’s food commodities… The lack of transparency in these markets bears worrying resemblance to the behaviour that led to the 2008 financial crash. Like any irrational asset bubble, the investors pile their money in for short-term profits, in spite of the consequences.” Estimates from WDM put the profits Barclays accumulated from food speculation at 340 million pounds in 2010.[34]

By 2012, it was reported that Barclays had made as much as half a billion pounds in two years from food speculation. An official at Oxfam noted: “The food market is becoming a playground for investors rather than a market place for farmers. The trend of big investors betting on food prices is transforming food into a financial asset while exacerbating the risk of price spikes that hit the poor hardest.”[35]

In an early 2012 interview with Der Spiegel, the head of the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), José Graziano da Silva, stated that, “speculation is indeed an important cause of the heavily fluctuating and very high prices” of food, and “only benefits banks and hedge funds, but not producers, processors and buyers – and certainly not consumers.” Apart from placing “regulations” on food speculation, da Silva suggested that the rich industrial countries should end their agricultural subsidies, noting that when the U.S. ended its subsidies for corn-based biofuels in the summer of 2011, global prices of corn immediately dropped, which “had a direct and positive effect on the food situation.” The FAO is hardly a radical organization, firmly entrenched within global power structures, it continues to promote “market solutions” to problems of hunger and food, though is critical of market “excesses.” Da Silva noted, however, that “there is enough food for everybody, but for many people, especially the poor, it’s simply too expensive. They are going hungry, even with full shelves of food.” Thus, when asked if the food crisis was “really a financial problem,” da Silva replied, “Of course.”[36]

In 2011, speculative investment in agricultural commodities amounted to 20 times the amount of money spent by all countries of the world on food and agricultural “aid.” The three biggest players in agricultural commodity speculation – Goldman Sachs, Morgan Stanley, and Barclays, respectively – have reaped hundreds of millions and billions in profits in this speculative assault against the world’s poorest billion people suffering from hunger. The UN rapporteur on food, Olivier De Schutter, noted: “What we are seeing now is that these financial markets have developed massively with the arrival of these new financial investors, who are purely interested in the short-term monetary gain and are not really interested in the physical thing – they never actually buy the ton of wheat or maize; they only buy a promise to buy or sell. The result of this financialisation of the commodities market is that the prices of the products respond increasingly to a purely speculative logic. That explains why in very short periods of time we see prices spiking or bubbles exploding, because prices are less and less determined by the real match between supply and demand.”[37]

The UN World Food Programme referred to the 2008-2011 global spike in food prices as a “silent tsunami of hunger,” pushing 115 million more people into hunger and poverty since 2008. This, explained De Schutter, is “an absolute catastrophe” for the world’s poor. In Kenya, an unemployed single-mother looking after her eight-year-old daughter and 83-year old father explained that since the massive food price hikes: “We stopped eating lunch, and saved the little we had to eat for supper. We drank tea without sugar and sometimes we also missed breakfast. I had to travel so much to wash clothes to get money for food, but sometimes I was so weak I fell down. For supper, we had one or two cups of flour mixed with water and salt. Our life was so hard.”[38] It is worth remembering – and reminding yourself continuously – that there is more than enough food in the world to feed the population of the world, yet, stories like this single mother’s are becoming increasingly common among billions of people. If ever there was a clear sign that something is fundamentally wrong with the global system – and “market solutions” – this is it.

In the summer of 2012, the United States experienced the worst draught in decades, contributing to increased speculation in food markets, driving prices up higher and inducing warnings of another major global food crisis on the brink.[39] Chris Mahoney, the head of agriculture at Glencore, a major global commodity trader, let slip some industry honesty when he stated: “The U.S. weather starting mid-May… has been among the worst three or four years of the century, comparable to the dust bowl years of the mid-1930s… In terms of the outlook for the balance [profits] of the year, the environment is a good one. High prices, lots of volatility, a lot of dislocation, tightness, a lot of arbitrage opportunities… I think we will both be able to provide the world with solutions, getting stuff to where it’s needed quickly and timely, and that should also be good for Glencore.” The CEO of Glencore, Ivan Glasenberg, referred to the volatile food market as “a time when industry fundamentals are the most positive they have been for some time.” Put simply, increased food prices, and thus, increased hunger, is “good for Glencore.”[40] Tens of millions more people pushed into abject poverty and hunger? No need to be concerned, that only means that “industry fundamentals are the most positive they have been for some time.”

What can we conclude, therefore, from a global system of ‘markets’ in which poverty and starvation create massive profits for a few select institutions and individuals, at the expense of literally billions of human beings, and entire nations and societies? Does this really reflect, as one trader stated that, “the market is always right”? Or does it reveal a market which benefits few at the expense of many? The answer is, of course, self-evident: so then why is the issue not framed in such a manner? Instead of acknowledging global markets as inherently and structurally (not to mention ideologically) immoral and wrong, we talk about “reforming” and “regulating” these markets as if minor changes would rectify the fundamental problems. The truth – as hard as it may be for many to accept – is that global markets are fundamentally wrong and immoral.

We acknowledge this type of immorality on an individual level, say with the literary character of Ebenezer Scrooge who profited from the misery of others, but when it reaches global institutional and ideological proportions, we often justify and excuse it, or possibly acknowledge that it is “not perfect” and there are “undesirable side effects,” possibly warranting ‘reform.’ Perhaps the institutional ideology could be best summarized by Ebenezer Scrooge when he was asked to donate to a charity to help the poor and hungry who were at risk of dying, to which Scrooge replied, “If they would rather die… they had better do it, and decrease the surplus population.”

At what point is it acceptable to suggest that humanity is in need of an entirely new way of organization and function? In a world of seven billion people, when billions live in poverty, in slums, and with hunger, at what point do we begin to acknowledge that this system simply does not work? Sadly, it seems that people only often recognize this when they are among the poor, within the slums, and starving. By that point, however, their concerns become those of daily survival, not issues of reform or even activism and revolution. Their days are spent toiling and struggling for a meager dollar or two so that they could afford a meager meal, or if lucky, two meals. Looking after other family members, they do not have the luxury of education, information, and the ready capacity for organization and activism that we – who do not live in hunger and absolute poverty – have. If we continue to uphold a world system which has created and sustains and exacerbates the conditions and prevalence of global poverty, slums, and hunger, we doom others – and indeed ourselves – to that same fate.

Andrew Gavin Marshall is an independent researcher and writer based in Montreal, Canada, with a focus on studying the ideas, institutions, and individuals of power and resistance across a wide spectrum of social, political, economic, and historical spheres. He has been published in AlterNet, CounterPunch, Occupy.com, Truth-Out, RoarMag, and a number of other alternative media groups, and regularly does radio, Internet, and television interviews with both alternative and mainstream news outlets. He is Project Manager of The People’s Book Project and has a weekly podcast show with BoilingFrogsPost.

Future samples from this chapter will focus on environmental degradation, poverty, and the global land grabs. If you found this excerpt of interest, please consider making a donation to The People’s Book Project to help the research and writing continue.

Notes

[1]       Sara Flounders, “Winner of Project Consored top 25 articles for 2009 – 2010 news stories: Pentagon’s role in global catastrophe,” IAC, 18 December 2009:

http://www.iacenter.org/o/world/climatesummit_pentagon121809/

[2]       UNEP, Background paper for the ministerial consultations, Governing Council of the United Nations Environment Programme, 14 December 2009: page 3

http://www.foxnews.com/projects/pdf/022510_greeneconomy.pdf

[3]       Ibid.

[4]       John Vidal, Copenhagen climate summit in disarray after ‘Danish text’ leak, The Guardian, 8 December 2009: http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2009/dec/08/copenhagen-climate-summit-disarray-danish-text

[5]       Ibid.

[6]       Ibid.

[7]       Richard Black, Copenhagen climate summit negotiations ‘suspended’, BBC, 14 December 2009: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/8411898.stm

[8]       John Vidal, Copenhagen climate failure blamed on ‘Danish text’, The Guardian, 31 May 2010: http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2010/may/31/climate-change-copenhagen-danish-text

[9]       Louise Gray and Rowena Mason, Copenhagen summit: rich nations guilty of ‘climate colonialism’, The Telegraph, 9 December 2009: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/copenhagen-climate-change-confe/6771129/Copenhagen-summit-rich-nations-guilty-of-climate-colonialism.html

[10]     Philippe Naughton, Copenhagen Summit: wealthy nations accused of ‘carbon colonialism’, The Sunday Times, 9 December 2009: http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/environment/article6950081.ece

[11]     Ben Webster, Britain angers poor nations with plan to switch cash from health to climate, The Times, 10 December 2009: http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/environment/article6951047.ece

[12]     William Gumede, Copenhagen is a disaster for Africa, The Guardian, 23 December 2009: http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/cif-green/2009/dec/23/copenhagen-africa-climate-change-deal

[13]     Julian Borger, “Crisis talks on global food prices,” The Guardian, 27 May 2008:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2008/may/27/food.internationalaidanddevelopment

[14]     Marc Lacey, “Across globe, hunger brings rising anger,” The New York Times, 18 April 2008:

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/04/18/world/americas/18iht-18food.12122763.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0

[15]     Orla Ryan, “Food riots grip Haiti,” The Guardian, 9 April 2008:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2008/apr/09/11

[16]     David M. Herszenhorn, “Senate Democrats Calling for More Food Assistance,” The New York Times, 29 April 2008:

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/04/29/washington/29food.html

[17]     Jane Croft, “Food: Employers may have to become providers,” The Financial Times, 18 November 2008:

http://www.ft.com/intl/cms/s/0/44136382-b43e-11dd-8e35-0000779fd18c.html#axzz2GfzBy39o

[18]     Paul Vallely, “The other global crisis: rush to biofuels is driving up price of food,” The Independent, 12 April 2008:

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/politics/the-other-global-crisis-rush-to-biofuels-is-driving-up-price-of-food-808138.html

[19]     Aditya Chakrabortty, “Secret report: biofuel caused food crisis,” The Guardian, 3 July 2008:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2008/jul/03/biofuels.renewableenergy

[20]     Ibid.

[21]     Julian Borger and John Vidal, “New study to force ministers to review climate change plan,” The Guardian, 19 June 2008:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2008/jun/19/climatechange.biofuels

[22]     John Vidal, “UN warned of major new food crisis at emergency meeting in Rome,” The Guardian, 24 September 2010:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2010/sep/24/food-crisis-un-emergency-meeting-rome

[23]     Ibid.

[24]     Jill Treanor, “World food prices enter ‘danger territory’ to reach record high,” The Guardian, 5 January 2011:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2011/jan/05/world-food-prices-danger-record-high-un

[25]     John Vidal, “Food speculation: ‘People die from hunger while banks make a killing on food’,” The Observer, 23 January 2011:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/global-development/2011/jan/23/food-speculation-banks-hunger-poverty

[26]     Ibid.

[27]     Ibid.

[28]     Ibid.

[29]     Katie Allen, “Hedge funds accused of gambling with lives of the poorest as food prices soar,” The Guardian, 19 July 2010:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2010/jul/19/speculators-commodities-food-price-rises

[30]     Frederick Kaufman, “How Goldman Sachs Created the Food Crisis,” Foreign Policy, 27 April 2011:

http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2011/04/27/how_goldman_sachs_created_the_food_crisis?wp_login_redirect=0

[31]     Horand Knaup, Michaela Schiessl and Anne Seith, “Speculating with Lives How Global Investors Make Money Out of Hunger,” Der Spiegel, 1 September 2011:

http://www.spiegel.de/international/world/speculating-with-lives-how-global-investors-make-money-out-of-hunger-a-783654.html

[32]     Ibid.

[33]     Ibid.

[34]     Felicity Lawrence, “Barclays faces protests over role in global food crisis,” The Guardian, 25 April 2011:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2011/apr/25/barclays-faces-commodity-protests

[35]     Tom Bawden, “Barclays makes £500m betting on food crisis,” The Independent, 1 September 2012:

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/business/news/barclays-makes-500m-betting-on-food-crisis-8100011.html

[36]     Spiegel Staff, “UN Food and Agricultural Chief: ‘Speculation Is an Important Cause of High Prices’,” Der Spiegel, 16 January 2012:

http://www.spiegel.de/international/world/un-food-and-agricultural-chief-speculation-is-an-important-cause-of-high-prices-a-809289.html

[37]     Grace Livingstone, “The real hunger games: How banks gamble on food prices – and the poor lose out,” The Independent, 1 April 2012:

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/politics/the-real-hunger-games-how-banks-gamble-on-food-prices–and-the-poor-lose-out-7606263.html

[38]     Ibid.

[39]     Vince Heaney, “US drought renews food speculation concerns,” The Financial Times, 19 August 2012:

http://www.ft.com/intl/cms/s/0/6d36d9ea-e16e-11e1-9c72-00144feab49a.html#axzz2GxI6Kccf

[40]     Tom Bawden, “Unholy trade of making millions out of misery,” The Independent, 23 August 2012:

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/business/news/unholy-trade-of-making-millions-out-of-misery-8073599.html

By: Andrew Gavin Marshall

Corporate power is immense. The world’s largest corporation is Royal Dutch Shell, surpassed in wealth only by the 24 largest countries on earth. Of the 150 largest economic entities in the world, 58% are corporations. Corporations are institutionally totalitarian, the result of power’s resistance to the democratic revolution, which was begrudgingly accepted in the political sphere, but denied the economic sphere, and thus was denied a truly democratic society. They are driven by a religion called “short-term profits.” Corporate society – a state-capitalist society – flourished in the United States, and managed the transition of American society in the early 20th century, just as Fascists and Communists were managing transitions across Europe. With each World War, American society – its political and economic power – grew in global influence, and with the end of World War II, that corporate society was exported globally.

This is empire. The American military, intelligence agencies, and national security apparatus operate with the intention of serving U.S. – and now increasingly global – state and corporate interests. Wars, coups, destabilization campaigns, support for dictators, tyrants, genocides and oppression are the products of Western interaction with the rest of the world.

In the same sense that “God made man in his own image,” corporations remade society in their own interest; and with equal arrogance. Corporations and banks created or took over think tanks, foundations, educational institutions, media, public relations, advertising, and other sectors of society. Through their control of other institutions, they extend their ideologies of power – and the variances between them – to the population, to other elites, the ‘educated’ class, middle class, the poor and working class. So long as the ideas expressed support power, it’s ‘acceptable.’ It can extend critiques, but institutional analysis is not permitted. Ideas which oppose institutional power are ‘ideological’, ‘idealist’, ‘utopian’, and ultimately, unacceptable.

Corporate culture dominates our society in the West. Being inherently totalitarian institutions, the culture – and its institutions – become increasingly totalitarian. This is the response by private economic power to undo the achievements in human history which came through increased democracy in the political sphere. Corporations and banks seek to control and consume all things, to dominate without end.

The only reason corporations were and are able to be the defining cultural institution of the 20th and now 21st century, is because of their economic power. This is derived from exploitation: of resources, the environment, labour, and consumers. It is enforced with repression: the job of the state in the state-capitalist society, along with massive subsidies and protectionist measures for corporate and financial interests. As corporate power extended around the world, the rapid destruction of the environment and resources accelerated, and Western powers ‘outsourced’ the environmental devastation our consumer societies ‘require’ to the so-called Third World. We consume, and they suffer; a marriage of inconvenience that we call “civilization.” Corporations and our state keep the rest of the world in a state of poverty and repression, eternally attempting to block the inevitable global revolution to create a human society that acts… humanely. We were busy buying things. Couldn’t be bothered.

Now what our societies have done to the people on whose land we now live, or everyone else in the world, is being done internally, to us. Everything is up for sale! Corporations make record profits, hoard billions and trillions in cash reserves, NOT being invested, but likely waiting until your standard of living is significantly reduced so that your labour and resources are cheaper, and thus, ultimately more profitable. This is called ‘austerity’ and ‘structural reform,’ political euphemisms for impoverishment and exploitation.

Corporations, banks and states have in recent years caused a massive global food crisis, driving food costs to record highs almost every subsequent year from 2007 onward. With billions of people in the world living on less than $2 per day, the majority of humanity spends most of their income on food. Price increases in food, caused primarily by financial speculation (big players include Goldman Sachs, Morgan Stanley, and Barclays), push tens of millions more people into poverty and hunger. Roughly one billion – 1/7th of the world’s population – live in slums. And they are growing rapidly. Massive urban slums were developed out of the imperialism Western states and corporations imposed upon the rest of the world, pushing people off the land and into the cities, whether induced by poverty or coerced by bombs and guns. All billed to the imperial Western state sponsors of terrorism. We supported (and support) ruthless and tiny elites in the countries we dominate[d] around the world, and now we are just beginning to realize the ruthless and tiny elite which rules over our own domestic lives. Their social function is that of a parasite: to suck the life blood out of all global society.

Food price increases have helped spur a massive global land grab, with Western (as well as Gulf and Asian powers) grabbing vast tracts of land – and water – around the world, for pennies on the dollar. This grab is most extensive in Africa, where in the past several years, mostly Western investors have grabbed land which amounts to an area roughly the size of Western Europe. The land not only contains extensive resource wealth, most importantly water (the Nile is up for sale!), but it is home to hundreds of millions of people, and globally, there are 2.5 billion poor people engaged in small-scale farming. This is primarily done through communal land ownership, something which Western society – with its ‘divine right’ of private property – does not understand. Thus, in international, state, and corporate law – which we designed – we deem communally owned and used land to be legally owned by the state. Our ‘investors’ – banks, hedge funds, pension funds, corporations and states – strike deals with corrupt states across the world to give us 40-100 year contracts for vast tracts of land, paying little or sometimes no rent. Then the “empty land” – as we call it – is cleared (of it’s “emptiness”, no doubt), evicting peoples who have been there for generations and beyond, who depend upon the land and the food it produces for their very lives. These people are being driven to cities, and ultimately, slums.

This is what we call “productive” use of land. So naturally, we then destroy it, eviscerate its environment, poison and pollute, extract, exploit, plunder and profit. Or we simply hold onto the land, not using it at all, just waiting until it goes up in profit. Even major American universities like Harvard are getting involved in the massive land grabs across Africa and elsewhere. This is the largest land grab in history since the late 19th century ‘Scramble for Africa’ where Europeans colonized almost the entire continent. When we do use the land for ‘productive use’, we say it will “help the climate” and “reduce hunger.” How? Because we will produce food and biofuels. And in doing so, we will use massive amounts of chemicals, pesticides, genetically modified organisms, deforestation, biodiversity destruction, highly mechanized and heavy fuel-use farming techniques. The food we produce – which is not much, we have more interest in things like biofuels, lumber, minerals, oil, cash-crops, etc. – is then exported to our countries, and away from the poor ones where hunger and poverty are so prevalent. They lose their land, gain more poverty, with the added bonus of extensive food insecurity, hunger, starvation, slum growth, increased mortality rates, disease, and violence. Poverty is violence.

This is how Western states, banks, corporations and international organizations address the issue of “hunger”: by creating more of it. And in a deeply disturbing irony, we call this moving towards “sustainability.” Little did we know that power interests have a different definition of “sustainability” than most people: they simply combined the words sustained and profitability, and called it “sustainability.” And coincidentally, that word already has a meaning to most people, so we simply misinterpreted the meaning. But there are people who take that concept seriously, those who experience the major costs of an unsustainable society.

We are witnessing a massive global resistance to these processes, largely driven by indigenous peoples – in Africa, Latin America, Asia, and now in North America. In Canada, the ‘Idle No More‘ movement began with four indigenous women in Saskatchewan deciding to meet up and discuss their concerns about Steven Harper’s “budget bill,” which, among other things, had reduced the amount of Canada’s protected rivers, lakes, and streams from roughly 2.5 million (as of Dec. 4, 2012) to somewhere around 62 (as of Dec. 5, 2012). Now a large, expanding, and increasingly international social movement led by indigenous peoples is taking place. Less than two months ago, it began with four women having a discussion.

Canada’s Indigenous peoples are showing Canadians – and others around the world – how to stand up against power. And they’ve had practice. For over 500 years, our societies have been oppressing and often eradicating indigenous populations at ‘home’ and abroad. Indigenous peoples, like other oppressed peoples, are at the front lines of the most oppressive nature of our society: they experience and have experienced exploitation, environmental devastation, domination and decimation. With the world’s Indigenous peoples speaking – not only in Canada, but across Latin America, Africa, and elsewhere – it is time that we in the West begin to listen. It is always important to listen to those who are most oppressed; the histories of our ‘victims’ are rarely written or known, at least not to us. Victims remember. And it matters that we begin to listen.

How can we expect to change – or know what and how to change – our societies if we do not listen and learn from those who have experienced the worst of our society? Indigenous people are now giving us a lesson in democratic struggle. If we continue on our current path, Indigenous communities will be completely wiped out; the powers that rule our society will have completed a 500-year genocide.

So we have to ask ourselves the question: should we now listen to, learn from, and join with these people in common struggle for justice and the idea of a humane society, or… are we still too busy buying things?

Perhaps it is time we all should be ‘Idle No More.’

The above was a short summary of roughly three separate chapters currently being researched and written as part of The People’s Book Project. To help the Project continue, please consider spreading the word, sharing articles, or donating.