Peter Dolack hit the nail on the head when he wrote,
"...The intention of “free trade” agreements is to elevate
corporations to the level of governments. In reality, they raise
corporations above the level of governments because only “investors”
can sue; governments and people can’t."
This has been my contention for some time. No longer will our
grandchildren sing, God Bless America..." Instead it will be, "God
Bless Standard Oil...", or some other corporate state to which we owe
allegiance.
Carl Jarvis
On 2/11/17, Miriam Vieni <miriamvieni@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
TPP Is Not Dead: It's Now Called Trade In Services Agreement
By Peter Dolack,
<https://systemicdisorder.wordpress.com/2017/02/08/tisa-worse-than-tpp/>
www.systemicdisorder.wordpress.com
February 10th, 2017
<https://popularresistance.org/tpp-is-not-dead-its-now-called-trade-in-servi
ces-agreement/>
Above Photo: by Annette Dubois
One can hear the cry ringing through the boardrooms of capital: "Free trade
is dead! Long live free trade!"
Think the ideas behind the Trans-Pacific Partnership or the so-called "free
trade" regime are buried? Sadly, no. Definitely, no. Some of the countries
involved in negotiating the TPP seeking to find ways to resurrect it in
some
new form - but that isn't the most distressing news. What's worse is the
TPP
remains alive in a new form with even worse rules. Meet the Trade In
Services Agreement, even more secret than the Trans-Pacific Partnership.
And
more dangerous.
The Trade In Services Agreement (TISA), currently being negotiated among 50
countries, if passed would prohibit regulations on the financial industry,
eliminate laws to safeguard online or digital privacy, render illegal any
"buy local" rules at any level of government, effectively dismantle any
public advantages to be derived from state-owned enterprises and eliminate
net neutrality.
TISA negotiations began in April 2013 and have gone through 21 rounds.
Silence has been the rule for these talks, and we only know what's in it
because of leaks, earlier ones published by WikiLeaks and now a new
<http://www.bilaterals.org/?+-tisa-+> cache published January 29 by
Bilaterals.org.
Earlier draft versions of TISA's language would
<https://systemicdisorder.wordpress.com/2016/06/08/no-regulation-trade-in-se
rvices-agreement/> prohibit any restrictions on the size, expansion or
entry
of financial companies and a ban on new regulations, including a specific
ban on any law that separates commercial and investment banking, such as
the
equivalent of the U.S. Glass-Steagall Act. It would also ban any
restrictions on the transfer of any data collected, including across
borders; place social security systems at risk of privatization or
elimination; and put an
<https://systemicdisorder.wordpress.com/2014/12/24/tisa-censorship-no-privac
y/> end to Internet privacy and net neutrality. It hasn't gotten any more
acceptable.
TISA is the backup plan in case
<https://systemicdisorder.wordpress.com/2015/11/11/why-tpp-text-is-secret/>
the TPP and the
<https://systemicdisorder.wordpress.com/2016/05/04/goodbye-democracy-transat
lantic-partnership/> Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership don't
come to fruition. Perhaps fearful that the recent spotlight put on "free
trade" deals might derail TISA as it derailed TPP, the governmental trade
offices negotiating it have not announced the next negotiating date. The
closest toward any meaningful information found was the Australian
government's
<http://dfat.gov.au/trade/agreements/trade-in-services-agreement/news/Pages/
news.aspx> bland statement that the "Parties agreed to reconvene in 2017."
The cover story for why TISA is being negotiated is that it would uphold
the
right to hire the accountant or engineer of your choice, but in reality is
intended to enable the financial industry and Internet companies to run
roughshod over countries around the world. And while "liberalization" of
professional services is being promoted, the definition of "services" is
being expanded in order to stretch the category to encompass manufacturing.
Deborah James of the Center for Economy and Policy Research
<https://popularresistance.org/there-is-still-one-big-corporate-trade-deal-t
hat-must-be-stopped/> laid out the breathtaking scope of this proposal:
"Corporations no longer consider setting up a plant and producing goods to
be simply 'manufacturing goods.' This activity is now is broken down into
research and development services, design services, legal services, real
estate services, architecture services, engineering services, construction
services, energy services, employment contracting services, consulting
services, manufacturing services, adult education services, payroll
services, maintenance services, refuse disposal services, warehousing
services, data management services, telecommunications services,
audiovisual
services, banking services, accounting services, insurance services,
transportation services, distribution services, marketing services, retail
services, postal and expedited delivery services, and after-sales
servicing,
to name a few. Going further, a shoe or watch that measures steps or sleep
could be a fitness monitoring service, not a good. A driverless car could
be
a transport service, not an automobile. Google and Facebook could be
information services and communication services, respectively."
Why is it you are kept in the dark?
Before we get to the details of the text itself, let's take a quick look at
how the world's governments, on behalf of multi-national capital, are
letting their citizens know what they are up to. Or, to be more accurate,
what they are not telling you. Many governments have not bothered to update
their official pages extolling TISA in months.
The European Union is negotiating TISA on behalf of its 28 member
countries,
along with, among others, the United States, Canada, Mexico, Australia, New
Zealand, Japan, South Korea, Taiwan, Chile, Colombia, Peru, Norway,
Switzerland, Pakistan and Turkey.
In the United States, the new Trump administration has yet to say a word
about it. The Office of the U.S. Trade Representative web site's
<https://ustr.gov/TiSA> page on TISA still says "TiSA is part of the Obama
Administration's ongoing effort to create economic opportunity for U.S.
workers and businesses by expanding trade opportunities." Uh-huh. President
Donald Trump is
<http://www.leftvoice.org/Free-Trade-Agreements-and-the-Dynamics-of-Capitali
sm> not against "free trade" deals; he simply claims he can do it better.
The Trump administration has issued blustery calls for "fair deals" and
braggadocio puffing up Donald Trump's supposed negotiating prowess. A
typical <https://www.whitehouse.gov/trade-deals-working-all-americans>
White House passage reads, "To carry out his strategy, the President is
appointing the toughest and smartest to his trade team, ensuring that
Americans have the best negotiators possible. For too long, trade deals
have
been negotiated by, and for, members of the Washington establishment."
More typical of the TISA negotiators is
<http://trade.ec.europa.eu/doclib/docs/2016/november/tradoc_155095.pdf> the
latest report from the European Commission, which summarized the latest
round, held last November, this way: "Parties made good progress in working
towards an agreed text and finding pathways towards solving the most
controversial outstanding issues at both Chief Negotiators and Heads of
Delegation levels." The Canadian government's
<http://www.international.gc.ca/trade-agreements-accords-commerciaux/topics-
domaines/services/tisa-acs.aspx?lang=eng> last update is from last June and
declares "Parties conducted a stocktaking session to assess the level of
progress on all issues."
Traveling across the Pacific brings no more useful information. Australia's
government offers this
<http://dfat.gov.au/trade/agreements/trade-in-services-agreement/news/Pages/
news.aspx> information-free update: "Parties agreed to a comprehensive
stocktake of the negotiations, identifying progress made and areas which
require ongoing technical work." New Zealand's government can't even be
bothered to provide updates, instead offering only discredited, boilerplate
<https://www.mfat.govt.nz/en/trade/free-trade-agreements/agreements-under-ne
gotiation/tisa/> public-relations puffery similar to other trade offices.
The one hint that TISA negotiations are experiencing difficulty that could
be found through an extensive online search is this passage in a U.S.
<https://fas.org/sgp/crs/misc/R44354.pdf> Congressional Research Service
report dated January 3, 2017: "Recognizing that outstanding issues remain
and the U.S. position under a new administration is unclear, the parties
canceled the planned December 2016 meeting but are meeting to determine how
best to move forward in 2017." Given that the new administration is moving
as fast as possible to eliminate the tepid Dodd-Frank Act
financial-industry
reforms, it would seem TISA's provisions to dismantle financial regulation
globally would not be a problem at all.
But that these talks are not progressing at the present time does not mean
the world can relax. It took years of cross-border organizing and popular
education to stop the TPP, and this effort will have to replicated if TISA
is to be halted.
The details are the devils already known
Commentary accompanying Bilaterals.org's publication of several TISA
chapters stresses that the Trans-Pacific Partnership, despite its apparent
defeat, is nonetheless
<http://www.bilaterals.org/?amidst-political-uncertainty-new> being used as
the model for the Trade In Services Agreement. Thus we are at risk of the
TPP becoming the "new norm":
"Several proposed texts from the failed Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP)
agreement have been transferred to TiSA - including state-owned
enterprises;
rights to hold data offshore (including financial data); e-commerce; and
prohibitions on performance requirements for foreign investors. While these
texts originated with the United States, they appear to be supported by
other parties to the TPP, even though those governments were reluctant to
agree to them in the TPP and will no longer be bound by that agreement.
That
suggests the TPP may become the new norm even though it has only been
ratified in two of the 12 countries, and that was done on the basis of U.S.
participation that no longer applies. TPP cannot be allowed to become the
new 'default' position for these flawed agreements."
Some of the most extreme measures have been dropped (at least for now) and
much of the text is not agreed. Nonetheless, there is nothing to cheer
about, Bilaterals.org reports.
"The effectiveness of opposition to TiSA has led governments to conclude
that they cannot sell some of the more extreme proposals, which have thus
been dropped from previous leaked texts. But the fetters on the rights and
responsibilities of governments to regulate in the interests of their
citizens from what remains would still go further than any single other
agreement. There are no improvements on the inadequate protections for
health, environment, privacy, workers, human rights, or economic
development. And there is nothing to prevent developing countries becoming
even more vulnerable and dependent in an already unequal and unfair global
economy."
Hypocritically, TISA would prohibit developing countries from adopting
measures that countries like the United States used to facilitate its
industrial development when it was an emerging country in the 19th century.
In
<https://wikileaks.org/tisa/New-Provisions/analysis/Analysis-of-TiSA-Annex-o
n-New-Provisions.pdf> an analysis for WikiLeaks, Sanya Reid Smith of the
Third World Network, an international coalition specializing in development
issues, wrote:
"[T]he proposals in this text restrict the ability of developing countries
to use the development paths taken by many of the developed TISA countries.
Some experts call this developed countries 'kicking away the ladder' after
they have climbed up, to prevent developing countries from developing the
same way. . In TISA, the USA is proposing restrictions on host countries
being able to require senior managers be citizens of the host country. Yet
when it was a capital importer, the USA had the opposite law: its 1885
contract labour law prohibited the import of foreign workers, i.e. the USA
required senior managers (and all other staff) be Americans, which
increased
the chances of skills being passed to locals."
Letting banks decide what's good for you
These proposals are more extreme than language in existing bilateral trade
agreements. Many of TISA's provisions are lifted from TPP, but some go
beyond the latter's already extreme proposals For example, not even the TPP
contemplated the entire elimination of regulations of any kind against the
financial industry. Article 14 of TISA's annex on financial services, which
had contained the most explicit language prohibiting regulation, has been
removed, but Article 9 still contains language requiring no limitations
beyond those applying to domestic financial firms. In other words, a
smaller
country would be required to allow a giant bank from a bigger country to
take over its entire banking system.
Incredibly, regulations against financial derivatives yet to be invented
would be illegal. A
<https://wikileaks.org/tisa/analysis/Analysis-of-20150415_Annex-on-Financial
-Services/Analysis-of-20150415_Annex-on-Financial-Services.pdf> Public
Citizen analysis states:
"TISA would require governments to allow any new financial products and
services - including ones not yet invented - to be sold within their
territories. The TISA Annex on Financial Services clearly states that TISA
governments 'shall permit' foreign-owned firms to introduce any new
financial product or service, so long as it does not require a new law or a
change to an existing law."
As another example, the financial-services annex (in article 21) would
require that any government that offers financial products through its
postal service l
<http://www.bilaterals.org/IMG/pdf/financial_services.pdf#21> essen the
quality of its products so that those are no better than what private
corporations offer. Article 1 of the financial-services annex states that
"activities forming part of a statutory system of social security or public
retirement plans" are specifically covered by TISA, as are "activities
conducted by a central bank or monetary authority or by any other public
entity in pursuit of monetary or exchange-rate policies."
That social security or other public retirement systems are covered is
cause
for much alarm because they could be judged to be "illegally competing"
with
private financial enterprises. It is conceivable that central banks could
be
constrained from actions intended to shore up economies during a future
financial crisis if banks decide such measures "constrain" their massive
profiteering off the crisis.
<https://popularresistance-uploads.s3.amazonaws.com/uploads/2017/02/tisa-cou
ntries-e1486734978847.png>
Article 10 of the annex continues to explicitly
<http://www.bilaterals.org/IMG/pdf/financial_services.pdf#12> ban
restrictions on the transfer of information in "electronic or other form"
of
any "financial service supplier." In other words, EU laws guarding privacy
that stop U.S.-based Internet companies from taking data outside the EU to
circumvent those privacy laws would be null and void. Laws instituting
privacy protections would be verboten before they could be enacted. These
rules, if enacted, could also provide a boon to companies like Uber whose
modus operandi is to
<https://systemicdisorder.wordpress.com/2015/08/05/high-tech-exploitation/>
circumvent local laws. The Bilaterals.org analysis accompanying the leaks
<http://www.bilaterals.org/?amidst-political-uncertainty-new> notes:
"The main thrust of TiSA comes through the e-commerce, telecommunications,
financial services and localisation rules and countries' commitments to
allow unfettered cross-border supply of services. Together they would
empower the global platforms who hold big data, like Google, without
effective privacy protections, and tech companies like Uber, who have
become
notorious for evading national regulation, paying minimal tax and
exploiting
so-called self-employed workers. Given the backlash against global deals
for
global corporations TiSA will simply add fuel to the bonfire."
Who interprets the rule is crucial
The language of TISA, like all "free trade" agreements, is dry and
legalistic. How these rules are interpreted is what ultimately matters.
TISA
contains standard language requiring arbitration by judges possessing
"requisite knowledge"; that language means that the usual lineup of
corporate lawyers who represent corporations in these tribunals will switch
hats to sit in judgment. The tribunals used to settle these "investor-state
disputes" are held in secret with no accountability and no appeal.
The intention of "free trade" agreements is to elevate corporations to the
level of governments. In reality, they raise corporations above the level
of
governments because only "investors" can sue; governments and people can't.
"Investors" can sue governments to overturn any law or regulation that they
claim will hurt profits or even potential future profits. On top of this, a
government ordinarily has to pay millions of dollars in costs even in the
rare instances when they win one of these cases.
Each "free trade" agreement has a key provision
<https://systemicdisorder.wordpress.com/2014/01/29/investor-dispute-mechanis
ms/> elevating corporations above governments that codifies the "equal
treatment" of business interests in accordance with international law and
enables corporations to sue over any regulation or other government act
that
violates "investor rights," which means any regulation or law that might
prevent the corporation from extracting the maximum possible profit. Under
these provisions, taxation and regulation constitute "indirect
expropriation" mandating compensation - a reduction in the value of an
asset
is sufficient to establish expropriation rather than a physical taking of
property as required under customary law. Tribunal decisions become
precedents for further expansions of investor "rights" and thus constitute
the "evolving standard of investor rights" required under "free trade"
agreements. TISA contains the usual passages requiring "equal treatment."
At bottom, "free trade" deals have little to do with trade and much to do
with imposing corporate wish lists through undemocratic means, including
the
elimination of any meaningful regulations for labor, safety, health or the
environment. TISA is another route to imposing more of this agenda. And the
TPP itself isn't necessarily dead - both Chile and New Zealand are holding
discussions with other TPP countries to salvage some of the deal. Chile has
invited TPP countries, plus China,
<https://insidetrade.com/daily-news/chilean-official-hopes-upcoming-summit-w
ill-provide-avenue-tpp-deal-chinese-involvement> to a March summit and the
New Zealand
<https://insidetrade.com/daily-news/new-zealands-trade-minister-fact-finding
-trip-tpp-countries> trade minister is visiting Australia, Japan, Mexico
and
Singapore.
Working people around the world scored a major victory in stopping the TPP,
at least in its current form. The activists who achieved this deserve much
credit. But there is far more to do. Capital never rests; nor can we. Here
we have class warfare in naked fashion, and there is no doubt on which side
the capitalist world's governments lie.
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TPP Is Not Dead: It's Now Called Trade In Services Agreement
Educate! <https://popularresistance.org/category/educate/> TISA
<https://popularresistance.org/tag/tisa/> , TPP
<https://popularresistance.org/tag/tpp/>
By Peter Dolack, www.systemicdisorder.wordpress.com
<https://systemicdisorder.wordpress.com/2017/02/08/tisa-worse-than-tpp/>
February 10th, 2017
Powered by https://translate.google.com/Translate
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Above Photo: by Annette Dubois
One can hear the cry ringing through the boardrooms of capital: "Free trade
is dead! Long live free trade!"
Think the ideas behind the Trans-Pacific Partnership or the so-called "free
trade" regime are buried? Sadly, no. Definitely, no. Some of the countries
involved in negotiating the TPP seeking to find ways to resurrect it in
some
new form - but that isn't the most distressing news. What's worse is the
TPP
remains alive in a new form with even worse rules. Meet the Trade In
Services Agreement, even more secret than the Trans-Pacific Partnership.
And
more dangerous.
The Trade In Services Agreement (TISA), currently being negotiated among 50
countries, if passed would prohibit regulations on the financial industry,
eliminate laws to safeguard online or digital privacy, render illegal any
"buy local" rules at any level of government, effectively dismantle any
public advantages to be derived from state-owned enterprises and eliminate
net neutrality.
TISA negotiations began in April 2013 and have gone through 21 rounds.
Silence has been the rule for these talks, and we only know what's in it
because of leaks, earlier ones published by WikiLeaks and now a new cache
published January 29 <http://www.bilaterals.org/?+-tisa-+> by
Bilaterals.org.
Earlier draft versions of TISA's language would prohibit any restrictions
<https://systemicdisorder.wordpress.com/2016/06/08/no-regulation-trade-in-se
rvices-agreement/> on the size, expansion or entry of financial companies
and a ban on new regulations, including a specific ban on any law that
separates commercial and investment banking, such as the equivalent of the
U.S. Glass-Steagall Act. It would also ban any restrictions on the transfer
of any data collected, including across borders; place social security
systems at risk of privatization or elimination; and put an end to Internet
privacy
<https://systemicdisorder.wordpress.com/2014/12/24/tisa-censorship-no-privac
y/> and net neutrality. It hasn't gotten any more acceptable.
TISA is the backup plan in case the TPP
<https://systemicdisorder.wordpress.com/2015/11/11/why-tpp-text-is-secret/>
and the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership
<https://systemicdisorder.wordpress.com/2016/05/04/goodbye-democracy-transat
lantic-partnership/> don't come to fruition. Perhaps fearful that the
recent spotlight put on "free trade" deals might derail TISA as it derailed
TPP, the governmental trade offices negotiating it have not announced the
next negotiating date. The closest toward any meaningful information found
was the Australian government's bland statement that
<http://dfat.gov.au/trade/agreements/trade-in-services-agreement/news/Pages/
news.aspx> the "Parties agreed to reconvene in 2017."
The cover story for why TISA is being negotiated is that it would uphold
the
right to hire the accountant or engineer of your choice, but in reality is
intended to enable the financial industry and Internet companies to run
roughshod over countries around the world. And while "liberalization" of
professional services is being promoted, the definition of "services" is
being expanded in order to stretch the category to encompass manufacturing.
Deborah James of the Center for Economy and Policy Research laid out the
breathtaking scope
<https://popularresistance.org/there-is-still-one-big-corporate-trade-deal-t
hat-must-be-stopped/> of this proposal:
"Corporations no longer consider setting up a plant and producing goods to
be simply 'manufacturing goods.' This activity is now is broken down into
research and development services, design services, legal services, real
estate services, architecture services, engineering services, construction
services, energy services, employment contracting services, consulting
services, manufacturing services, adult education services, payroll
services, maintenance services, refuse disposal services, warehousing
services, data management services, telecommunications services,
audiovisual
services, banking services, accounting services, insurance services,
transportation services, distribution services, marketing services, retail
services, postal and expedited delivery services, and after-sales
servicing,
to name a few. Going further, a shoe or watch that measures steps or sleep
could be a fitness monitoring service, not a good. A driverless car could
be
a transport service, not an automobile. Google and Facebook could be
information services and communication services, respectively."
Why is it you are kept in the dark?
Before we get to the details of the text itself, let's take a quick look at
how the world's governments, on behalf of multi-national capital, are
letting their citizens know what they are up to. Or, to be more accurate,
what they are not telling you. Many governments have not bothered to update
their official pages extolling TISA in months.
The European Union is negotiating TISA on behalf of its 28 member
countries,
along with, among others, the United States, Canada, Mexico, Australia, New
Zealand, Japan, South Korea, Taiwan, Chile, Colombia, Peru, Norway,
Switzerland, Pakistan and Turkey.
In the United States, the new Trump administration has yet to say a word
about it. The Office of the U.S. Trade Representative web site's page on
TISA <https://ustr.gov/TiSA> still says "TiSA is part of the Obama
Administration's ongoing effort to create economic opportunity for U.S.
workers and businesses by expanding trade opportunities." Uh-huh. President
Donald Trump is not against
<http://www.leftvoice.org/Free-Trade-Agreements-and-the-Dynamics-of-Capitali
sm> "free trade" deals; he simply claims he can do it better. The Trump
administration has issued blustery calls for "fair deals" and braggadocio
puffing up Donald Trump's supposed negotiating prowess. A typical White
House passage
<https://www.whitehouse.gov/trade-deals-working-all-americans>
reads, "To carry out his strategy, the President is appointing the toughest
and smartest to his trade team, ensuring that Americans have the best
negotiators possible. For too long, trade deals have been negotiated by,
and
for, members of the Washington establishment."
More typical of the TISA negotiators is the latest report
<http://trade.ec.europa.eu/doclib/docs/2016/november/tradoc_155095.pdf>
from the European Commission, which summarized the latest round, held last
November, this way: "Parties made good progress in working towards an
agreed
text and finding pathways towards solving the most controversial
outstanding
issues at both Chief Negotiators and Heads of Delegation levels." The
Canadian government's last update
<http://www.international.gc.ca/trade-agreements-accords-commerciaux/topics-
domaines/services/tisa-acs.aspx?lang=eng> is from last June and declares
"Parties conducted a stocktaking session to assess the level of progress on
all issues."
Traveling across the Pacific brings no more useful information. Australia's
government offers this information-free update
<http://dfat.gov.au/trade/agreements/trade-in-services-agreement/news/Pages/
news.aspx> : "Parties agreed to a comprehensive stocktake of the
negotiations, identifying progress made and areas which require ongoing
technical work." New Zealand's government can't even be bothered to provide
updates, instead offering only discredited, boilerplate public-relations
puffery
<https://www.mfat.govt.nz/en/trade/free-trade-agreements/agreements-under-ne
gotiation/tisa/> similar to other trade offices.
The one hint that TISA negotiations are experiencing difficulty that could
be found through an extensive online search is this passage in a U.S.
Congressional Research Service report
<https://fas.org/sgp/crs/misc/R44354.pdf> dated January 3, 2017:
"Recognizing that outstanding issues remain and the U.S. position under a
new administration is unclear, the parties canceled the planned December
2016 meeting but are meeting to determine how best to move forward in
2017."
Given that the new administration is moving as fast as possible to
eliminate
the tepid Dodd-Frank Act financial-industry reforms, it would seem TISA's
provisions to dismantle financial regulation globally would not be a
problem
at all.
But that these talks are not progressing at the present time does not mean
the world can relax. It took years of cross-border organizing and popular
education to stop the TPP, and this effort will have to replicated if TISA
is to be halted.
The details are the devils already known
Commentary accompanying Bilaterals.org's publication of several TISA
chapters stresses that the Trans-Pacific Partnership, despite its apparent
defeat, is nonetheless being used as the model
<http://www.bilaterals.org/?amidst-political-uncertainty-new> for the
Trade
In Services Agreement. Thus we are at risk of the TPP becoming the "new
norm":
"Several proposed texts from the failed Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP)
agreement have been transferred to TiSA - including state-owned
enterprises;
rights to hold data offshore (including financial data); e-commerce; and
prohibitions on performance requirements for foreign investors. While these
texts originated with the United States, they appear to be supported by
other parties to the TPP, even though those governments were reluctant to
agree to them in the TPP and will no longer be bound by that agreement.
That
suggests the TPP may become the new norm even though it has only been
ratified in two of the 12 countries, and that was done on the basis of U.S.
participation that no longer applies. TPP cannot be allowed to become the
new 'default' position for these flawed agreements."
Some of the most extreme measures have been dropped (at least for now) and
much of the text is not agreed. Nonetheless, there is nothing to cheer
about, Bilaterals.org reports.
"The effectiveness of opposition to TiSA has led governments to conclude
that they cannot sell some of the more extreme proposals, which have thus
been dropped from previous leaked texts. But the fetters on the rights and
responsibilities of governments to regulate in the interests of their
citizens from what remains would still go further than any single other
agreement. There are no improvements on the inadequate protections for
health, environment, privacy, workers, human rights, or economic
development. And there is nothing to prevent developing countries becoming
even more vulnerable and dependent in an already unequal and unfair global
economy."
Hypocritically, TISA would prohibit developing countries from adopting
measures that countries like the United States used to facilitate its
industrial development when it was an emerging country in the 19th century.
In an analysis for
<https://wikileaks.org/tisa/New-Provisions/analysis/Analysis-of-TiSA-Annex-o
n-New-Provisions.pdf> WikiLeaks, Sanya Reid Smith of the Third World
Network, an international coalition specializing in development issues,
wrote:
"[T]he proposals in this text restrict the ability of developing countries
to use the development paths taken by many of the developed TISA countries.
Some experts call this developed countries 'kicking away the ladder' after
they have climbed up, to prevent developing countries from developing the
same way. . In TISA, the USA is proposing restrictions on host countries
being able to require senior managers be citizens of the host country. Yet
when it was a capital importer, the USA had the opposite law: its 1885
contract labour law prohibited the import of foreign workers, i.e. the USA
required senior managers (and all other staff) be Americans, which
increased
the chances of skills being passed to locals."
Letting banks decide what's good for you
These proposals are more extreme than language in existing bilateral trade
agreements. Many of TISA's provisions are lifted from TPP, but some go
beyond the latter's already extreme proposals For example, not even the TPP
contemplated the entire elimination of regulations of any kind against the
financial industry. Article 14 of TISA's annex on financial services, which
had contained the most explicit language prohibiting regulation, has been
removed, but Article 9 still contains language requiring no limitations
beyond those applying to domestic financial firms. In other words, a
smaller
country would be required to allow a giant bank from a bigger country to
take over its entire banking system.
Incredibly, regulations against financial derivatives yet to be invented
would be illegal. A Public Citizen analysis
<https://wikileaks.org/tisa/analysis/Analysis-of-20150415_Annex-on-Financial
-Services/Analysis-of-20150415_Annex-on-Financial-Services.pdf> states:
"TISA would require governments to allow any new financial products and
services - including ones not yet invented - to be sold within their
territories. The TISA Annex on Financial Services clearly states that TISA
governments 'shall permit' foreign-owned firms to introduce any new
financial product or service, so long as it does not require a new law or a
change to an existing law."
As another example, the financial-services annex (in article 21) would
require that any government that offers financial products through its
postal service lessen the quality
<http://www.bilaterals.org/IMG/pdf/financial_services.pdf#21> of its
products so that those are no better than what private corporations offer.
Article 1 of the financial-services annex states that "activities forming
part of a statutory system of social security or public retirement plans"
are specifically covered by TISA, as are "activities conducted by a central
bank or monetary authority or by any other public entity in pursuit of
monetary or exchange-rate policies."
That social security or other public retirement systems are covered is
cause
for much alarm because they could be judged to be "illegally competing"
with
private financial enterprises. It is conceivable that central banks could
be
constrained from actions intended to shore up economies during a future
financial crisis if banks decide such measures "constrain" their massive
profiteering off the crisis.
https://popularresistance-uploads.s3.amazonaws.com/uploads/2017/02/tisa-coun
tries-e1486734978847.pnghttps://popularresistance-uploads.s3.amazonaws.com/u
ploads/2017/02/tisa-countries-e1486734978847.png
Article 10 of the annex continues to explicitly ban restrictions on the
transfer <http://www.bilaterals.org/IMG/pdf/financial_services.pdf#12> of
information in "electronic or other form" of any "financial service
supplier." In other words, EU laws guarding privacy that stop U.S.-based
Internet companies from taking data outside the EU to circumvent those
privacy laws would be null and void. Laws instituting privacy protections
would be verboten before they could be enacted. These rules, if enacted,
could also provide a boon to companies like Uber whose modus operandi is to
circumvent local laws
<https://systemicdisorder.wordpress.com/2015/08/05/high-tech-exploitation/>
. The Bilaterals.org analysis accompanying the leaks notes
<http://www.bilaterals.org/?amidst-political-uncertainty-new> :
"The main thrust of TiSA comes through the e-commerce, telecommunications,
financial services and localisation rules and countries' commitments to
allow unfettered cross-border supply of services. Together they would
empower the global platforms who hold big data, like Google, without
effective privacy protections, and tech companies like Uber, who have
become
notorious for evading national regulation, paying minimal tax and
exploiting
so-called self-employed workers. Given the backlash against global deals
for
global corporations TiSA will simply add fuel to the bonfire."
Who interprets the rule is crucial
The language of TISA, like all "free trade" agreements, is dry and
legalistic. How these rules are interpreted is what ultimately matters.
TISA
contains standard language requiring arbitration by judges possessing
"requisite knowledge"; that language means that the usual lineup of
corporate lawyers who represent corporations in these tribunals will switch
hats to sit in judgment. The tribunals used to settle these "investor-state
disputes" are held in secret with no accountability and no appeal.
The intention of "free trade" agreements is to elevate corporations to the
level of governments. In reality, they raise corporations above the level
of
governments because only "investors" can sue; governments and people can't.
"Investors" can sue governments to overturn any law or regulation that they
claim will hurt profits or even potential future profits. On top of this, a
government ordinarily has to pay millions of dollars in costs even in the
rare instances when they win one of these cases.
Each "free trade" agreement has a key provision elevating corporations
above
governments
<https://systemicdisorder.wordpress.com/2014/01/29/investor-dispute-mechanis
ms/> that codifies the "equal treatment" of business interests in
accordance with international law and enables corporations to sue over any
regulation or other government act that violates "investor rights," which
means any regulation or law that might prevent the corporation from
extracting the maximum possible profit. Under these provisions, taxation
and
regulation constitute "indirect expropriation" mandating compensation - a
reduction in the value of an asset is sufficient to establish expropriation
rather than a physical taking of property as required under customary law.
Tribunal decisions become precedents for further expansions of investor
"rights" and thus constitute the "evolving standard of investor rights"
required under "free trade" agreements. TISA contains the usual passages
requiring "equal treatment."
At bottom, "free trade" deals have little to do with trade and much to do
with imposing corporate wish lists through undemocratic means, including
the
elimination of any meaningful regulations for labor, safety, health or the
environment. TISA is another route to imposing more of this agenda. And the
TPP itself isn't necessarily dead - both Chile and New Zealand are holding
discussions with other TPP countries to salvage some of the deal. Chile has
invited TPP countries, plus China, to a March summit
<https://insidetrade.com/daily-news/chilean-official-hopes-upcoming-summit-w
ill-provide-avenue-tpp-deal-chinese-involvement> and the New Zealand trade
minister is visiting
<https://insidetrade.com/daily-news/new-zealands-trade-minister-fact-finding
-trip-tpp-countries> Australia, Japan, Mexico and Singapore.
Working people around the world scored a major victory in stopping the TPP,
at least in its current form. The activists who achieved this deserve much
credit. But there is far more to do. Capital never rests; nor can we. Here
we have class warfare in naked fashion, and there is no doubt on which side
the capitalist world's governments lie.