Links to conferences, projects, NGOs

CANADA TODAY is under threat. The country's capacity and even existence as an independent nation, able to shape its own political, social and economic future, are at risk. Relations between Canada and the United States (US) are decidedly chilly these days: the Iraq war, trade disputes, name-calling, and bickering at the border.

It doesn't mean that the relationship will grind to a halt. With more than half a million people and a billion dollars worth of trade crossing the border daily that is not going to happen.

Every day thousands of cars, trucks, trains and planes roll across the Canada-U.S. border as more than $1 billion in trade circulates between the countries. Year in and year out, Canada and the United States are each other’s biggest trading partners. The longtime relationship is worth hundreds of billions annually. Canada’s exports to the U.S. accounted for $348.4 billion – about 84 per cent – of the $410.7 billion in goods shipped out of the country last year. Conversely, about 71 per cent of Canada’s $356 billion in imports last year arrived from the U.S. Together the United States, Canada and Mexico have a trading relationship worth more than $700 billion a year; an increase of 88 percent between 1993 and 2003.

Economic retaliation is unlikely because the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) has changed the trading relationship between the two countries. Many plants in Canada now have North American product mandates and are producing for the entire Canada-U.S. market, while those in the U.S. operate in the same fashion. That means a huge amount of cross-border trade is now intra-company trade. That creates a strong incentive for business to lobby both governments to avoid economic disruptions or retaliation no matter what the nature of the relationship at the top. The U.S. has a vital interest in keeping the border open. Its economy would be hurt, whether in the integrated auto and other manufacturing sectors, or in petroleum and other vital resource sectors. Thus, both countries would be highly motivated to minimize disruptions and normalize cross-border traffic quickly should another terrorist attack occur.

The most important priority for Canadian diplomacy over the next few years is to reach a new accommodation with the United States because it is only when that relationship is comprehensible, predictable and sound that the country can again assume a meaningful world role.

There is a wide gap in attitudes between the business élite and the Canadian public. Business leaders are closer to U.S. policymakers in their attitudes on a range of issues, from the war in Iraq to missile defense to Kyoto. Unlike the general public, they favour minimalist government and low taxes. They believe we must fall into line with U.S. policies at all costs or risk our economic security. Many would like Canada to become more like the U.S. Although small in number, this group has great capacity, as the record shows, to shape the public debate and influence policmakers. Allowing corporate North America to define our interests as a nation implies, in the end, complete regulatory harmonization with the U.S. and the subordination of our economic, social, cultural, environmental and defence policies to U.S. policies. Business elites and many of our own politicians argue that Canada can and should enter into a relationship with the U.S. which is similar to the relationship between the countries of the European Union (EU). However, it is a mistake to think that harmonization or integration with the U.S. will cause the U.S. to adopt Canadian or Canada-friendly policies. While the EU countries enjoy a relatively balanced relationship, Canada and the U.S. are far from equal partners. The economic and military superpower status of the U.S. makes such balance impossible. Thus, although it is rarely acknowledged by our economic and political elites, the practical implications of closer ties to the U.S. are that Canada will be forced to adopt U.S. policies through immense economic pressure. Everything from health care to immigration to security to control of resources would be affected. How would Canada maintain any sort of distinct identity or sovereignty in such conditions? The simple answer is that it wouldn't. Canada would become an American colony in all but name; it would not become the 51st state, because that would mean political integration on a par with the level of economic integration, which is not a factor in any proposals for deep integration (FTA, NAFTA, etc.).

This is an even more pressing issue at a moment in history when the U.S. is governed by an administration that is repealing civil rights and liberties, pulling money from social programs, disputing the scientific evidence for climate change and increasing pollution, and most disturbing of all, withdrawing from agreements and treaties which have allowed the world to develop an international rule of law. While Canada remains committed to multilateralism, the U.S. has refused to participate in a long list of important international conventions and treaties, including the Kyoto Protocol, the Rome Statute of the International Criminial Court, the land mines and nuclear test ban treaties, and many others. Nor has the U.S. respected the U.N. in launching its war against Iraq, a predatory invasion of the Iraqui people for their oil & gas resources.

Meanwhile, every public opinion poll continues to demonstrate that the overwhelming majority of Canadians don't want to be just like the U.S. Canadians may respect the U.S. ideals of freedom and democracy, enjoy some U.S. movies, T.V., music and authors, and remain committed to the close neighbourly relationship between the people of the two countries, but that doesn't mean that Canadians want to adopt every aspect of U.S. policy or sacrifice our ability to make unique democratic decisions of our own. Most of us still believe that there are important differences between the U.S. and Canada, and that these differences should be preserved. Many Canadians disagree strongly with the policies of the current U.S. administration, and object to implementing similar policies here at home. Unfortunately, our voices are rarely being heard when compared with the abundant propaganda of the "continentalists", and those advocating "deep integration".

"Continentalists" and "deep integration" proponents rarely miss an opportunity to warn that another terrorist attack is inevitable and that an extended border disruption (or series of border disruptions) would be devastating for the Canadian economy unless we protect ourselves by entering into agreements with the US. What is needed, they say, is a comprehensive negotiation where trade-offs across sectors are possible.

"Deep integration" is an economic term. It refers to economic integration that goes well beyond removal of formal barriers to trade and includes various ways of reducing the international burden of differing national regulations, such as mutual recognition and harmonization. "Deep integration" means, in reality, subjugating many of Canada's policies to those of the United States — including trade, immigration, energy, water, our dollar, taxation, defence and the environment — but without any corresponding voice in the governance structure — that is, the U.S. government — where decisions affecting many aspects of Canadian life would be made.

For example, "deep integration" means:

a)     giving the US whatever access to our energy that they want, even if that means dropping our pledge to deal with climate change through the Kyoto agreement.
b)     water exports to the United States;
c)     take on major new defence expenditures (presumably by buying lots of U.S.-made military technology);
d)     give up policies on culture and agriculture, including the Canadian Wheat Board; and so on.

Canadians would not only become almost powerless in addressing their fundamental future economic concerns, but would also lose the capacity to control the social environment and the ability to adjust to change because social policy would also end up being driven by U.S. policies.

What kind of Canada do proponents envisage at the end of the proposed deep integration path? And what guarantees would we have that, no matter what economic or security integration agreements are in place, the Americans wouldn’t still close or disrupt the border? The FTA dispute mechanism was supposed to protect us from U.S. actions against softwood lumber, cattle, and other exports, but has disastrously failed to do so.

Here, then, is the real story behind “deep integration”. Canada’s business class simply cannot compete with its U.S. counterpart. They refuse to pay for the necessary research and development, refuse to train their workers, are constantly begging for more tax cuts, and are notoriously risk-averse. As well, Canadian companies are eager to simply sell out to U.S. corporations. Since 1989, more than 95 percent of foreign investment in Canada has gone to buying up Canadian companies. Head offices are pouring over the border. The sheer lack of entrepreneurial vision is evident in Bay Street’s determination to tie itself to what more and more economists are declaring a declining economic power. The growing consensus is that smart countries and companies are getting in on the game where the growth is: China, India, Brazil, Russia, and South Africa. But not Canadian companies.

One of the reasons: the US is now beginning to lose its technology-based competitive advantage. The countries of western Europe, Japan, Korea, and even China have set ambitious national goals and are building universities, inviting immigration, and have clear objectives regarding industrial development and new technologies.

The United States is the economy and country to which Canada’s business leaders want us to tie our star. But even worse, the Government of Canada and Canada's business class actually believes they can negotiate a good deal with the current U.S. administration and Congress. This is delusional, given the rapid devolution of the U.S. into an imperial theocracy. It’s time for Canadians to look elsewhere for leadership; our economy, not to mention our country, is far too important to leave to the failed imagination of Bay Street CEOs.

Under their interpretation of co-operation, Canada, the U.S. and Mexico would insulate themselves against competition from the rest of the world with a common external tariff, and with an outer security perimeter against external threats. But as fast as they would construct these walls on the outside, they would tear down almost every fence on the inside with an across-the-board harmonization of rules, regulations and laws on everything from who could seek asylum in North America to military operations to pollution and environmental controls. In fact, they would go so far as to give Canadians and Americans absolute freedom to decide where they would work and where they would live.

The Europeans have built an economic and social partnership to address shared problems by creating shared political and administrative institutions. But it would be naïve to believe that similar institutions could be effectively created and made to work genuinely in a Canada-U.S. or a Canada-U.S.-Mexico partnership. The United States, as an imperial superpower, acts on the basis of economic and military power, not shared decision-making, and, given the country's great size, would not consider serious sharing of decisions and power with a much smaller country. The United States is instinctively unilateral in its approach.

If Canada is to pursue "deep integration" with the United States, then logically we should seek political union as well so that Canadians in the different provinces would have some opportunity to influence decisions. But this logical implementation of "deep integration" would also mean the end of Canada as a distinct geopolitical entity and the conversion of our provinces into U.S. states.

Despite accelerated economic integration over the last 15 years, opinion polling reveals a deep and growing divide in attitudes and values between Canadians and Americans. It shows that the vast majority of Canadians do not want to be more like Americans. On the contrary. Nevertheless, a majority of Canadians have come to terms in principle with NAFTA, and a substantial minority favour even closer economic integration. However, most Canadians don’t understand the term economic integration, and support drops sharply the more NAFTA and deep integration initiatives are perceived to impair domestic policy freedom. For the vast majority of Canadians, continued support is contingent on maintaining policy independence and retaining Canada’s unique social character. The confusion around the issue of integration and independence is understandable. The linkages are often subtle and indirect, and it takes time for effects to become apparent. And the mainstream media gatekeepers and pundits have steered away from this issue.

"Continentalists" promote a "strategic bargain," in which Canada and the United States, over time, would move to a customs union with a common made-in-Washington trade policy toward the rest of the world and the free movement not only of goods and services but also of people and capital. (So much for maintaining Canadian ownership of banks, TV networks or transportation systems.) This would also affect foreign policy: If the United States decided to use trade measures to punish China, attack the Europeans or demonize the Cubans, we would have to follow suit.

Deep integration advocates see a customs union as the next stage in the deepening of the continental market. Key features associated with a customs union are the creation of a common external tariff applied to all nations not part of the free trade area, and the establishment of a common trade policy. However, many advocates of a customs union also insert elements of a common market into their definition. A common or single market is seen in the literature as a still deeper stage of economic integration. It would include removing barriers to trade and investment in agricultural, cultural, legal, communications, and financial services. It would include the harmonization of a vast range of regulations and policies (economic, social, environmental, cultural, immigration, etc.) to achieve the free movement of goods, services, capital and labour.

This is an important point. The lesson to recall from the FTA is that what was initially presented as a proposal for a conventionally defined free trade agreement resulted in a comprehensive deep economic integration agreement that went far beyond the border into the very heart of domestic policy-making power. An alleged customs union negotiation would be similarly open-ended, making it hard in advance to fully evaluate its costs. We also know from the FTA experience that much will be surrendered for little gain.

The standard economic case for a customs union is that removing rules of origin (which currently prevent back-door entry of imports from a non-member country into the NAFTA area through a member that has lower tariffs on the those imports) will eliminate costly administrative procedures and thereby reduce transaction costs of doing business. Proponents have built economic models that greatly exaggerate the overall efficiency gains to the economy (2-3% of GDP). Many of us remember the wildly exaggerated estimates of economic benefits of tariff elimination generated by similar models during the FTA debate. Nor do they mention possible costs of removing rules of origin as an incentive to source production within Canada. But the focus on rules of origin is a diversion The far greater cost is that a common trade policy—given the huge difference in power—would mean effectively handing over Canada’s trade policy to U.S. authorities. It would have huge implications for both our domestic institutions and our relations with the rest of the world.

Contrary to proponents’ claims that Canada’s positions and protections in multilateral trade agreements, such as the World Trade Organization (WTO), are very similar to those of the U.S., there are in fact major differences between them, affecting crucial public policy areas. They include public services such as health, education, and other social services which, unlike in the U.S., are not organized on market principles; they include cultural industries, which are subsidized and regulated in direct opposition to free trade principles. Also on the table would be agricultural marketing boards, the Canadian Wheat Board, telecommunications, and banking. The U.S. has long objected to these policies and would definitely target them for elimination. In heavily protected U.S. sectors such as sugar, textiles, beef and tropical fruits, Canada would ironically be pushed to raise its tariffs to U.S. levels. It would mean complying with U.S. trade embargoes on Iran and Cuba and ending Canadian trade preferences with, for example, Commonwealth countries. And it would foreclose future independent policy initiatives. Imagine, for example, under a common trade policy persuading American drug companies and policy-makers to allow the export of cheap generic AIDS drugs to poor countries.

If, like the FTA, a negotiation were to go beyond the traditional scope of a customs union, the potential for ceding regulatory and policy space would grow exponentially. A major Canadian objective would obviously be exemption from U.S. trade protection laws. But the U.S. Congress would insist that this be off-limits and would (as it does now) say that, if Canada wants exclusion from U.S. trade laws, it has merely to adopt U.S.-style laws and practices.

Since the signing of the Free Trade Agreement, Canada's economic life has become deeply integrated into a newly developed North American economy dominated and directed by U.S. corporate and government interests. The results of this integration are now clear. As critics predicted, the free flow of capital without government regulation has resulted in job losses - 276,000 high-paying industrial jobs have been lost - and we are now even more dependent on the American economy as a destination of our exports, and therefore less able to direct our own economy.

Economic growth in the 10-plus years of free trade has been the worst since the 1930s. Following the deregulation imperative of free trade, we have both abandoned the tools of industrial development that brought us the auto industry and deliberately pursued policies that weaken the domestic economy in the interests of trade. By pursuing trade with a low Canadian dollar we have exposed Canadian industry to the most extensive and prolonged sell-off of Canadian assets in our history.

The results of this for ordinary working Canadians have been the longest period of stagnation in standard of living levels in the country's history, a dramatic erosion of social programs and protection for workers, extreme levels of economic insecurity for millions of workers and their families, and a loss of democratic control by citizens over the future of their communities. All of these economic facts can be traced primarily to the FTA and the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA). The nature of those binding and legal agreements prevents from reconsidering our options.

After a decade of rapid integration with the United States and the harmonization of public policy with that country, Canada is experiencing the fastest and most dramatic increases in social and economic inequality in its history. The severe erosion of programs such as UI/EI, social assistance and income redistribution, and the erosion of our progressive tax system, have systematically changed the relationship between individual citizens and their community - because government is a reflection of community. As citizens perceive government as less and less relevant to them, we feel less and less commitment to the collective that is neighbourhood, community and country.

Economic integration with the United States is changing our very definition and conception of culture and therefore our sense of who we are. In the United States, culture is seen as a commodity no different from any other commodity - it is equated with entertainment in the marketplace. Canada's efforts to promote our unique identity and reflect it to ourselves confront increased burdens as the United States watches over any "unfair subsidies" to our so-called "cultural industries." As we become integrated with the most powerful example of consumer society in the world, we face the threat of commodification of our cultural traditions and their gradual assimilation into the American entertainment industry.

When Canada signed the FTA and NAFTA it agreed to do what literally no other country in the world has ever agreed to. It agreed to give up, forever (barring the abrogation of the trade agreements themselves), the legislative and regulatory authority to protect and conserve the country's energy resources for its own needs. In effect, we have completely abandoned that part of our national sovereignty that allowed us to determine our energy policy based on the current and future needs of Canadian consumers - both individual and industrial. It is perhaps the most stunning and dramatic example of the abandonment of the national interest by any government in the history of Canada.

But it is not just oil and gas that have been affected by our free trade relationship with the United States. The free trade imperative is now threatening to force deregulation of electricity as well. Our water is threatened by provisions in NAFTA that define water as a "good" and therefore tradable, opening up the possibility that U.S. water shortages will be met by the diversion of Canadian rivers.

Canada's environment is increasingly threatened by the nearly total integration of the North American economy. Canada's ability to meet the requirements of environmental treaties has already been seriously compromised by a NAFTA case that successfully challenged our attempt to halt the cross-border movement of toxic waste. Since the signing of the free trade agreement the federal government has attempted to pass just two new pieces of environmental legislation. Both failed the free trade test and were, in effect, overturned by the provisions of NAFTA. It is impossible to know how many other pieces of legislation were considered by the government but rejected. The chill effect - declining to pass legislation for fear it will attract a costly NAFTA or WTO challenge - has crippled Canada's ability to pass laws and regulations to protect its own environment.

For decades Canada occupied a unique and often very difficult terrain in the international field. A small country by population standards and dwarfed by the American colossus on its border, Canada nonetheless wielded the influence of a middle power much larger than its size would have suggested. We were once seen by developing countries and other smaller powers as a voice of internationalism and multilateralism. We often championed human rights and took a leading role in the boycott of the Apartheid regime in South Africa. Canada's foreign aid was generous and the Canadian International Development Agency had a reputation for taking a genuine interest in development issues. It was not just an agency promoting Canadian industry and foreign trade. Since the 1960s Canada developed and maintained a reputation for being a nation committed to peacekeeping, indeed defined the modern notion of that international role. The past 13 years of the new free trade relationship with the United States, in which Canada's commitment to free-market policies of economic globalization has increased, have witnessed a fundamental shift in Canada's foreign policy and its peacekeeping tradition. Right now, Canada has soldiers fighting in an undeclared war and the Canadian command has absolutely no say in directing them. They are not peacekeepers; they are not even Canadian soldiers. They are, in effect, American conscripts.

If Canada was to go along the United States on the integration of Canadian forces under the new U.S. Northern Command, or on ballistic missile defense, Canada would squander the respect Canada gained within the international community for its stand on the Iraq war, reinforcing the image of Canada as a mere proxy for the superpower.

Canada's generous foreign aid policy has been replaced by a diminished contribution to developing nations and an extremely aggressive trade policy that mimics that of the United States and is in complete support of the structural adjustment policies of the IMF and the World Bank. CIDA is now a shameless promoter of Canadian industry - including the nuclear industry - and has tarnished its reputation as a development agency. Canada, partly through deliberate policy shifts and partly because it feels it cannot risk offending what is now its almost exclusive trading partner, has become little more than an echo of American foreign policy interests.

In the context of the new imperatives of the economic globalization, both sovereignty and democracy have suffered. Economic globalization has demanded of nations that they give up those aspects of sovereignty that allow for democracy. A nation's ability to regulate and guide economic development and the actions of capital are key to a nation's well-being in a free market system. The signing of the FTA and NAFTA have fundamentally altered Canada's sovereignty and its democracy. In order for Canada to create a "level playing field" with the United States it has systematically gutted its social programs, its progressive tax system, its commitment to industrial development, and its laws and regulations balancing the power of employees and employers.

In order to accomplish this free trade objective, the Canadian and provincial governments and other political institutions have gone to great lengths to lower Canadians' expectations of democratic governance. Using scare tactics regarding the large deficits of the early 1990s, the deliberate misrepresentation of government employees, huge cuts to health and education budgets, and a relentless campaign to promote tax cuts, governments at all levels have convinced many Canadians that their values can no longer be reflected in government policy. It is not an exaggeration to suggest that as a result of this campaign, and the cuts to government services, democracy in Canada is in crisis. Unprecedented levels of cynicism and anger toward government and political parties have led to the lowest voter turn-outs in the country's history.

The denigration of Canadian political institutions and democracy has been accompanied by a growing and alarming disregard for civil liberties and human rights in this country. Nowhere is the link between globalization and trade and the downsizing of democracy more obvious. The rapid Americanization of Canada's institutions and political culture demands both long-term and immediate action. Only by giving Canadians a genuine opportunity to engage in a dialogue about their country and its future direction can this alarming erosion of democratic participation and the resulting decline of the nation be halted and eventually reversed.

The aftermath of September 11 taught us a great deal about how deeper economic integration has heightened our vulnerability. It reminded us that the Bush administration will not hesitate to unilaterally rewrite the terms and conditions of entry into its market, regardless of NAFTA; it will not hesitate to link our compliance with its security demands to access to the United States market. It reminded us that we have a border and that it matters. It reminded us that we are different and that our different laws and institutions are under siege. People are beginning to connect integration and loss of independence: NAFTA meant deeper economic integration and increased vulnerability which, with September 11, meant the Smart Border Accord, which in turn meant pressure for still deeper integration.

To want to chart a different course does not imply a better course. This is not about moral superiority, or being anti-American. It is simply that we have different values and interests. We want to be able to reaffirm and preserve our founding myths, our historical experiences, and the values that have shaped and defined us. We want our laws and institutions to reflect our unique social character and our successful blend of individual and collective rights. We want to chart a course that affirms our highly original political experiment: our complex (tri-national and multicultural) federation with its long and extraordinary history of resolving tensions and conflicts peacefully. We also want, as we have in the past, to make our mark in the world: to help strengthen the fabric of international law, to advance world peace, social justice, democracy, and the environmental sustainability of the planet.

Politics and Justice without borders: Canada, the U.S. and Mexico

In 1994, along with Mexico, Canada and the United States enact the North American Free Trade Agreement, aimed at eliminating tariffs on trade between the signing countries. Over the past decade, several other agreements were signed between these three countries. One of them was concernend with refugees. Formally signed by Canada and the U.S. in December 2002, the Safe Third Country Agreement stipulates that refugees must seek asylum in whichever of the two countries they reach first. The new rules would eliminate the practice of asylum shopping by refugee applicants by allowing their return to the last safe country from which they came. The agreement prevents asylum-seekers from using Canada as a “foot-in-the-door” to the U.S. or vice versa. Border official have subsequently said the new legislation will force more refugees to cross the border illegally. Bill C-11 was brought into force two weeks after the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks. It provides for a more thorough refugee screening process than previously used. Before the bill was passed, applicants would be photographed, fingerprinted and checked for a criminal record. If they seemed law-abiding and legitimate as applicants, they would be allowed into the country to settle while they awaited a formal hearing. A full criminal check wouldn’t be held until they were accepted at the hearing. Under C-11, the security check is done at the border. Under the new rules the applicant is interviewed up to five hours to determine if he or she is a genuine refugee. That’s followed by a security check by the Canadian Security Intelligence Service (CSIS). If there is any suspicion, the RCMP and FBI can be called upon for assistance. The entire process is to be done within 72 hours. If it is determined they are not a genuine refugee, or they fail the security check, they are deported. Otherwise they are allowed into Canada to await a formal hearing. Although Bill C-11 was in the works prior to the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks, it was implemented two months before being passed.

Canada, the United States, and Mexico have agreed on a framework to implement the Security and Prosperity Partnership of North America. Both opponents and proponents of the agreement say that this is the most important step in the integration of North America since NAFTA was signed more than a decade ago.

As liberal democracies, the three governments of North America also share common principles: protecting individual rights, upholding the rule of law, and ensuring equality of opportunity for their citizens. North America, in short, is more than an expression of geography. It is a partnership of sovereign states with overlapping economic and security interests, where major developments in one country can and do have a powerful impact on the other two.

North America is also energy interdependent. In 2005, Canada and Mexico were the two largest exporters of oil to the United States. Canada supplies the United States with roughly 90 percent of its imported natural gas and all of its imported electricity.

In March 2005, the leaders of Canada, Mexico, and the United States adopted a Security and Prosperity Partnership of North America (SPP), establishing ministerial level working groups to address key security and economic issues facing North America and setting a short deadline for reporting progress back to their governments. To that end, the Task Force proposes the creation by 2010 of a North American community to enhance security, prosperity, and opportunity. The Task Force proposed a community based on the principle that “our security and prosperity are mutually dependent and complementary.” Its boundaries will be defined by a common external tariff and an outer security perimeter within which the movement of people, products, and capital will be legal, orderly, and safe. Its goal will be to guarantee a free, secure, just, and prosperous North America.

On the economic side, for instance, the initiative is aimed at both increasing productivity within the three nations and also at making their markets more competitive with the European Union and China. Joint undertakings could include standardizing some regulations on businesses, making it easier for business people to move across borders, increasing cooperation on energy exploration and moving toward a common external tariff for certain North American products sold to other economic blocs.

A U.S.-Canada-Mexico task force has made some bold recommendations, including a North American border pass based on fingerprints or eye scans to speed border crossings. The Task Force on the Future of North America also advocated an "outer security perimeter" around the three countries, to be achieved by harmonizing visa and asylum regulations, integrating "watch" lists, conducting joint law enforcement training, setting up a "marine defense command" to protect North American ports and pursuing closer military cooperation with Mexico.

In 1993, the United States, Mexico, and Canada adopted a labor side accord to the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), pledging to work toward broad improvements in the situation of labor rights in their respective countries. Seven years after the agreement entered into force, however, the record shows that the three countries have failed to live up to this commitment. While the accord, known formally as the North American Agreement on Labor Cooperation (NAALC), has suffered from structural defects from the outset, it nevertheless holds far greater potential to promote workers' rights and high labor standards than its limited use by the signatory states would suggest. Instead of exploiting this potential, the NAFTA countries have ensured the accord's ineffectiveness in protecting workers' rights.

The NAALC, for all its deficiencies in practice, remains the most ambitious link between labor rights and trade ever implemented. It broke new ground by creating labor-related obligations and establishing sanctions for failure to fulfill them in certain cases. Under the accord, the signatories must ensure that labor laws and regulations provide for "high labor standards;" they must strive to improve those standards; and they must ensure access to "fair, equitable, and transparent" mechanisms for enforcing their labor law. The accord obligates the parties to effectively enforce their own labor law in eleven key subject areas, and stipulates that a "pattern of practice" of non-compliance (more than one incident) in certain subject areas could lead to the appointment of an outside panel of experts to recommend measures to resolve the problem. A "persistent pattern" of non-enforcement (a sustained or recurring pattern of practice) could lead to the convocation of an arbitral panel and the imposition of sanctions.

As initially conceived and negotiated, NAFTA included no provisions to protect labor rights in its text or through a side agreement. The NAALC that was finally negotiated by Canada, Mexico, and the United States sidestepped thorny international political issues by avoiding any suggestion that it was intended to harmonize labor standards in the three countries, and by ruling out the establishment of multinational judicial processes or appeals procedures. Rather, it aims to promote broad improvements in the labor rights situation in the signatory countries, and it relies on political engagement between the parties as the means to address its violations. Nongovernmental organizations and individuals also play a part by signaling to the governments involved when the obligations established by the accord have not been met.

The NAALC does not incorporate international labor rights norms; instead, it calls on the signatories to enforce their domestic labor standards effectively while working cooperatively with the International Labor Organization (ILO). Interestingly, the labor principles subject to NAALC consideration include a wider range of issues than the ILO's core standards, including protections for migrant workers and workers' compensation.

The NAALC does not purport to resolve labor rights problems in specific cases. A worker unjustly fired for organizing a union in the United States, for example, could not expect a case filed under the NAALC to lead to job reinstatement. Fixing problems with the enforcement of laws designed to protect freedom of association, however, would fall squarely within the accord's obligations. Similarly, a Mexican worker victimized by an unfair labor tribunal could not expect a NAALC-based process to correct the legal deficiencies suffered in the case heard domestically, but could legitimately expect the pact to contribute to a general improvement in Mexico's labor tribunals.

Even with these limitations, the NAALC has the potential to be a much more effective mechanism for promoting labor rights than it has been, in practice, to date. For example, if they had the necessary political will, the signatories could use the NAALC's framework to identify longstanding weaknesses in labor rights protections and develop comprehensive plans to remedy them. They could contribute to the development of labor law policy in their respective countries by promoting higher standards. And they could contribute to the wider international debate about how to link labor rights and trade.

An important structural weakness of the NAALC is its lack of an independent oversight body. Thus, for example, if the United States violates one of its NAALC obligations, Mexico or Canada can either separately or jointly push for a remedy. In practice, however, in deciding whether to do so they are likely to also take account of other issues relevant to their bilateral relations with the United States, such as immigration, narcotics control, and the promotion of trade. So it is scarcely surprising that the NAALC's potential as a means for promoting respect for, and improvements in, labor rights has been dramatically underused.

The NAALC signatories have taken advantage of the accord's silence on how to deal with allegations of non-compliance with its obligations. National Administrative Offices (NAOs), which were created in each signatory country to address instances of non-compliance, have complete discretion to determine which complaints to accept and how to investigate and report on them. Similarly, the accord sets out no standards regarding how labor ministries in the three signatory states should design programs to address instances of non-compliance with NAALC obligations. As a result, the governments have sometimes ignored issues raised by petitioners, reported on issues but then failed to include them in government-to-government talks, or included them in bilateral discussions but established no mechanism for remedying the problems identified.

The accord permits the establishment of an outside panel of experts known as an Evaluation Committee of Experts (ECE) and an arbitral panel to address non-compliance with the obligation to enforce certain NAALC labor principles. However, it is vague on what to do when the accord's other obligations are not met. The obligation to have high labor standards, to strive to improve those standards, and to provide access to fair labor tribunals cannot by themselves be brought before such bodies. This constitutes a serious problem, because these obligations are fundamental to the ability of any government to enforce its labor law. In addition, the failure of a signatory government to enforce laws related to three fundamental labor rights-freedom of association and the right to organize, the right to bargain collectively, and the right to strike-cannot be brought before an expert committee or sanctions panel at all.

Politics and Justice without borders: Global Government of North America

a.    Human and Earth Rights within the GGNA
b.    GGNA proposals
c.    GGNA principles

Global Government of North America: Member Nations, Territories and the Pole Region

Human and Earth Rights within the GGNA

Article 103: Scale of Human and Earth Rights

The Scale of Human and Earth Rights contains six (6) sections. Section 1 has more importance than all other sections below, and so on.

Concerning sections 1, 2, and 3, it shall be Global Governments highest priority to guarantee these rights to their respective Member Nations and to have proper legislation and implement and enforce global law as it applies and as shown in the Global Constitution.

Section 1. Ecological rights and the protection of the global life-support systems

Section 2. Primordial human rights

Our investigation has shown that in the past very little importance was ever given to Sections 1,2,3, and 4 of the Scale of Human and Earth Rights. And it is made clear how urgent it is to replace both the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and Charters from all nations by the Scale of Human and Earth Rights.

safety and security
have shelter
'clean' energy
a 'clean' and healthy environment
drink fresh water
breath clean air
eat a balance diet and
basic clothing.

Section 3.    The ecological rights, the protection of the global life-support systems and the primordial human rights of future generations

Concerning Sections 4, 5 and 6, it shall be the aim of Global Governments to secure these other rights for all global citizens within their respective Member Nations but without immediate guarantee of universal achievement and enforcement. These rights are defined as Directive Principles, obligating the Global Governments to pursue every reasonable means for universal realization and implementation.

Section 4.    Community rights and the right that the greatest number of people has by virtue of its number (50% plus one) and after voting representatives democratically

Section 5.    Economic rights (business and consumer rights, and their responsibilities and accountabilities) and social rights (civil and political rights)

Section 6.    Cultural rights and religious rights

GGNA proposals.

The Global Government of North America (GGNA) proposes:

a)     A common economic zone through the elimination of remaining tariff and nontariff barriers to trade among Member Nations of the GGNA. Member Nations must also expand cooperation on trade-related areas, including border and transportation infrastructure; a concerted effort to reduce the many regulatory gaps and inconsistencies that hamper the flow of trade in Member Nations; and coordinated investment in North America’s human capital, both through education and training, and through improved labor mobility within the continent.

b)     An economic space that provides new opportunities for individuals in all Member Nations: adopting a common approach to regulation, increasing labor mobility, and enhancing support for education programs.

c)     Establishing a Seamless North American Market for Trade. With tariff barriers virtually eliminated, the time has come to take a more comprehensive approach to strengthening the economic prospects for citizens in all Member Nations. The first step is to encourage convergence in the most-favored-nation tariff rates each partner charges on imports from outside the GGNA. Next, the governments should reduce the remaining nontariff barriers to the flow of goods and services, and address problems arising from charges of price discrimination and subsidization by competitors within the GGNA. Finally, they should coordinate their approach to unfair trade practices by foreign suppliers to the North American market. The ultimate goal should be to create a seamless market for suppliers and consumers throughout North America.

d)     Adopting a common external tariff. We recommend that Member Nations harmonize external tariffs on a sector-by-sector basis, to the lowest prevailing rate consistent with multilateral obligations. The effort should begin with goods on which current tariff rates are closest and then proceed to close larger gaps, with the goal of adopting a common external tariff, thus eliminating the need for rules of origin and further facilitating integration and better use of scarce resources.

e)     Reviewing those sectors of NAFTA that were excluded or those aspects that have not been fully implemented. Each of the three countries decided to exclude unilaterally certain sectors and issues from NAFTA. Some of these remain sensitive issues; others may be ripe for review. In addition, several elements have not been implemented in the way that all had anticipated. Some changes—for example, the negotiation of a sanitary agreement to promote agricultural trade, or expanding the NAFTA services agreement to include cabotage—would be useful but also difficult. We recommend a high-level review to examine all of these issues and make recommendations on how to make the coverage of NAFTA more comprehensive.

f)     Establishing a permanent tribunal for GGNA dispute resolution. The Earth Court of Justice will develop and administer the program. The current NAFTA dispute-resolution process is founded on ad hoc panels that are not capable of building institutional memory or establishing precedent, may be subject to conflicts of interest, and are appointed by authorities who may have an incentive to delay a given proceeding. As demonstrated by the efficiency of the World Trade Organization (WTO) appeal process, a permanent tribunal would likely encourage faster, more consistent, and more predictable resolution of disputes. In addition, there is a need to review the workings of NAFTA’s dispute settlement mechanism to make it more efficient, transparent, and effective.

g)     Establishing a joint approach to unfair trade practices. The use of countervailing and anti-dumping duties by one Member Nation country against another has generated considerable ill will, though there has been a steady decline in the use of these trade remedies; there have been few new cases in the industrial sectors, with the most difficult cases now limited to resource and agricultural trade. The time has come to adopt a unified approach to deal with the internal and the external challenge of unfair trade practices, beginning with phased suspensions in sectors of laws governing unfair trade practices.

h)     Establishing a common competition commission. Once Member Nations have concluded the resource accord described above and phased in the suspension of antidumping and countervailing duty proceedings for all sectors, they should also establish a common commission — a continental anti-trust agency — to address harmful subsidy practices, to promote healthy competition, and to protect against predatory pricing. At the same time, they should develop shared standards for identifying and responding collectively to unfair trade practices by parties outsidethe GGNA.

i)     Adopting a common approach to regulation. Significant regulatory differences continue to divide the North American economic space, and as other barriers to trade, such as tariffs, fall worldwide, regulatory efficiency is becoming increasingly important as a source of competitive advantage. Canada, the United States, and Mexico each have developed rules to protect their environment and the well-being of their citizens. All three share the same broad objectives, but their actual rules have evolved largely in isolation. In many cases, the result is what has been labeled “the tyranny of small differences,” one that imposes large economic costs even when regulatory goals, processes, standards, and outcomes are quite similar.

The most obvious costs of unnecessary regulatory differences are borne by businesses and consumers. Rules that fragment the North American market reduce economies of scale and discourage specialization, competition, and innovation. Harmonization of regulation, in effect, creates a bigger market, one that would lead to more competitive exports and lower consumer prices across North America. In addition to raising compliance costs for businesses and their customers, fragmented regulation increases the administrative costs to governments and taxpayers. Regulators in Canada and Mexico each must try to achieve the same results as their counterparts in the United States and yet must do so with only a fraction of the resources. Furthermore, because much of the resulting administrative work is carried out at border points, regulatory differences are particularly damaging in their impact on border delays and congestion, as the volume of trade within North America exceeds the capacity of its border infrastructure.

Regulatory differences can have a negative impact on the very environmental and health outcomes the regulations themselves are supposed to encourage. Unnecessary delays in the approval for sale and distribution of innovative products can prevent timely access to new pharmaceuticals or medical technology that might save lives, or to new fertilizers or chemicals that could help industrial plants and farmers do a better job of protecting the environment.

A collaborative approach to regulatory reform could help all Member Nations expand economic opportunity within North America while strengthening the protection of the environment, health and safety, and other shared objectives of regulatory policy. While each country must retain its right to impose and maintain unique regulations consonant with its national priorities and income level, the three countries should make a concerted effort to encourage regulatory convergence.

j)     Making transportation more efficient. The efficiency of the transportation network is critical to making North America a more competitive place to invest and to produce, and in spreading the benefits of economic growth to all corners of the continent. Among other regulatory reforms, governments should consider the benefits of allowing North American transportation firms unlimited access to each others’ territory, including provision for full cabotage (trade between two points within a country, for example, a Canadian trucker hauling freight from Chicago to Los Angeles or an American airline carrying passengers between Mexico City and Vancouver) for airlines and surface carriers.

k)     Adopting the “tested once” approach for biotechnology and pharmaceuticals. The cost and quality of health care is a critical issue in all three countries. Biotechnology and pharmaceuticals play a vital role in providing new treatments that improve health outcomes and often reduce costs as well, but they face huge costs in developing and then winning regulatory approval for new products. Preliminary research suggests that regulatory cooperation in the areas of human and veterinary drugs, medical devices, pest control, and chemicals would raise the value of sales in these sectors by more than 10 percent, profits by 8 percent, and the rate of return on new products by an average of 4.8 percent. Two possible approaches to reducing the regulatory burden while maintaining rigorous standards to protect health and safety would be to adopt a “tested once” principle by which a product tested in one country would meet the standards set by another, or to establish a North America testing center with personnel from each country.

l)     Integrating protection of food, health, and the environment. The North American market for agricultural and food products is highly integrated, and the intense disruption of this market by just two cases of mad cow disease demonstrates the need to ensure that regulatory processes are as integrated as their relevant markets. Greater North American cooperation also is essential in providing effective responses to threats to human and animal health and to the environment.

m)     Increasing Labor Mobility among Member Nations. People are GGNA’s greatest asset. Goods and services cross borders easily; ensuring the legal transit of workers has been more difficult. Experience with the NAFTA visa system suggests that its procedures need to be simplified, and such visas should be made available to a wider range of occupations and to additional categories of individuals such as students, professors, bona fide frequent visitors, and retirees.

To make the most of the impressive pool of skill and talent within the GGNA, Member Nations should look beyond the NAFTA visa system. The large volume of undocumented migrants from Mexico within the United States is an urgent matter for those two countries to address. A long-term goal should be to create a “North American preference”—new rules that would make it much easier for employees to move and for employers to recruit across national boundaries within the continent. This would enhance North American competitiveness, increase productivity, contribute to Mexico’s development, and address one of the main outstanding issues on the Mexican-U.S. bilateral agenda.

Canada and the United States should consider eliminating restrictions on labor mobility altogether and work toward solutions that in the long run could enable the extension of full labor mobility to Mexico as well.

n)     Expanding temporary migrant worker programs. Canada and the United States should expand programs for temporary labor migration from Mexico. For instance, Canada’s successful model for managing seasonal migration in the agricultural sector should be expanded to other sectors where Canadian producers face a shortage of workers and Mexico may have a surplus of workers with appropriate skills. Canadian and U.S. retirees living in Mexico should be granted working permits in certain fields, for instance as English teachers.

o)     Implementing the Social Security Totalization Agreement negotiated between the United States and Mexico. This agreement would recognize payroll contributions to each other’s systems, thus preventing double taxation.

p)     Creating a “GGNA preference.” Member Nations should agree on streamlined immigration and labor mobility rules that enable citizens of all Member Nations to work with far fewer restrictions than immigrants from other countries. This new system should be both broader and simpler than the current system of NAFTA visas. Special immigration status should be given to teachers, faculty, and students in the region.

Moving to full labor mobility between Canada and the United States. To make companies based in North America as competitive as possible in the global economy, Canada and the United States should consider eliminating all remaining barriers to the ability of their citizens to live and work in the other country. This free flow of people would offer an important advantage to employers in both countries by giving them rapid access to a larger pool of skilled labor, and would enhance the well-being of individuals in both countries by enabling them to move quickly to where their skills are needed. In the long term, the two countries should work to extend this policy to Mexico as well, though doing so will not be practical until wage differentials between Mexico and its two North American neighbors have diminished considerably.

Reinforcing an approach of mutual recognition of professional standards and degrees. Professional associations in each of Member Nations make decisions on the standards to accept professionals from other countries. But despite the fact that NAFTA already encourages the mutual recognition of professional degrees, little has actually been done. Member Nations should devote more resources to leading and create incentives that would encourage, the professional associations of each of the three countries in developing shared standards that would facilitate short-term professional labor mobility within the GGNA.

q)     Supporting a GGNA Education Program. Given their historical, cultural, geographic, political, and economic ties, Member Nations should have the largest and most vibrant educational exchange network in the world. Currently, we do not. Despite the fact that Mexico is the second-largest trading partner of the United States, it ranks only seventh in sending students there. In 2004, only 13,000 Mexican undergraduate and graduate students attended U.S. universities. Similarly, Canada is the largest trading partner of the United States but ranked only fifth in educational exchanges, with 27,000 students in the United States compared to 80,000 students from India, followed by China, South Korea, and Japan. The number of Mexicans studying in Canada remains very low—about 1,000. And although American students study all over the world, relatively few go to Mexico and Canada. These numbers should be expanded dramatically to deepen familiarity and increase knowledge in each Member Nation.

r)     Creating a major scholarship fund for undergraduate and graduate students to study in Member Nations and to learn the region’s languages. For many students, study abroad is possible only with financial assistance, but many scholarships, including the Fund for the Improvement of Post-Secondary Education (FIPSE), which has supported scholarships to and from all North American countries, have been reduced or halted. Cross-border educational study within the GGNA by its citizens should expand to reflect the degree of our commercial exchanges. To illustrate the scale of this proposal, it would lead to some 60,000 Mexican students studying in the United States and Canada, and comparable numbers of Canadian and American students studying in another Member Nation. We urge that state, provincial, and federal governments begin funding such scholarships now. The scholarships should include “language immersion” courses in each Member Nation and should encourage students to study in all Member Nations.

Developing a network of centers for GGNA studies. The European Union provides substantial funding for EU centers in fifteen universities in the United States, as well as twelve Jean Monnet Chairs. The U.S. Department of Education provides similar grants to support language and international studies outside North America, but not within North America. That should change. We recommend that the governments open a competition and provide grants to universities in each Member Nation to promote courses, education, and research on the GGNA and assist elementary and secondary schools in teaching about the GGNA. They could also administer scholarship programs. To support this effort, a student summit should be held periodically in each of the three countries.

Promoting Internet-based learning within the GGNA. A natural way to channel communication between Canada, the United States, and Mexico would be through Internet-based learning tools. Current examples include the Historica Foundation’s YouthLinks program in Canada, which enables high-school students to connect with their counterparts in other regions of Canada and around the world, and the School Connectivity Program (SCP) launched by the U.S. Department of State, which installs computers with Internet access in schools across nations that lack access to computer technology. The SCP program should be extended to all Member Nations.

Developing teacher exchange and training programs for elementary and secondary school teachers. This would assist in removing language barriers and give some students a greater sense of the GGNA identity. Greater efforts should also be made to recruit Mexican language teachers to teach Spanish in the United States and Canada.

Developing “sister school” and student exchange programs. Studying or living in another country or hosting a foreign-exchange student fosters cultural understanding. We recommend that states and municipalities encourage the development of “sister school” programs at both the secondary and university level to include the annual exchange of students between participating schools.

Encouraging imaginative ways to build GGNA connections between Member Nations. Foundations and research institutes can shape the way public and private institutions engage in a new concept such as the GGNA community. We encourage foundations and research institutes to provide support and research for addressing continental issues and developing curricula that would permit citizens of our three countries to look at each other in different ways than in the past.

GGNA principles.

Member Nations of the Global Government of North America (GGNA) should be guided by the following principles:

•     Member Nations should approach continental issues together with a GGNA perspective rather than the traditional “dual-bilateral” approach that has long characterized their relationships.

•     North America is different from other regions of the world and must find its own cooperative route forward. A new GGNA community should rely not only on the market, but also on building a true GGNA Community. We must maintain respect for each other’s national sovereignty by forming the GGNA protecting such sovereignty and developing the Global Constitution.

•     Our economic focus should be on the creation of a common economic space that expands economic opportunities for all people in the region, a space in which trade, capital, and people flow freely.

•     The strategy needs to be integrated in its approach, recognizing the extent to which progress on each individual component enhances achievement of the others. Progress on security, for example, will allow a more open border for the movement of goods and people; progress on regulatory matters will reduce the need for active customs administration and release resources to boost security. GGNA solutions could ultimately serve as the basis for initiatives involving other like-minded countries, either in our hemisphere or more broadly.

•     A GGNA strategy must provide real gains for all Member Nations, and must not be approached as a zero-sum exercise. Poverty and deprivation are breeding grounds for political instability and undermine both national and regional security. The progress of the poorest among us will be one measure of success.

The threat of international terrorism originates for the most part outside North America and is due primarily on the American Government foreign policies. All Member Nations of the GGNA should have a veto on such policies. All foreign policies should be dealt by the GGNA and not by a single individual Member Nation. Security should be handle by the GGNA. Any weakness in controlling access to Member Nations from abroad reduces the security of the GGNA as a whole and exacerbates the pressure to intensify controls on intracontinental movement and traffic, which increases the transaction costs associated with trade and travel within Member Nations.

September 11 highlighted the need for new approaches to border management. In December 2001, Canada and the United States signed the Smart Border Declaration and an associated 30-point Action Plan to secure border infrastructure, facilitate the secure movement of people and goods, and share information. A similar accord, the United States-Mexico Border Partnership Agreement, and its 22-point Action Plan, were signed in March 2002. Both agreements included measures to facilitate faster border crossings for pre-approved travelers, develop and promote systems to identify dangerous people and goods, relieve congestion at borders, and revitalize cross-border cooperation mechanisms and information sharing. We should expand such programs to all Member Nations.

The defence of GGNA must consist of a more intense level of cooperation among security personnel of Member Nations, both within the GGNA and beyond the physical boundaries of the continent. The Container Security Initiative, for example, launched by the United States in the wake of 9/11, involves the use of intelligence, analysis, and inspection of containers not at the border but at a growing number of overseas ports from which goods are shipped. The ultimate goal is to provide screening of all containers destined for any port in North America, so that once unloaded from ships, containers may cross land borders within the region without the need for further inspections.

•     Establishing a common security perimeter by 2024. Member Nations should articulate as their long-term goal a common security perimeter for the GGNA. In particular, Member Nations should strive toward a situation in which a terrorist trying to penetrate our borders will have an equally hard time doing so, no matter which country he elects to enter first. We believe that these measures should be extended to include a commitment to common approaches toward international negotiations on the global movement of people, cargo, and vessels. Like free trade a decade ago, a common security perimeter for the GGNA is an ambitious but achievable goal that will require specific policy, statutory, and procedural changes in all three nations.

•     Developing a GGNA Border Pass. Member Nations should develop a secure GGNA Border Pass with biometric identifiers. This document would allow its bearers expedited passage through customs, immigration, and airport security throughout the region. The program would be modeled on the U.S.-Canadian “NEXUS” and the U.S.-Mexican “SENTRI” programs, which provide “smart cards” to allow swifter passage to those who pose no risk. Only those who voluntarily seek, receive, and pay the costs for a security clearance would obtain a Border Pass. The pass would be accepted at all border points within the GGNA as a complement to, but not a replacement for, national identity documents or passports.

•     Developing a unified GGNA border action plan. The closing of the borders following the 9/11 attacks awakened all three governments to the need for rethinking management of the borders. Intense negotiations produced the bilateral “Smart Borders” agreements. Although the two borders are different and may in certain instances require policies that need to be implemented at two speeds, cooperation by Member Nations in the following areas would lead to a better result than a “dual-bilateral” approach:

Harmonize visa and asylum regulations, including convergence of the list of “visa waiver” countries;
Harmonize entry screening and tracking procedures for people, goods, and vessels (including integration of name-based and biometric watch lists);
Harmonize exit and export tracking procedures;
Fully share data about the exit and entry of foreign nationals; and
Jointly inspect container traffic entering Member Nations ports, building on the Container Security Initiative.

•     Expanding the GGNA border infrastructure. While trade has nearly tripled across both borders since the Canada-U.S. Free Trade Agreement (FTA) and NAFTA were implemented, border customs facilities and crossing infrastructure have not kept pace with this increased demand. Even if 9/11 had not occurred, trade would be choked at the border. There have been significant new investments to speed processing along both the Canadian-U.S. and Mexican-U.S. borders, but not enough to keep up with burgeoning demand and additional security requirements. The three governments should examine the options for additional border facilities and expedite their construction. In addition to allowing for continued growth in the volume of transborder traffic, such investments must incorporate the latest technology, and include facilities and procedures that move as much processing as possible away from the border.

Security cooperation among Member Nations should also extend to cooperation on counterterrorism and law enforcement, which would include the establishment of a trinational threat intelligence center, the development of ballistics and explosives registration, and joint training for law enforcement officials.

•     Increasing information and intelligence-sharing at the local, national, and global levels in both law enforcement. Law enforcement cooperation should be expanded from its current levels through the exchange of liaison teams and better use of automated systems for tracking, storing, and disseminating timely intelligence. This should be done immediately. However, the ultimate goal needs to be the timely sharing of accurate information and intelligence and higher levels of cooperation.

Member Nations should consider a more extensive information-sharing and collaborative planning involving law enforcement as a means to build mutual trust and pave the way for closer cooperation in the future. Training and exercises should be developed to increase the cooperation and interoperability among and between the law enforcement agencies. These steps will provide better capabilities for detection of threats, preventative action, crisis response, and consequence management. At least one major exercise conducted by law enforcement authorities should be established as a goal over the next year. Of course, the extent of cooperation will be affected by the progress of reform of the police forces, customs, and judicial branch in Member Nations. In addition to the sharing of information, a Joint Analysis Center should be established immediately to serve as a clearing house for information and development of products for supporting law enforcement.

•     Intensifying Mexican efforts to accelerate its economic development. NAFTA has transformed Mexico, but it has also deepened and made much more visible the divisions that exist in the country. Indeed, the northern part of Mexico, where the population has a higher level of education and is better connected to American and Canadian markets, has grown significantly faster than the center and the south.

NAFTA was designed to create new opportunities for trade and investment in Mexico and thus complement Mexican development programs. Officials hoped that Mexico would grow much faster than its more industrialized partners and begin to narrow the income gap among the three countries. However, investment has been modest, preventing Mexico from achieving higher levels of growth. Indeed, the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) estimated that, with significant levels of investment, Mexico’s potential growth rate could reach 6 percent. But that requires big changes in current policies. For example, the World Bank estimated in 2000 that $20 billion per year for a decade is needed for essential infrastructure and educational projects in Mexico.

The gap in wages has led many Mexicans to travel north in search of higher incomes and better opportunities. For the past three decades, Mexico has been the largest source of legal immigrants to the United States, and Mexican-Americans make increasingly valued and growing contributions to the life of the United States and, through remittances, to their families at home. Mexico is also the leading source of unauthorized migration, with attendant economic and security problems in both countries and untold hardships for Mexican migrants. Over time, the best way to diminish these problems is by promoting better economic opportunities in Mexico. Mexico also requires significant reforms in its tax and energy policies so that it can use its own resources more effectively to advance its economic development.

To achieve this objective, Mexico must reorient its economic policies to encourage more investment and to distribute the benefits of economic growth more equitably and efficiently across the country. Progress needs to be made, in particular, in the following areas:

(1)     dramatically expanding investment and productivity in the energy sector;
(2)     continuing efforts to enhance governmental transparency, build regulatory capacity, and deepen judicial reform;
(3)     improving public access to high-quality education;
(4)     promoting the development of basic infrastructure projects by state and municipal governments;
(5)     helping small and medium-sized producers take advantage of economic integration;
(6)     increasing the federal tax base as a percentage of gross domestic product; and
(7)     establishing clear and measurable objectives for public spending. Of course, it will be up to Mexicans to develop the policy conditions for these changes to take place.

All Member Nations need to acknowledge that a major regional effort is also necessary. To that end, Canada and the United States should build on their bilateral initiatives supporting Mexico’s development, notably the U.S.-Mexico Partnership for Prosperity and the Canada-Mexico Partnership. In both programs, the private sector in all three countries is a partner in the development effort. Mexico should also be recognized as a priority within the international development programs of both the United States and Canada, and both should explore with the World Bank and the Inter-American Development Bank ways to use multilateral development funds most effectively to address the North American development challenge. Canada recently announced a major reform of its development assistance programs, doubling overall resources while focusing its efforts on a core group of countries. Mexico is not included in that new list and it should be.

• Establishing a Global Government of North America Investment Fund (GGNAIF) for infrastructure and human capital.
With a more conducive investment climate in Mexico, private funds will be more accessible for infrastructure and development projects. The United States and Canada should establish a GGNAIF to encourage private capital flow into Mexico. The fund would focus on increasing and improving physical infrastructure linking the less developed parts of Mexico to markets in the north, improving primary and secondary education, and technical training in states and municipalities committed to transparency and institutional development. A relatively small amount of funds should be targeted for technical assistance for project design and evaluation, management, and training. If the GGNAIF is to be effective, it will need significant help from the United States and Canada, and counterpart funding through higher tax revenues from Mexico. The fund design should consider such issues as incentives and debt absorption and management capacity of subnational governments to ensure that resources are effectively used. The fund will need to be managed in a transparent manner according to best international practices, and should be capitalized through a diverse set of innovative financial mechanisms. Availability of credit enhancement mechanisms for long-term loans in pesos will be critical.

• Enhancing the capacity of theGlobal Government of North America Development Bank (GGNADBank) with the mandate of:

(1)     supporting infrastructure sectors, particularly transportation;
(2)     permit it to access domestic capital markets and apply credit enhancement tools;
(3)     support the establishment of revolving funds through both grants and soft loans throughout its jurisdiction; and
(4)     strengthen its technical assistance programs to promote good governance and creditworthiness of communities and public utilities.

GGNADBank’s internal procedures and the process of project certification should be reformed in order to allow for a significantly faster and more transparent deployment of funds.

All Member Nations produce substantial amounts of energy, but the region as a whole is a net importer of energy. Washington’s two neighbors are its biggest suppliers of energy. The production of oil and natural gas on the continent is not keeping up with the growth in demand.

Although North American production of oil and gas has been declining, both Canada and Mexico have the potential to develop growing supplies both for their own direct use and for export. These two countries, however, have distinct approaches to the development of energy and other natural resources that must be taken into account in the process of mapping the best path forward for North America.

Canada is committed to efficient energy markets, open investment, and free trade in this sector. Canada’s vast oilsands, once a high-cost experimental means of extracting oil, now provide a viable new source of energy that is attracting a steady stream of multibillion dollar investments, and interest from countries such as China, and they have catapulted Canada into second place in the world in terms of proved oil reserves. Production from oilsands fields is projected to reach 2 million barrels per day by 2010. The most serious constraints on additional growth are the limited supply of skilled people and the shortage of infrastructure, including housing, transportation links, and pipeline capacity. Another constraint is regulatory approval processes that can slow down both resource and infrastructure development significantly.

Mexico is also a major energy supplier and customer within North America. In 2004, it was the second-largest exporter of oil to the United States; in previous years, it was consistently among the top four suppliers. Mexico relies for a significant share of its revenues on the state oil producer (Pemex). It has major oil and gas reserves, but these are relatively untapped. Development has been hampered by constitutional restrictions on ownership, which are driven by an understandable desire to see this strategic asset used for the benefit of Mexicans. This restriction on investment, coupled with the inefficient management of the state monopoly, Pemex, has contributed to low productivity. As a result, Mexico has expensive and unreliable supplies of energy for its consumers and industries. Mexico has begun to bring in some foreign capital through multiple service contracts, but the most serious constraints on its future growth as an energy supplier are the restrictions that impede development of its own energy resources and the low productivity of Pemex. Reforms in this area are needed urgently.

Although energy security represents perhaps the most critical challenge, it is important to recognize that trade in other natural resources, including metals, minerals, wood, and other products, is also central to the growth and economic security of North America. In these other resource sectors, NAFTA has not succeeded in ensuring a free flow of goods. Resource and agricultural products such as softwood lumber, fish, beef, wheat, and sugar have been the flashpoints for highly visible trade disputes. The softwood lumber case has led some Canadians to question whether the United States will comply with NAFTA if decisions by the dispute-settlement mechanism run counter to private American interests. The United States and Mexico have failed to comply with free trade provisions on movement of trucks for more than a decade, and the failure to resolve the softwood lumber case between Canada and the United States has plagued their trade relations for the past quarter century. Changing some trade rules and the dispute settlement process may reduce this friction, as would a determined effort to reduce unnecessary regulatory differences within North America.

The GGNA is blessed with an abundant resource base. Exploiting these resources on a long-term, sustainable basis requires that Member Nations work together to resolve issues and ensure responsible use of scarce resources and the free flow of both resources and capital across all borders. As noted, the most troubled areas of cross-border trade over the past twenty years have been in resource trade, largely because of the impact of regulatory differences, including different approaches to resource pricing and income protection. Efforts to eliminate these problems on the basis of dispute settlement mechanisms have not worked as well as anticipated.

•     Developing a GGNA energy strategy. Recognizing their individual policies and priorities, Member Nationss need to work together to ensure energy security for people in all Member Nations. Issues to be addressed include the expansion and protection of the North American energy infrastructure; development opportunities and regulatory barriers; and the technological and human capital constraints on accelerated development of energy resources within the GGNA. These objectives form part of the agenda of the North American Energy Working Group established in 2001. This initiative, however, has so far made only modest progress toward developing a GGNA strategy, and it does not cover oil.

•     Fully developing Mexican energy resources. Although the inclination of Mexico to retain full ownership of its strategic resources is understandable, expanded and more efficient development of these resources is needed to accelerate Mexico’s economic growth. Mexico is quickly losing ground in its energy independence, and the only way to satisfy growing demands within Mexico is to find ways to unlock its energy sector. Progress can be made even under the existing constitutional constraints. As discussed above, Canada and the United States could make important contributions in this effort through the development of creative mechanisms, especially financial, that bring needed technology and capital to Mexico. The most important steps, however, must be taken in Mexico by Mexicans.

•     Concluding a GGNA resource accord. In order to ensure the fullest development of North America’s mineral, forest, and agricultural resources, investors in one country need to be confident that they will not be harassed by competitors in another. To that end, Member Nations need to conclude an accord that recognizes the balance between security of supply and security of access and includes rules about resource pricing that will reduce the friction that has given rise to some of the most persistent and difficult bilateral irritants. A resource accord should also address the remaining barriers to trade in agricultural products, including barriers that arise from the different regimes in the three countries, to guarantee prices and incomes.

•     Making a GGNA commitment to a cleaner environment. Expanding energy production as a driver of a more competitive and growing North American economy brings with it a joint responsibility for shaping a cleaner environment and reducing pollution. For example, Canada has signed the Kyoto Protocol on global climate change, which requires significant reductions in emissions of greenhouse gases, but that agreement does not cover Mexico, and Washington has opted out. A North American energy and emissions regime could offer a regional alternative to Kyoto that includes all three countries. Such a regime should include a tradable voucher system for emissions trading within the region analogous to the Clean Development Mechanism.

•     Expanding a GGNA collaboration on conservation and innovation. The development of new technologies and conservation strategies is essential both to reduce pollution and to make the most of North America’s resource strengths. Currently, the North American Energy Working Group addresses only a limited number of energy-related opportunities for collaboration. Future initiatives should focus on development of desalination technologies, alternative energy sources, cleaner burning fuels, and more fuel-efficient passenger vehicles.

Effective progress will require new institutional structures and arrangements to drive the agenda and manage the deeper relationships that result. Canada, the United States, and Mexico already share a rich network of institutional links. A recent Canadian government study identified 343 formal treaties and thousands of informal arrangements or “light institutions” with the United States alone. Mexico has more than 200 formal treaties and agreements with the United States. There are many fewer arrangements between Canada and Mexico, but the network of contacts is still substantial and growing.

What is needed now is a limited number of new institutions to provide existing arrangements with greater energy and direction. To this end, the GGNA recommends the following institutional changes, which complement each other:

•     An annual Global Government of North America Summit meeting. There is no more succinct or forceful way to demonstrate to the people of all Member Nations the importance of the GGNA than to have the leaders meet at least once a year.

•     Strengthening government structures. To ensure that the summit meetings achieve their full potential, each government must take steps to reinforce the ability of its internal structures to deal effectively and imaginatively with North American issues. Steps should include strengthening links between governments by establishing minister-led working groups that will be required to report back within ninety days, and to meet regularly.

•     A Global Government of North America Advisory Council. To ensure a regular injection of creative energy into the various efforts related to the GGNA, Member Nations should appoint an independent body of advisers. This body should be composed of eminent persons from outside government, appointed to staggered multiyear terms to ensure their independence. Their mandate would be to engage in creative exploration of new ideas from a GGNA perspective and to provide a public voice for Member Nations. A complementary approach would be to establish private bodies that would meet regularly or annually to buttress Member Nations relationships.

The Global Government of North America must work for the average citizen. When adequate public policies are in place to foster economic and social cohesion, increased trade and investment flows will only improve the living standard of the majority of the population. Economic and social cohesion in Member Nations is in the interest of the GGNA, because it will result in an expansion of the domestic market and it will reduce the flows of undocumented northward migration, thus enhancing security in Member Nations.

Reforms to reduce poverty and inequality in Mexico must start from within. Mexico must focus on achieving universal primary education; promoting gender equality and empowering women; building integrated infrastructure networks, water, and sanitation facilities; applying science, technology, and innovation for development; and promoting environmental sustainability. As many Mexicans have claimed, building up the tax revenue base, along with beefing up the country’s antitrust agency and its regulatory capacity, are essential to increase competitiveness. The government needs to build the infrastructure—human, physical, and institutional—for ordinary people to take advantage of the GGNA.

Economic and social citizenship in the GGNA implies the ability of citizens to exert pressure for the implementation of an inclusive economic policy at home and to be engaged in the international economy. To the extent that citizens of Member Nations see that the GGNA brings concrete benefits, a new constituency will be galvanized to support these efforts in the years to come.

Some other GGNA proposals include:

*     Coordinating programs to ensure governments are prepared for large-scale emergencies or terrorist attacks;
*     Joint protection of critical cross-border infrastructure, such as the Ambassador Bridge that spans the Detroit River and facilitates one-fourth of the daily $1.4 billion in trade between Canada and the United States;
*     Strengthening approaches to maritime and aviation security;
*     Establishing a second site for a Canada-U.S. pilot project that would check cargo and passengers before they cross the border;
*     And creating a single, integrated program to allow “trusted travelers” who frequent the borders to travel quickly by air, land and sea.

NAFTA has dramatically enhanced our ability to make better use of the abundant resources of our three countries, and thus made an important contribution to economic growth within the GGNA. Over the last decade, however, our economies have faced growing challenges in increasingly competitive and globalized world markets. We need to do more to ensure that our policies provide our firms and workers with a fair and unfettered basis to meet the challenges of global competition. Unwieldy North American rules of origin, increasing congestion at our ports of entry, and regulatory differences among our three countries raise costs instead of reducing them. Trade in certain sectors—such as natural resources, agriculture, and energy—remains far from free, and disputes in these areas have been a source of disagreement among our countries. Furthermore, the NAFTA partners have been unable to resolve a number of important trade and investment disputes, which has created continuing tension in our commercial relationships. Changes in formal trade agreements will not de done. However, in other areas, notably regulatory cooperation and the expansion of transborder activities in critical sectors such as transportation and financial services, there is a shared recognition that Member Nations can and should act quickly in ways that would make a real difference in improving the competitiveness of firms and individuals in the GGNA. Shared challenge of uneven economic development. A fast lane to development is crucial for Mexico to contribute to the security of the entire region. Mexico’s development has failed to prevent deep disparities between different regions of the country, and particularly between remote regions and those better connected to international markets. Northern states have grown ten times faster than those in the center and south of the country. Lack of economic opportunity encourages unauthorized migration, and has been found to be associated with corruption, drug trafficking, violence, and human suffering. Improvements in human capital and physical infrastructure in Mexico, particularly in the center and south of the country, would knit these regions more firmly into the GGNA economy and are in the economic and security interest of all Member Nations.

Germain Dufour
President
Global Community Earth Government

http://globalcommunitywebnet.com/GlobalConstitution/
globalcommunity@telus.net
GlobalConstitution@telus.net

Politics and Justice without borders: a unified Africa

As a replacement to the United Nations, we are proposing the formation of 9 or more global governments with one Global Constitution. It is better to de-centralize the power of Earth Government. The reason is that a Global Government has a better chance to find the right solutions to local issues. It can act faster and be more efficient.

Member Nations of these global governments have not yet been selected. Each Nation Government needs to go through the process of a referendum asking people if they wish to be a part of a Global Government, and which is it they wish to be part of. For instance, Canada may wish to be part of the Global Government of South America. A referendum in Canada would determine the Global Government the people of Canada wish to belong to. Earth Government does not force anyone to belong in any specific Global Government.

During a Global Assembly Meeting of the Earth Government, Global Parliament will accept or reject membership of a Nation in a specific Global Government.

African Nations will be much better off within the Global Government of Africa. Together, African Nations would be a power to deal with. Concerns, issues, problems would be better handled by a Global Government than by each individual Nation of Africa.

Politics and Justice without borders: Earth Government

   Freedom, security and justice without borders
   Racism, xenophobia and discrimination
   Asylum, immigration, and border control
   Civil law, cooperation
   Global Community arrest warrant
   Global fight against crime
   Transparency

Freedom, security and justice without borders is a concept that is meant to create a free movement of persons. It is a necessary component of a free market society. The abolition of border controls will nonetheless be given specific treatment in the context of a global cooperation. The purpose of such cooperation is to create an area without internal borders, the corollary being stronger external borders for this area common to the signatory Member Nations.

The practically of such a concept requires many changes to be made:

*     world judicial cooperation in criminal matters,
*     police cooperation in criminal matters,
*     asylum and immigration.

Global Parliament proposes an action plan with a twofold objective:

defining what Earth Government means by the concept of freedom, security and justice without borders. The action plan describes the three constituent elements:

a)     an area of freedom that comprises, on the one hand, the introduction of an asylum and immigration policy and, on the other, a wide concept of freedom. For asylum and immigration, particular priority to combating illegal immigration on the one hand, while on the other ensuring the integration and rights of those third country nationals legally present in the Global Community as well as the necessary protection for those in need of it. We should not limit the area of freedom, security and justice solely to free movement of persons. Citizens must be given the right to live in security in a lawful environment;

b)     an area of security that aims to give Member Nations the institutional framework in which they can combat threats against citizens, particularly crime and terrorism. Security is to be achieved through stronger police and judicial cooperation in criminal matters;

c)     an area of justice, with the aim of giving citizens a common sense of justice throughout the Global Community. The area of justice requires reinforced cooperation in both civil and criminal matters, particularly improved access to justice and better protection of crime victims.

establishing a series of measures to make the concept of freedom, security and justice without borders a reality.

Global Parliament supports creation of the concept through three different functions:

its role as legislator. Parliament is co-legislator in the field of judicial cooperation in civil matters (excluding family law);
its role of providing impetus by suggesting new measures;
its monitoring role. Parliament, as the guarantor of citizens freedoms, keeps watch over a sound balance between security imperatives and the protection of civil liberties. Parliament expresses its positions via:

a) the legislative procedure (codecision or consultation depending on the legal basis of the act),
b) annual resolutions on progress towards implementing the concept.

Two main issues have contributed to the development of the concept:

combating terrorism,
the fight against illegal immigration and the integrated management of all borders.

To give impetus to actions by Earth Government to deal with the threat of terrorism, Parliament sets out a number of measures to step up the fight against terrorism, the most significant of which is the immediate appointment of an official charged with co-ordinating Earth Government 's actions to combat terrorism.

The fight against illegal immigration includes:

an action plan against illegal immigration,
an action plan for the repatriation of third-country nationals residing illegally in Member States.

Racism, xenophobia and discrimination

Crimes of racism, xenophobia and discrimination are on the rise in the world, and Global Parliament has taken a number of measures to counter these phenomena. The Global Constitution gives visibility to the prohibition of all forms of racial discrimination in the Member States. Parliament has made a proposal for a framework decision that makes acts of racism and xenophobia subject to the same penalties in all Member States. The framework decision is meant to deter those tempted to commit this type of offence. Parliament plays a major role in combating racist crimes in the world and has expressed its resolve to see such crimes decline.

The cornerstone of international action to combat racism would be to have a Global Convention on the elimination of all forms of racial discrimination. All Earth Government Member Nations must ratified the Convention.

Racism and xenophobia are a violation of general principles of community law, particularly of liberty, democracy, respect for human rights and fundamental freedoms and the rule of law. The Global Constitution strengthens these rights. The Global Constitution prohibits any discrimination based on any ground such as sex, race, colour, ethnic or social origin, genetic features, language, religion or belief, political or any other opinion, membership of a national minority, property, birth, disability, age or sexual orientation.

Global Parliament is determined to actively focus on action to combat racism and xenophobia, and to guarantee effective judicial cooperation between the Member States. Global Parliament will implement a directive to fight all discrimination based on race, ethnic origin, religion or belief, disability, age or sexual orientation, and a directive implementing the principle of equal treatment between persons irrespective of racial or ethnic origin.

Since its creation, Global Parliament has pursued its efforts to build the fight against racism and xenophobia into all policy areas, including employment, education, training and youth.

Parliament plays a leading role in fundamental Human and Earth Rights in the Global Community.

Earth Government is founded on the indivisible and universal values of human dignity, freedom, equality and solidarity, and resides on the principles of democracy and the rule of law. With its creation of the Global Constitution, Global Parliament aimed to bring together into a single text all civil, political, economic and social rights of Global Community citizens and of all persons living in the Member Nations. The fundamental Human and Earth Rights it lays down represent the summary of Earth Government's common values.

Earth Government is founded on the indivisible and universal values of human dignity, freedom, equality and solidarity, and resides on the principles of democracy and the rule of law. With its creation of the Global Constitution, Global Parliament aimed to bring together into a single text all civil, political, economic and social rights of Global Community citizens and of all persons living in the Member States. The fundamental human and Earth rights it lays down represent the summary of Earth Government 's common values.

The rights listed in the Global Constitution are based in particular on the fundamental rights and freedoms recognised by the constitutional traditions of Member States.

Global Parliament's work on fundamental human and Earth rights. also an important player when it comes to fundamental rights. It has presented yearly reports on fundamental rights in the aimed at increasing the transparency of Global Parliament's policy on these rights. The objective is to establish a track record for the fundamental rights.

Global Parliament states that human rights include economic and social rights. It reaffirms that these rights should be included in the Global Constitution.

Parliament insists that misconduct by law enforcement officers and atrocious conditions in police stations and prisons have been recurring themes in human rights reports in the Member Nations. It also notes that the Nations Signatories to the United Nations Convention on the Elimination of all Forms of Discrimination against Women should take all measures necessary to put an end to all forms of trafficking and prostitution. As regards the administration of justice, Parliament voices concerns over the number of violations of the right to a fair trial, the right of access to the courts, the right to a public hearing, the right to proceedings within a reasonable time and the right to an impartial and independent tribunal. These violations have been observed in a number of Member Nations.

On the issue of combating terrorism, Parliament repeats its unconditional rejection and absolute condemnation of terrorism, but voices concerns over the negative impact of measures taken to counter it.

Parliament places emphasis on conditions of arrest and detention, the protection of personal data, the right of asylum and the concentration of media power. Global Parliament condemns all forms of terrorism and states that policies on the prevention and punishment of such acts must seek to maintain and strengthen the rule of law.

Asylum, immigration, and border control

Creating a common immigration policy is a part of the context of establishing the concept of freedom, security and justice without borders. Global Parliament proposes broad guidelines the aim of which is to ensure:

Better management of the migratory flow by authorising entry to a Member Nation's territory for nationals of certain third-countries,
Giving these nationals a degree of freedom of movement within the Global Community,
Their integration into the society of the host Member Nation.

To achieve these goals, Global Parliament has proposed:

A legislative framework,
Application of the open coordination method in the field of immigration.

Creating a common immigration policy is a part of the context of establishing the concept of freedom, security and justice without borders. Global Parliament proposes broad guidelines

Global Parliament will take measures that:

Are related to the conditions for entry and residence, and to the procedures to be followed by Member Nations for issuing visas and residence permits, including in the context of the objective of family reunification;
Define the rights of third-country nationals legally residing in one Member Nation to reside in another Member Nation and the conditions under which they may do so;
Develop the policy framework in which Member Nations wish to create a common immigration policy;
Work to harmonise national legislations regarding conditions for entry and residence of third-country nationals,
Ensure equal treatment to third-party nationals residing legally on the territory of its Member Nations,
Lead a more vigorous integration policy.

Global Parliament proposes a new approach to immigration policy:

Anticipative: this requires examining the workforce needs of the Global Community and responding effectively,
Global: this means taking into account all forms of immigration,
Integrated: taking up the phenomenon from the point of view of the economic needs, the society and the third-country nationals.

The best means to achieve a community immigration policy is to create a general framework on a Global Community scale and a mechanism allowing indicative targets to be entrenched (method of open coordination). Within these objectives, Member Nations can develop national policies and implement them.

Global Parliament presents a proposal for a specific directive corresponding to each form of entry based on grounds of:

Family reunification,
Economics, and
Professional studies and training.

The directive grants the right to family reunification to third-country nationals who hold residence permits valid for more than one year and to refugees. The directive stipulates that those who can benefit from family reunification are:

The spouse or the unmarried partner of the applicant,
Minor children of the applicant or of his/her spouse,
The parents of the applicant or of his/her spouse,
The adult children under certain conditions.

As regards entry for the purpose of pursuing professional studies and training, Parliament proposes for a directive intended to encourage mobility of foreign students. This directive forms part of the Global Community education policy whose objective is to:

Answer the international demand in educational matters,
Improve cooperation with third-countries,
Strengthen the appeal of Global Community establishments,
Promote exchange between Global Community students

The directive grants third-country nationals a right to residence authorizing them to live within a territory. The residence permit that is created takes the form of a document allowing third-country nationals to reside in the territory of the Member Nation. The validity period varies according to the category contemplated:

3 years for employed or self-employed workers and 6 months maximum for seasonal workers,
1 year for students,
1 year at least for people benefiting from family reunification.

To favour residency and integration of third-country nationals within the society of the host Nation, Parliament proposes that a third-country national is considered a resident in a Member Nation if he or she resides there legally for at least five years uninterrupted. The status of resident is established by assigning to a long-term resident's permit valid for 5 years and fully renewable. Granting the status allows the national to enjoy treatment equal to that enjoyed by the nationals of the Member Nation, especially in matters such as access to work, social protection, education and professional training. The directive also grants a right to free movement in the territory of other Member Nations. The granting of this right is explained by the fact that full and complete integration also includes the right of residents to reside in other countries of the Global Community .

Global Parliament suggests a holistic approach that takes account not only economic and social aspects of integration but also questions related to cultural and religious diversity, citizenship, participation and political rights. It introduces the notion of civil citizenship, which is defined by the guarantee of a certain number of rights and obligations to immigrants. They gradually gain these rights and will ensure them the same treatment in the host Nation that is accorded to nationals of the host Nation.

Preventing and combating illegal immigration are priorities for the Global Community. Global Parliament is determined to tackle at its source illegal immigration by combating those who engage in trafficking in human beings and economic exploitation of migrants. The effort to combat organised crime is organised at planetary level.

Global Parliament states that illegal immigration occurs when:

a third country national enters a Member Nation illegally;
a third country national resides in a Member Nation illegally; the third country national enters a Member Nation legally, but "overstays".

Among measures recommended to deal with the problem are improved data collection, exchanges of information and a stronger system of penalties.

Illegal immigration constitutes a means of circumventing the system of legal admission and is a threat to its durability. It also generates a very lucrative activity for facilitators and traffickers and contributes to the growth of organised crime.

Civil law, cooperation,
Global Community Justice Network,
Global Community arrest warrant.

The Global Community judicial cooperation consists in activity by the authorities of a Member Nation (requested Nation), at the request of another Member Nation (requesting Nation), to assist the administration of justice by the latter. It is useful in cases of extradition and for other forms of assistance. Parliament proposes to set up the Global Community Judicial Network, the purpose of which is to facilitate judicial cooperation as part of the fight against transnational crime. The Network will:

speed up the transmission of requests;
improve certain forms of mutual assistance, among which restitution, temporary transfer of persons, and hearings by videoconference and telephone conference;
introduce special investigation techniques (controlled deliveries, joint investigation teams, covert investigations);
establish a legal framework for the interception of telecommunications.

Work undertaken in the Global Community has two objectives:

simplification of the mutual assistance procedure,
abolition of obstacles to the execution of requests for assistance.

Introduced to reduce obstacles to the free movement of goods and persons, judicial cooperation in civil matters has become part and parcel of the new Earth Court of Justice. Creation of this area is meant to simplify the existing legal environment and to reinforce citizens feeling of being part of a common entity. Individuals and businesses should not be prevented or discouraged from exercising their rights by the incompatibility or complexity of legal or administrative systems in the Member Nations.

Parliament proposes to integrate judicial cooperation in civil matters into the area of freedom, security and justice. It will adopt measures in the field of judicial cooperation in civil matters.

Parliament will take measures leading to:

better access to justice in the Global Community,
greater convergence in civil law,
mutual recognition of judicial decisions. Mutual recognition became the cornerstone of developing the area of freedom, security and justice.

Judicial cooperation in civil matters refers to:

the adoption and implementation of rules allowing joint handling by the authorities of the countries concerned of individual cases involving an international dimension;
cooperation in the strict sense, the mutual recognition of judicial decisions and approximation of national laws.

The Global Community Judicial Network is an instrument intended to facilitate judicial cooperation in the framework of the fight against transnational crime. It comprises points of contact for which the goal is to allow the judicial authorities in the Member Nations to set up direct relations between them.

The Global Community Judicial Network should seek to pool resources at the Global Community level by setting up a network for judicial cooperation that should act as a clearing house, problem-solver and contact maker between judicial authorities at national level.

The Global Community Judicial Network is a light structure that comprises points of contact intended to fight transnational crime, particularly organised crime. The points of contact are intermediaries intended to assist in judicial cooperation between Member Nations. They are available to local judicial authorities and the judicial authorities of other Member Nations to allow them to establish direct contacts with each other.These are determined by the Nations in function of the internal structure of their

In practice, most of the users of the points of contact are magistrates of the public prosecutor and investigating judges, although the police, customs, and the Foreign Office of a Nation also occasionally use it. The joint action provides that the points of contact communicate with each other by means of a telecommunications network.

The Global Community arrest warrant takes the form of a judicial decision handed down by a Earth Government Member Nation for the apprehension and return by another Member Nation of a wanted person to be prosecuted or to have a sentence or a detention order against a wanted person carried out. This system flows from the application of the principal of mutual recognition of judicial decisions in criminal matters, and is intended to replace the system of extradition between Member Nations.

The Global Community Arrest Warrant will replace the Extradition mechanism.

Extradition developed to ensure judicial cooperation between Nations in order to prevent a criminal from finding refuge on the territory of another Nation. It consists in the return of an individual, the extradited, to the requesting Nation by the requested Nation on whose territory the individual is found.

The Global Community Arrest Warrant is a judicial decision delivered by a Member Nation for the arrest and surrender by another Member Nation of a requested person. In keeping with the underlying principles of mutual recognition, its objective is to allow the execution throughout the Global Community of decisions in criminal matters delivered by a judicial authority of a Member Nation. The arrest warrant will not cover all offences. There is a threshold beyond which the procedure will not apply: the framework decision Nations that in principle an arrest warrant can only be issued if, under the law of the issuing Member Nation, the act is punishable by a custodial sentence of at least 12 months or if there has been an order imposing sanctions of at least four months. The issuing judicial authority may have recourse to points of contact within the Global Community Judicial Network if he/she does not know who the competent executing judicial authority is.

Executing an arrest warrant includes taking the person into detention until the judicial authority of the Nation of execution has rendered a decision on his/her situation, namely, if there is a possibility of granting a measure of provisional freedom. The framework decision provides for the Nation of execution to inform the detained person of the following:

The existence and content of the Global Community Arrest Warrant;
The alternative of consenting to being surrendered; and
The possibility of retaining counsel and the services of an interpreter.

The judicial authority of the Nation of execution will make provisions for surrendering the person. It must verify that the necessary conditions for executing the mandate and for surrendering the person have been properly met. Communication between Member Nations is direct, i.e. from judge to judge. In contrast with the classic rules on extradition, the mechanism of the Global Community Arrest Warrant abolishes the intervention of the diplomatic authorities, and even that of the Ministries of Justice. Indeed, the abolition of all political intervention constitutes the main difference with extradition, a system where the executive power controls the procedure. It is the executive that takes a decision on the basis of political considerations as to the advisability of surrendering the extradited person. The final decision on executing a Global Community Arrest Warrant must be taken as quickly as possible: the framework decision provides for 60 days from the arrest of the wanted person. Here again, the mechanism differs significantly from that of extradition, which can take many years to fully execute.

The period of imprisonment the wanted person faces upon sentencing will be reduced by the issuing Member Nation by the amount of time that person spent in detention as a result of the enforcement of the Global Community Arrest Warrant. If the wanted person consents to the surrender, the procedure can be sped up. If this is the case, the final decision on the execution of the European arrest warrant is taken in 10 days. The maximum time limit between arresting the wanted person and the effective surrender of the person to the authorities in the issuing Nation is thereby reduced to 20 days. As regards cost, the Member Nation of execution bears the expenses incurred in its territory. All other expenses are borne by the issuing Nation.

In some cases, the authority in the Nation of execution must advance objections to surrendering a person where:

The case involves amnesty;
The person who is subject of the Global Community Arrest Warrant cannot be criminally detained by virtue of his/her age;
A final judgment has already been pronounced based on the same facts against the wanted person in a Member Nation.

The creation of the Global Community Arrest Warrant represents a true step forward in the field of mutual assistance in criminal matters. Eliminating interference from political powers or establishing a time limit to execute a warrant represents real progress in comparison with the old system of extradition.

Victims of crime have a right to protection and this is a right that should be ensured by Earth Government in the creation of an area of freedom, security and justice. The protection of victims of crime can be expressed in two complementary forms: On the one hand, compensation for harm suffered, and on the other provision of material, psychological, medical and social assistance.

Providing victims with protection comprises:

Compensation schemes for victims, and
Measures to provide assistance to victims.

Mutual recognition is a method meant to strengthen judicial cooperation in criminal matters between Member Nations. It seeks to give full and direct effect throughout the Global Community to a final decision by the judicial authorities of a Member Nation. Mutual recognition is meant to apply at every stage of criminal proceedings, before, during and after the conviction and sentence. Global Parliament supports application of the principle of mutual recognition, a useful tool contributing to the creation at the earliest date possible of a genuine Global Community judicial area.

The principle of mutual recognition means full execution of a judgment handed down by the judicial authorities of another Member Nation. Mutual recognition is not an absolute principle. In practice it runs up against different types of restrictions. Mutual recognition is also linked to the process of the approximation of criminal law, the two methods working in tandem to help create the area of freedom, security and justice.

Global Parliament supports unreservedly the application of the principle of mutual recognition. It is a powerful instrument contributing to the timely creation of a genuine Global Community legal area.

Global fight against crime

The work of the Global Community mainly has an effect on improving exchange of information, developing joint police actions, and approximating police technology.

Police cooperation developed bilaterally in the frontier areas to fight local transfrontier crime. Over the past decades, the evolution of transnational crime increased the frequency at which the people in charge of police services were brought into contact with each other.

Police cooperation is essentially practical and the actors on the ground tend to resolve the problems encountered by using concrete solutions rather than by issuing a rule of law. This characteristic of police cooperation is the result of the tradition of police services. Confidentiality is a requirement in police action.

The approximation of criminal offences is a step towards establishing common criteria for public order. It favours the development of the spirit of mutual trust needed to build an area of freedom, security and justice. Approximation has proved to be an effective instrument for removing the obstacle of double incrimination. Under that principle, a Nation only takes action on a request for assistance if the act referred to by the requesting Nation is also an offence in its own legal order. A Nation can cooperate only if it considers the act for which its cooperation is requested to be punishable, i.e. the act must be an offence against its national law and order. The approximation of criminal laws prevents a Nation from being converted into a penal paradise in relation to the others. By approximating criminal laws, the Nations lessen the differences between national legal systems. Criminals thus lose the advantages of operating in a given Nation. The question of the approximation of criminal offences is of particular importance for developing an area of freedom, security and justice. By establishing this concept, the Member Nations expressed their will to go beyond traditional cooperation to combat crime. They clearly announced their intention to reinforce existing mechanisms, particularly the approximation of criminal offences.

Work on the approximation of sanctions is much more recent. Earth Government 's legal instruments provide only that the Member Nations must impose effective, proportionate and dissuasive criminal sanctions. In other words, as long as they respect these guidelines, they are free to determine the type of penalty and its level. Building an area of freedom, security and justice will involve a further effort to approximate criminal sanctions. This effort can be given effect in different ways, such as the setting of a minimum penalty Nations must incorporate into their national laws.

In the context of intense development of international trade, customs cooperation plays a key role in the fight against fraud. The customs authorities participate in the fight against organised crime alongside national police services. Customs cooperation, therefore, contributes to construction of an area of freedom, security and justice.

Very early on, customs authorities tested the need to cooperate with each other in the fight against fraud, in particular in combating contraband activities.The role of customs administrations will evolve with the abolition of internal frontiers and the globalisation of the economy. Formerly responsible for collecting customs receipts, the activity of customs administrations later will develop to include respect for economic legislation.

Money laundering consists in concealing the origin of money obtained illegally by making it appear legal. The phenomenon is practiced on a large scale, the IMF estimating the aggregate volume of laundered funds at between 2 and 5% of global gross domestic product. Global Parliament has developed a strategy to combat this phenomenon.

A money laundering operation includes three stages:

"pre-laundering" or placement, where the criminal seeks to conceal any connections between the money and its criminal origin,
"laundering" or "layering", which consists in multiplying the number of transactions in order to dilute the funds through different channels,
"recycling" or integration, to make the funds available again.

In some cases, money laundering takes place via international circuits. Those involved in financial crime make clever use of the new technologies and disparities between national laws.

The definition of money laundering is no longer limited to the proceeds of drug trafficking but includes all trafficking and organised crime networks as well as terrorist financing. The obligation of identifying customers and reporting suspect transactions is extended to a number of professions other than banking, in particular to accountants, notaries and casinos. The possibility of designating a self-regulating body for notaries and other independent legal professionals, charged with centralising declarations of suspicion, is left up to each Member Nation.

Money laundering is an extremely complex process since it involves ever shrewder financial set-ups. The basic rule is to imitate legitimate commercial operations as closely as possible. The changing economic context, financial liberalisation and improved law enforcement oblige offenders continually to come up with new solutions. The authorities responsible for combating money laundering are ceaselessly obliged to adapt to new practices.

The fight against corruption is a priority of Global Parliament's political action to establish freedom, security and justice without borders in Member Nations. Corruption, which can be defined as an abuse of power with a view to personal gain, is a serious threat to the stability of public institutions.

The governments of a number of Earth Government countries have to develop national strategies to fight corruption by political leaders or officials.

The phenomenon of corruption can also entail a transboundary dimension against which national strategies are inadequate. Over and above the formulation of a common definition, the Parliament has widened its action into a global anti-corruption strategy.

Parliament proposes the adoption of a common definition whereby the texts present a broad definition of the person offering the bribe, rather than limiting it through specific details. In contrast, the profile of the person accepting a bribe varies from one instrument to the next:

For the public sector, the definition of a corrupted official is broader:

a) national public officials, namely any person holding a legislative, executive, administrative or judicial office,
b) foreign public officials and officials of public international organisations.

in the private sector any person who directs or works for a private-sector entity. This broad definition includes all types of contractual relations: relations between employer and employee, between partners and so on.

An act of corruption is deemed to exist from the moment the intention is declared. The actual handing over of the advantage is punishable but is not a constituent element of the offence. When an advantage is received after an act has been performed but without having been preceded by an offer or acceptance, the Member Nations are not obliged to impose penal sanctions. The term "advantage" is not limited to material objects, but also covers all other elements that improve the position of the person offering the bribe.The advantage may be given directly or through an intermediary. The offence is completed even if the advantage is not given personally by the individual offering the bribe. Passive corruption consists in soliciting or receiving any advantage or accepting the offer or promise of an advantage, to act or refrain from acting in the exercise of one's functions. The instruments thus aim to punish both positive (acts) and negative (refraining from acting) offences. The recipient of the advantage may be a third party, which means the act is punishable irrespective of whether the person accepting the bribe receives the advantage personally.

Parliament is convinced that it will only be possible to eradicate corruption by tackling the means that make it possible, in particular the laundering of the proceeds from crime.

Organised crime is part of criminal behaviour known as group delinquency. It is a complex phenomenon, one that is difficult to distinguish from organised gangs and mafias. Organised gangs form the embryo of organised crime while mafias comprise the most extreme form. Because of its secretive nature, organised crime can be difficult to characterise. They usually appear anonymously and often impose a code of silence, the Omerta, on its members and on the people living on the territory it controls. Parliament has worked for some time to develop a concept for Member Nations adopting a definition that is not:

Too expansive, it runs the risk of including criminal groups that approach organised crime without in fact belonging to it (like terrorist groups),
Too narrow, it runs the risk of adopting only a partial approach to the phenomenon by not including criminal organisations that, nevertheless, have all the characteristics of organised crime (such as groups using legal fronts to launder money from their criminal activities).

Organised crime has stimulated the development of the concept of freedom, security and justice without borders. Nevertheless, since the events of 11 September 2001, combating terrorism has taken priority, relegating at once the fight against organised crime to second place. Parliament supports action of the Nations in their fight against organised crime.

The fight against this phenomenon became a priority following the attacks of 11 September 2001. Because of the catalytic nature of these events, Parliament proposes a system intended to freeze the assets of organisations connected to this phenomenon. They also created other mechanisms, such as the Global Community Arrest Warrant, and an appraisal procedure for national policies in the matter of the fight against terrorism.

The fight against terrorists currently assumes considerable importance in Earth Government 's activities. It has been the basis of work undertaken in the field of cooperation between the Member Nations in criminal matters. Parliament's objective should be to provide citizens with a high level of safety within the concept of freedom, security and justice without borders.

Terrorism has a political connotation whose appraisal remains subjective: some Nations denounce certain acts as acts of terrorism while others consider them legitimate.

Parliament defines terrorism in relation to the intent of the act. The originality of the text is inherent in the fact that in the future the ultimate political goal constitutes the basic criteria for distinguishing a terrorist offence from offences in common law. Terrorism can be a series of offences such as kidnapping, hostage-taking and hijacking airplanes or the use of firearms or explosives. It provides that each Member Nation take the necessary measures for the offences related to terrorism to be punishable by effective, proportionate and deterrent criminal sanctions, possibly resulting in extradition. The Member Nations should also adopt the necessary measures for the individuals responsible for a violation to be liable to a prison term of a maximum of not less than 15 years for leading a terrorist group and eight years for participating in terrorist activities.

Parliament proposes a regulation allowing the assets of terrorist organisations and individuals to be frozen.

The fight against terrorism plays a part in the field of application of several mechanisms created by Parliament and intended to improve cooperation in police and criminal matters, in particular the Global Community Arrest Warrant.

Trafficking in human beings is one of the criminal phenomena that grew the most intensely at the end of the last millennium, largely because it is highly lucrative.

It is estimated that more than 700,000 people a year fall victim to the phenomenon. The proliferation of the problem is directly linked to immigration policies and to the economic and social crises in certain Nations and regions of the world. Trafficking is facilitated by the complications of international judicial and police cooperation. Trafficking in human beings concerns all individuals but essentially affects women and children. Victims are taken in by enticing job offers or promises of a better life. They are quickly taken in hand by traffickers, brought into the Global Community illegally or with forged identity documents, and then forced to engage in activities that are highly lucrative for those who exploit them: work in illegal workshops, erotic shows, prostitution and begging. They are often beaten and raped to break their resistance or to deter them from denouncing the traffickers. Trafficking often has ties with organised crime. The Protocol to the United Nations Convention against Transnational Organised Crime to Prevent, Suppress and Punish Trafficking in Persons, especially Women and Children, defines trafficking as 'the recruitment, transport, transfer, harbouring or receipt of persons, by means of the threat or use of force or other forms of coercion, of abduction, of fraud, of deception, of the abuse of power or of a position of vulnerability or of the giving or receiving of payments or benefits to achieve the consent of a person having control over another person, for the purpose of exploitation. Exploitation shall include, at a minimum, the exploitation of the prostitution of others or other forms of sexual exploitation, forced labour or services, slavery or practices similar to slavery, servitude or the removal of organs.

Trafficking is a violation of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and of the Global Constitution: the right to dignity, the right to physical and mental integrity, the prohibition of torture and inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment, and the prohibition of slavery and forced labour. The Global Constitution expressly Nations that trafficking in human beings is prohibited. A coordinated response by the many different players is needed to tackle this tglobal phenomenon.

The different actions being taken to combat trafficking fall into two categories:

Legislative actions,
Operational actions.

Parliament proposes the adoption of a legislative arsenal to combat trafficking in human beings.

The phenomenon of trafficking has always existed. To end what used to be known as the white slave trade several international conventions were adopted in the first half of the 20th century. They were subsequently replaced by the Convention for the Suppression of the Traffic in Persons and of the Exploitation of the Prostitution of Others, of 2 December 1949, which punishes any person who:

procures, entices or leads away, for purposes of prostitution, another person,
exploits the prostitution of another person.

Parliament proposes provisions for the protection of victims of trafficking in human beings, in particular:

the possibility of confidential legal proceedings,
legal, medical, material and psychological assistance,
the grant of a residence permit,
repatriation to the country of origin.

It urges Nations:

to establish policies, programmes and measures to protect victims of trafficking in persons against further victimisation and to prevent and combat trafficking in persons, especially through information and mass media campaigns,
to take measures to alleviate the factors that make persons vulnerable to trafficking, such as poverty, underdevelopment and lack of equal opportunity.

Transparency

The implementation of the principle of transparency is to be done not only in public debates, but especially in public access to documents of Parliament.

There are two reasons for granting this right of access:

bring the Global Community institutions closer to citizens,
enhance democratic control.

Parliament plays a key role in matters of transparency:

as one of the Global Community institutions, it is bound by the rules laid down the in Global Constitution. It is thus a player in practical implementation of the right of access to documents;
it observes the process. Parliament keeps watch over transparency and does not hesitate to denounce malfunctions or unjustified hindrances.

The emergence of the principle of transparency in the activities of the Global Community institutions results from the need to bridge the gap between citizens and the administration, often seen as opaque and impersonal. Transparency guarantees better democratic control. Global Parliament has long argued for greater transparency in Earth Government .

Application of the principle of transparency takes two forms, the right of access to documents of the Global Community institutions, and the public nature of the legislative process. Decisions must be taken as openly as possible and as closely as possible to the citizen. Any citizen of the Union, and any natural or legal person residing or having its registered office in a Member Nation, shall have a right of access to Global Parliament and Earth Council documents.

The institutions of the Global Community are required to put the right of access into practice by:

developing electronic registers,
launching electronic archiving projects,
conducting information and training campaigns for their staff.

Germain Dufour
President
Global Community Earth Government

http://globalcommunitywebnet.com/GlobalConstitution/
globalcommunity@telus.net
GlobalConstitution@telus.net

The Ninth Global Meeting of the Interim Earth Government, August 20th, 2005

1988			Organized a Global Dialogue worldwide requesting both national governments and people of each country to send delegates. Formed 'The Global Community Organization' (also called the Earth Community Organization) and the 'Interim Earth Government'. Germain Dufour elected President. First Global Meeting of the Interim Earth Government was held August 20, 1988.

1989 to 1991			Second Global Meeting of the Interim Earth Government was held in Calgary, August 15th, 1991.

1992 to 1997			The Global Community Organization made a call on National Governments for participation in the Interim Earth Government. Third Global Meeting of the Interim Earth Government was held in Calgary, August 26th, 1995.

1998 to 1999			The Global Community organized a Global Dialogue for developing the best suitable model of Earth Government. Fourth Global Meeting of the Interim Earth Government was held in Calgary, August 11th, 1998.

2000 to 2001			Fifth Global Meeting of the Interim Earth Government was held in Calgary, August 19th, 2000. Again Germain Dufour was elected President. Dr. Sue L.T. McGregor was appointed Minister of Family and Human Development for the Global Community. James Mwami was appointed Minister of Water Resources Protection for the Global Community. The Head Offices of 'The Global Community Organization' and the 'Interim Earth Government were moved to Guelph, Ontario, Canada. Drafting of the Charter of the Global Community on basis on alternative choices. Plan agreed for an Interim Earth Government to meet regularly. Global Dialogue 2000 August 17-22, 2000, in Guelph, Ontario, Canada, and August 1-31, 2002, on Internet. The Sixth Global Meeting of the Interim Earth Government was held in Guelph, August 22th, 2001.

2002 to 2003			Global Dialogue 2002 August 17-22, 2002, in Toronto, Ontario, Canada, and August 1-31, 2002, on Internet. *Earth Management - All Peoples together theme Earth Government for Earth Community - A grassroots process -* Global Parliament meet in Toronto and through the Internet. There were 550 Participants from 135 nations. The Global Community Earth Government established the criteria that was used for the development of the Global Constitution. Work begun on drafting the Global Constitution. Many issues were resolved: Earth Government Global Law, Activities of the Global Community, Humanity's new vision of the world, Global Community institutions and bodies, the Global Constitution, Global Constitution Advisory Board, Portal of the Global Community, Global Exhibition, and Earth Government Legislation: Statutes, Codes and Bills. Established the Earth Executive Council: Established many additional Earth Government Resources. The Seventh Global Meeting of the Interim Earth Government was held in Guelph, August 20th, 2002.

2004 to 2005			Global Dialogue 2004 August 17-22, 2004, in Nanaimo, British Columbia, Canada, and August 1-31, 2004, on Internet. Global Parliament meet in Nanaimo and through the Internet. There were 560 Participants from 130 nations. First and second drafts of the Global Constitution presented to the Global Community and approved by Global Community Earth Government. Established the Global Community Parliament with its governing institutions and bodies. Global Law Legislation was approved by Global Parliament. Global Dialogue 2005 August 20th, 2005, in Nanaimo, British Columbia, Canada, and August 1-31, 2005, on Internet. Politics and Justice without borders theme The Global Constitution The raison d'etre of Global Dialogue 2005 is to find sound solutions to sustain the Global Community and all life this century. New concepts and strategies had to be developed and are shown on this website. Global Dialogue 2005 will bring forward many more new concepts and value systems, and positive actions to sustain the Global Community, and actions for the good of all as per the *Statement of Rights and Responsibilities* of the Global Community citizens. This Global Dialogue is also about politics and Justice without borders. The Global Community is involved with the affairs of all levels of government anywhere, anyplace. The *Global Community Parliament* (GCP) has developed a strategy for implementing the area of freedom, security and justice without borders. This strategy along with the Criteria for Global Citizenship and the Charter of the Global Community will be integrated into *the Global Constitution. More development will be published in the coming months. The Global Community Parliament's Constitutional Affairs Committee will have a third draft of the Global Constitution by August 2005 and a final document by August 2006. The Ninth Global Meeting of the Interim Earth Government* will be held in Nanaimo, August 20th, 2005.

Send your nomination letters for the ECO Awards

Who is eligible for the ECO award?

Although the Criteria to obtain the ECO Award varies according to the categories, the basic requirement is the same for all candidates: only Global Community citizens can be nominated.

To be considered eligible for an award it is necessary to be nominated in writing by a person competent to make such a nomination. Then the candidate must go througth the process of obtaining the award, the selection process.

Categories

The ECO Award is an international award given yearly for achievements in several categories.

In November 2004, there were 76 ECO Award recipients in different categories listed at http://globalcommunitywebnet.com/global06/listofrecipients.htm

This is the time to send your nomination letters by email at:

globalcommunity@telus.net
or
GlobalConstitution@telus.net

Back to top of page

Approval of the Global Constitution

Issues for discussion in Global Dialogue 2005 include the social dimension of globalisation, debt cancellation, reform of international institutions, global development and Global Parliament with its governing institutions and bodies. The Global Constitution discussed here becomes an integral part of the Global Community governing institutions and bodies. Global Parliament has developed a strategy for implementing the area of freedom, security and justice without borders. This strategy along with the Criteria for Global Citizenship and the Charter of the Global Community have been integrated into the Global Constitution. More development will be published in the coming months.

The joint efforts of progressive people all over the world, whether from politics, trades unions, businesses or NGOs, are needed more than ever to ensure that global policies and institutions become more effective in managing globalisation for the benefit of everyone. The opinion of every Global Community citizen is important.

Global Governance

The Global Community has no intention of changing the status and privileges of state governments. In fact, state governments become primary members of the Global Community. Global governance can only be effective within the framework of a world government or world federalism.

Effective Earth governance requires a greater understanding of what it means to live in a more crowded,

interdependent humanity with finite resources and more pollution threatening the global life-support systems. The Global Community has no other choice but to work together at all levels. The collective power is needed to create a better world.

We will be there to listen to everyone, but also to present our own proposals. We will not agree on everything but we think we can work together on a positive agenda for another kind of globalisation.

The Global Community shares the deep concerns of many organisations and individuals active in the Global Social Dialogue.

They believe that globalisation is currently on the wrong track, unable to eliminate poverty and to put the world on a sustainable and peacful development path.

We will make globalisation work for everyone. We recognise that globalisation has had together with positive effects also some negative ones. To overcome the negative effects, the Global Community must promote a global sustainability through a more generous and targeted aid policy, and must give through the multilateral trading system the world's poorest nations access to our markets to escape the poverty trap.

The world must be built not only as a Global Community of States based on diplomacy, but also by a democratic community of peoples.

We are committed to unlocking the potential of the Global Community, by building on the fundamental principles of freedom, democracy, solidarity, the rule of law, respect for human rights, free enterprise and equal opportunities.

This is also accomplished by promoting peace throughout the Global Community in the federal tradition that respects our diverse cultural, local and linguistic identities, and is open to all Member States which comply with the criteria for membership. A Global Community that can finally vote with a qualified majority system in order to fully exercise the world sovereignty in compliance with the principle of subsidiarity. The ratification and entry into force of the Global Constitution is in this respect essential.

The Global Community is a global player bridging the gap between its economic and political dimension, and speaking with one voice in world affairs. This is why we fully support a Common Foreign and Security Policy which aims to promote a new era of peace, democracy and security.

The full potential of the Global Community is attained by opening up, democratising, making more accountable and strengthening its institutions, also by identifying forms of participation and global dialogue able to bring into the global scene those who at the moment feel excluded. To this end, media pluralism is crucial. Furthermore, to foster common global experiences and the sense of belonging to a single planet-wide community, language training and exchange among students, trainees and volunteers should be stimulated.

We guarantee the fundamental rights of all Global Community citizens and removing all forms of discrimination. In our common fight against international crime and terrorism, we will always remain vigilant against any erosion of personal freedom. A Global Community of security and justice for all is also a Global Community that extends these rights to those who justly seek asylum or a new life. To that effect, the Global Community needs to harmonise asylum policy. The Global Community has to develop a common strategy to manage legal immigration and coordinate action against illegal immigration, and to firmly combat any form of racism and xenophobia. The protection of minorities is the essence of democracy. The issues of freedom, security and justice without borders should be deepened. Intercultural dialogue should be promoted and deepened further.

We believe that the aim of society must be the self-fulfilment of each individual, and that can be accomplished by promoting education at all levels; supporting scientists and researchers; allowing technology transfer; making investments in information, eco-friendly technologies and R&D networks.

The full potential of the Global Community is attained by strengthening economic governance after the introduction of a common currency. A common economic policy must aim to create prosperity, competitiveness and jobs, and keep the Global Community social model viable, by modernising the Global Community economy and fostering an innovative society. In this framework, we must reform world's economy to secure a stable and competitive climate for businesses to invest in innovation and create jobs, to facilitate labour mobility, and to achieve a real single and liberalised market. An effective single market implies also the reduction of the bureaucratic impact of its implementation.

We will ensure that:

our global citizens will obtain value for tax money,
fraud and corruption will be stopped wherever it is found,
tackling unnecessary bureaucracy,
by reforming the system of own resources to make it more transparent, progressive and fair.

Global Community Earth Government will lead the world in environmental protection. This means seeking common solutions to our common environmental, public health problems, consumers protection and food safety. We must commit ourselves to cleaner, safer forms of energy and embrace renewable resource use. The Global Community should work for the achievement of the targets set out in the Kyoto Protocol for reductions in greenhouse gas emissions and for the launch of a follow-up to Kyoto. Environmental and security policies should lay at the core of the Global Community’s cooperation within Member Nations.

The full potential of the Global Community is attained by ensuring a full recognition and enhancement of the role of Global Community’s regions, particularly those with legislative powers, and by building a structural policy which develops the potential of most needy regions. Resources should be used to mobilise additional investments, and cohesion funds should be focused on the poorest regions. The Global Community cannot afford that any of its region lags behind. For a balanced development at home and abroad, it is necessary to create a Common Agricultural Policy.

Name	Title	Date started	Photo and info
Germain Dufour	Chairman	January 4th 2005	info
Eugenia Almand	Adviser Global Government of North America	May 10th, 2005	info
Md. Hasibur Rahman	Adviser Global Government of Asia	July 10, 2005	info

Name	Title	Date started	Photo and info
Germain Dufour	President of the Interim Earth Government President of the Earth Executive Council	August 22, 2000	info
Dr. Sue L.T. McGregor	Minister of Family and Human Development	August 22, 2000	info
James Mwami	Minister of Water Resources Protection	August 22, 2000	info

Send email to gdufour@globalcommunitywebnet.com with questions or comments about this web site. Copyright © 2004 Global Community WebNet Ltd.

Send email to gdufour@globalcommunitywebnet.com with questions or comments about this web site.

Copyright © 2004 Global Community WebNet Ltd.