Resisting corporate India

It is predicted that India will be one of the economic powerhouses of the twenty-first century, with the current government focusing on the corporate sector. This collection of articles argues that progressive forces across India must unite in order to resist the current path of development focused on ‘corporate India.’

This set of brief papers falls into three sections: trade, defending and reclaiming the commons, and peace and human security. While the majority or articles focus on the particular case of India, some paper also highlight cases from other countries in the Global South.

The articles on trade focus on the current Doha round of WTO trade negotiations. They argue that:

• the collapse of the trade negotiations is good news for the poor and the task should now be to create alternative frameworks and institutions that would make trade more beneficial to the poor
• the new Indian Seeds Bill aims to promote the multinational seed industry by consolidate its control over seeds which will hinder the traditional rights of Indian farmers
• India continues to focus on the benefits of the General Agreement on Trade in Services (GATS), an emphasis that will continue even if the negotiations fail
• the ascension of China into the WTO and its rapid market development have contributed to poverty reduction but also increased suffering for those that have been left behind
• the privatisation of water services in Mumbai should be opposed

Points raised by the second set of articles, on reclaiming of public goods, include:

• the current approach to urban development in India is exclusionary as it only focuses on the desires of private corporations
• peoples’ movements across India have begun to mobilise around the affects of Special Economic Zones (SEZs) in order to protect natural resources and the land and rights of farmers
• micro-credit is an important tool but it cannot replace the role of state-led development
• Southern governments must listen to their citizens, who continue to be hurt by the policies of the World Bank and International Monetary Fund (IMF)
• the IMF is losing relevance and should either be disbanded or severely curtailed

The third section, on peace and human security, argues that:

• continued negotiations between the United States and India on nuclear energy has led to discontent within the United Progressive Alliance (UPA)
• in Lebanon, an unarmed and armed resistance was able to humble Israel, one of the most powerful armies in the world