Fair Trade in Action
At the WTO talks in Cancun, Bureaucrash activists set up a "fair trade vs free trade" soda stand, allowing thirsty protesters to decide whether they wanted to pay jacked up "fair" soda prices. Most, surprise surprise, did not. Some "anarchists" then enacted their own form of trade barrier-cum-censorship by forming a human chain around the 'Crashers. I guess this is the version of "anarchism" where all the things governments do are actually OK, so long as they're instead done by black-clad mobs imbued with superior social conscience. Maybe we should rename it "sanctimoniocracy."
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Humans are political animals. Therefor anarchism does not exist and will never exist. Free market “anarchists” are really just advocating a differnet type of government.
Same goes for the leftist “anarchists.”
The question is what level of authority is necessary for the good life, liberty, social justice, etc.
In this situation, the leftist anarchists have proved they support an authority that supports none of the above and is disasterous for poor workers and US consumers.
Big fucking surprise.
Link: http://bureaucrash.com/blogs/hq/000550.shtml
Julian, you have….
Anarchy, on a certain level anyway, could exist if a government dissolved itself or was overthrown without any officially recognized authority taking its place. But there’s the rub: if someone has a gun to your head, does it matter much if he’s “official”?
To further the educational benefit of Bureaucrash’s soda stand, I would like to see how they come up with the cost of the fair trade versus free trade. What are the protectionist barriers to push the fair trade soda value up to $2?
Whats to say that bureaucrash didn’t “subsidize” their free trade soda to make a biased point? There is no doubt that people will take the less expensive route more than 2/3 of the time. However, if the $2 soda gets them health care and protection from terrorism while rebuilding invaded countries and getting an immediate thirst quencher at the same time, they might consider that one hell of a deal.
Now before I get slammed for bringing up these questions, I want everyone to know that this was discussed at the office “coffe pot” Monday morning forum on the weekend’s event.
JSM:
>>Whats to say that bureaucrash didn’t “subsidize” their free trade soda to make a biased point?
That would make them liars, as the cheaper “free trade” soda woundn’t be based on free trade. Are you calling them liars?
>>However, if the $2 soda gets them health care and protection from terrorism while rebuilding invaded countries
Yes, but you are _forcing_ the consumer to pay for these things. Obviously people would rather pay less, why do their opinions count less than other workers? And the people getting free health care et al still pay to have to pay for higher soda. How are they comming out ahead? And if they are coming out ahead, is it right for soda produerces to _profit_ at the expense of other workers? Doesn’t sound like “fair” trade to me.
Anarchy exists in a number of places on this planet right now today – the Afghan/Paki border region, big chunks of Africa, probably significant areas of IndoChina, are all places where no government writ runs. They are without exception pestilential hellholes. Draw your own conclusions.
Who cares about theoretical anarchism — what an old, tired debate — what counts is that Bureaucrash did absolutely outstanding, cutting edge activism down in Cancun on a shoestring budget — they should be applauded and I hope lots of libertarians interested in good activism and capturing the youth market take note. I hopet o see more activism like it in the future — check out the rest of their work in Cancun and elsewhere at http://www.bureaucrash.com
(I do not work for Bureaucrash, not do I usually gush so much, I swear)
SPUR
Let’s take a look at the average profile of your typical World Bank / IMF protester, shall we? Your average World Bank / IMF protester found in Cancun:
-Hails from suburban America
-Grew up in an upper-middle-class household, and has never really had to work for anything
-During High School or, more likely, college, after hitting the bong and attending a few Grateful Dead-sque Shows or Punk Rock Shows, developed an ultra-liberal point of view
-Wants to tear down the system, but does not really understand what exactly he/she is trying to tear down
-If he/she could actually graduate from college, would enjoy joining the peace corps
-Hates mom and dad but loves their credit card
-Thinks Bill Gates is evil but uses MS Windows every day
-Is a pacifist, but willing to get violent with anyone that opposes his/her views
-Enjoys the image of driving a Volkswagon
-Is against the domination of Western Technology and economic system, but if you take his/her cellphone, playstation, or ATM card, he/she won’t think twice to bust a cap in yo’ @ss
I spoke at length on the subject of “Fair Trade” coffee with a friend of mine who owns and operates a trendy cafe in Victoria, Canada. The city is a haven for the progressive/organic/enviro/labour/activist segment of society. As such, (and in the interest of social justice) he chose to exlusively carry organic, “Fair Traded” coffee on his menu.
While the beans cost nearly 3 times as much, they only added a few cents per cup to his cost. So pricing his beverages at 25 cents above the average $1.50 / 12 oz cup, while appealing to his customers collective social conscience, seemed reasonable. Unfortunely, most people were not willing to pay the higher price despite his marketing efforts. The folks who were coming in for food and getting a coffee as well didn’t seem too concerned, nor did some of his ethically-minded regular customers, but those who stopped in solely for coffee started to go to cheaper “un-fair trade” competitors.
He ended up dropping his price back to the previous level, and took the hit to his profit margin.
If it was really free trade, they’d let me haggle over the price of the soda.
Fantastic. Completely Fantastic. Thanks for the Bureaucrash link, I’d never heard of them before.
This post left me wondering – where was the bar at this event? Who on earth goes to a conference without a bar?
On his personal blog, Julian has made clear that there are things that are okay for individuals (or groupings thereof) to do which are not okay for governments. Perhaps the “anarchists” in question agree!
That said, I’ve long wondered about the assumption that preventing people from going where they want counts as “non-violent protest.”
ANON 2:40:
“That would make them liars, as the cheaper “free trade” soda woundn’t be based on free trade. Are you calling them liars?”?
No, I would call it an uninformed observer curious as to how these prices were determined. If you want people to buy into the better system, show them how it works. Of course, with some people, Fischer-Price couldn’t even explain it to them!
However, your second point is exactly what people need to know and the spin doctors need to leave alone. Hopefully, and I am willing to bet, that is exactly what the bureaucrash folks running the stand told their customers. Its cleverness needs bigger media attention.
From Brad S.
“Let’s take a look at the average profile of your typical World Bank / IMF protester, shall we? Your average World Bank / IMF protester found in Cancun:”
this is completely wrong, most the protestors were poor campesinos from Mexico and central America
While this clever attempt at media attention is appreciated (I rank it up there with the “affirmitive action bake sale” in michigan for its entertainment value), would a “free trade” price entail the soda-sellers taking money from their friends to lower the price of their soda to undercut the price of the “fair price” soda?
Real anarchy is a state where the one with the most bullets is in charge, essentially.
foyodor says that one group of people stopping another group of people from going somewhere in particular is non-violent protest.
If I as a private citizen, with bills to pay and mouths to feed, can’t get into my factory in the morning because a bunch people have formed a human chain, what am to do? I’ll cut my analogy short by saying just that someone is going to get hurt.
Two of the three posts I have written tonight have involved punching, . . . must be too much of that “free trade” coffee I’m drinking.
It always occurs to me to clarify after I’ve pushed ‘post.’
The point against foyos’ non-violent protest schtick is that his people using a human chain or whatever is imposing physical restraint on another citizen.
Therefore it is not non-violent. The only way a picket line or human chain can keep me out of my office tomorrow is to physically resist my attempts at entering the building.
Ray
I dont’t read fyodor’s post that way. Perhaps you should re-read it.
Yes, I think I read that wrong.
Sorry foyodor.
I was cooking dinner and bouncing back and forth, I’ll be more careful. (Dinner was tasty though.)
“Anarchy, on a certain level anyway, could exist if a government dissolved itself or was overthrown without any officially recognized authority taking its place.”
Yeah, but at some point, someone is going to take over. Nature abhors a vacuum, and all that. Steet gangs and the mob are really just local governments filling a vacuum left by the big government–when it bans things people are going to do anyway.
To querstion whether the lower price were the result of a subsidy _is_ to question their honesty, but is not calling them “liars”—it is rather calling them “propagandists”.
On a purely nerdy note, even if they’re just charging what they paid for the “free trade” soda, how do we know that the price they paid was a “free trade” price. More than answers, I want them to show their work, dammit, with footnotes.
The unpopularity of the “free trade” soda could be linked to people thirsty enough to buy from these folks, but in strong enough disagreement with them that they don’t want to give them much more money than they have to.
“Human chains ‘force’?”: any movement whose sole arbiter of morality is the question, “Who has initiated force or fraud?” will usually decide (mirabile dictu!) that its opponents’ usage of force is initiative, and their friends’, defensive.
“Let’s take a look at the average profile of your typical World Bank / IMF protester, shall we? Your average World Bank / IMF protester found in Cancun:”: I’m glad you had the time to take such exhaustive survey data from the protesters. But you forgot to mention their big noses and pony-tails; I guess the “Mallard Fillmore” version will see to this sin of omission in an otherwise gratifying post.
“One such “anarchist” I’m aware of claimed he was entitled to hack and disable the website of anyone he deemed a “racist” or “fascist”; not only that, but he was likewise entitled to hack the sites of anyone who questioned his right to do the former.”
Sounds like John Ashcroft (or the RIAA).
Pysander Looner,
Let’s see, which of the following could more plausibly be said to be initiating force:
1) the people who set up the stand, and sold only to those who willingly walked up and bought from it;
2) the people who chose to spend their money there; or
3) the people who physically prevented other people from going where they wanted or freely interacting with other people?
Hmmmm, that’s a real stumper. Any philosophy majors out there want to tackle it?
A good point in this case, but more generally anarchists have a point about the artificial nature of defining ‘initiation’ as ‘after I have used all the force I need’.
Pysander: Soda is probably not subsidized or subject to trade barriors, so it was obvsiously just a simulation. Without a huge economic discussion on why, I consider it a good one.
What do you want? Them to import a bunch of agracultural products and try to sell it to the crowd? They were just making a statement. And a smarter one that the crude brownshirts that tried to shut them down.
Soda is massively subsidised via explicit subsidies to corn-growers, the maintenance of highways for transport, and the usual massive Statist subsidies implicit in the use of the threat of force to protect the ‘ownership’ of huge tracts of land not so tenable in the State of Nature (see T. Paine’s “Agrarian Justice”) and the benefits of State-created limited liability and protection in bankruptcy.
Pysander Looner & others,
Before the debate over the scientific merit of Bureaucrash’s soda stand experiment goes any further, let me clarify: This wasn’t our point at all.
We didn’t set up our soda stand to see whether or not all the fair-trade activists would buy soda at fair-trade prices. To be honest, I don’t think any of us involved could care less about the results of the “sale”.
Our point in setting up this soda stand was to make people realize the effects of the policies they?re pushing for. We wanted to create a dilemma in the minds of the fair-trade activists, in order to make them think about whether the benefits they?re seeking from regulated (?fair?) trade outweigh the costs, and who it is that they?re ideas would really be hurting. They claim to be standing up for the rights of the working class & the poor – and I honestly think that they believe that?s what they?re doing – but the poor & the working class are the very people who would be most affected by the increase in the price of basic goods that their demands call for. Our point was to make this fact clear.
It?s ideas such as these that stick in the minds of people, whereas the results of an unscientific experiment would fade and fail to convince. We didn?t go to Cancun to do experiments; we went to start the spread of our ideas throughout the culture of the youth who were there to protest them. I don?t know that any of the other Bureaucrashers in Cancun would have put their asses on the line like they did to do something as ineffective as the former. I know I certainly wouldn?t have.
If you?re interested in reading more about our actions in Cancun, take a look at the http://www.FreeTradeNow.com website. I?m currently working on compiling a video of the Crash-a-cola project, which will be posted to the ?Dispatches? section in the next few days.
All The Best,
Shane S.
Bureaucrash Activist