This Asia-Europe Joint Consultation on "Challenging Globalization: Solidarity and Search for Alternatives" takes place even as the 'Asian financial crisis' continues to deepen and spread across continents. The conference sees this Asian and world economic crisis in the context of globalization, as rooted in the structures, policies and politics that have been shaping the global economic order in the last three decades under the heading of neoliberalism.

Globalization as a historic process is not new. It has been going on since the inception of the modern world market system. However, it has acquired new features with the breakdown of the Bretton Woods system in the early seventies and with the consequent emergence of finance capital as the primary moving force in the world market. The policy pursued by the OECD countries after the breakdown of the old financial order helped create new financial markets in the so-called 'emerging markets' in the South and Eastern Europe. At the same time, the new rules of the global market formulated primarily by the World Bank, IMF, and more recently, the WTO, and inspired by neoliberal economics have rendered the national policies of some countries and regions irrelevant, exposing the most vulnerable sectors of society to the mercy of the market while favoring only a few. In some cases, whole countries have been marginalized and their development status thrown back by as much as 20 years.

The issue of the loss of national sovereignty to the transnational companies today is much more complex since the transnational companies have not only grown in power but have also managed to manipulate the policies of nation-states in order to pursue their narrow corporate interests. Some states have made efforts, in varying degrees, against the undesirable effects of globalization. The adverse social and economic impacts of globalization push people's movements, both in the North and the South, to resist and struggle for positive social, political and economic changes over a broad range of regions and issues. Globalization is not a unilinear, monolithic process but a multifaceted and highly contradictory one.

Globalization in general and neoliberal globalization in particular have had a very deep impact on the fabric of social relations. Globalization affects labor markets and labor relations, migration, the use and control of resources, human rights, democracy, cultures and traditions and gender relations; and has a tendency to increase ethnic and racial conflicts in ways which have sometimes led to civil wars. Despite the adverse impacts of globalization, however, peoples of both the North and the South have managed to create space for struggle over the social, economic, political and cultural issues impinging on their lives. People's organizations and NGOs should contribute to widening these spaces for struggle and resistance, and for seeking new alternatives.

On October 7-10, more than 60 representatives of NGOs, advocates and groups from Asia and Europe met in Hong Kong to jointly discuss the phenomenon of globalization. Our objectives were to deepen our understanding of globalization and its impact on people, discuss ways of challenging and resisting globalization, explore alternatives, and forge stronger partnerships.

The conference deliberated on the following issues:

LABOR

The conference noted the following trends in the labor market: fragmentation of work and the workforce at the national and international levels; widespread informalization; intensification of labor migration; feminization of labor; and massive retrenchments and layoffs aggravating the crisis of employment associated with the pattern of jobless growth. There has been a consequent radical erosion of labor rights, making it more difficult for workers to represent their interests in the company and political levels, and reducing the strength of traditional unions. Thus there is a need for new ways of organizing and representing labor interests.

With regard to the formal sector, the conference recognizes the importance of universally observing core labor standards. It welcomes the various relevant international agreements but demands more effective mechanisms for implementing them.

With regard to the informal sector, there is a need to develop strong organizations for the protection and empowerment of workers and to adopt minimum "safety nets." The conference takes note of the positive impact, limited though it may be, of such initiatives to minimize labor exploitation as pressuring transnational companies to observe codes of conduct and pressuring governments to adopt and implement core labor rights and international standards, including for migrants, informal sector workers and the unemployed.

The linkage between labor standards and trade/investment regimes as a way of protecting workers remains a contentious issue even among civil society groups. Advocates of this idea are calling for the rethinking of the linkage to take WTO and other international bodies into consideration.

The conference participants are united on the need to address economic and social issues as an indivisible whole. We see the need for increased solidarity, defined in part as working against the further fragmentation of the global workforce and the unemployed. One possible avenue for solidarity action is pressure for the enforcement of core labor rights and standards.

RURAL ECONOMIES

Neoliberal globalization has everywhere marginalized the peasant sector. This marginalization has been intensified by the agribusiness TNCs' domination of world agriculture facilitated by the "Green Revolution"; by the unequal liberalization of agricultural trade, including especially European Union and United States subsidy policies; by corporate monopoly of biotechnology; and by the withdrawal of government supports for agriculture and bias towards the industrial sector.

Moreover, this marginalization is aided by governments' lack of political will to carry out genuine agrarian reform. The overall effects of these processes are the following: landlessness and joblessness; unviability of farms; poverty, indebtedness and destitution of peasants; loss or erosion of land rights, loss of on-farm decision-making; overexploitation of natural resources; depletion of genetic resources; water scarcity; and soil erosion. The breakdown of rural economies, with its attendant massive rural unemployment, has also led to migration and the displacement of communities; beyond the peasant sectors, it has led to the loss of food security at a global level.

Other critical issues posed by globalization to the rural sector include the monopoly of food production by the North, which contributes to undermining food security; the effects of IMF structural adjustment programs (SAPs); the withdrawal of necessary government supports in the South; and a broad range of issues confronting indigenous peoples.

HUMAN RIGHTS

Globalization creates pressures not only for economic but also for political issues, which are increasingly interconnected. While political accountability becomes ever more essential in response to the pressures of globalization it also becomes harder to achieve because of these same pressures.

One crucial focus in the struggle over globalization should be the pressure for democratization on all levels and in all spheres of politics. This includes both democratization at the national levels and the democratic restructuring of international organizations, particularly the World Bank, International Monetary Fund and World Trade Organization.

The recognition of human rights is an essential element of democratization. The conference stressed the need for the implementation and adoption of existing human rights instruments. The basic values contained in the human rights instruments have to orient the political sphere at the national level; each state has the responsibility to fulfill the basic needs of the people. But these values also have to guide the principles of politics within the international organizations. Civil society has a crucial role to play in confronting official decision-making bodies at all levels, in forcing them to live up to their responsibilities. The central element of democratization is the strengthening of civil society as a countervailing power to the economically and politically dominant forces. Our understanding of civil society is emancipatory.

The politics of Western countries are highly contradictory when it comes to human rights. On the one hand they push for the recognition especially of political rights, while on the other they pursue policies which not only impede the realization of economic, social, and cultural rights (e.g., SAPs) but also endanger the exercise of political rights. This is becoming perfectly clear in the present economic crisis.

The realization of social, economic and cultural rights has to proceed from the understanding that these constitute a right to life. As a step in this direction there is a need for systematic collation of data on the impact of the economic crisis on such most vulnerable and affected sectors as women and children; migrants; refugees; victims of violence; peasants; and the unemployed, both in the South and the North. The commonality of these problems calls for solidarity across national and North/South dividing lines and for more creative and effective ways of working towards the enforcement of human rights.

Foreign debt has caused the impoverishment of peoples by depriving them of their dignity and their right to survive. Debt cancellation for the poor countries before the year 2000 is crucial to claiming people's basic rights.

As substantive democracy is threatened everywhere in the world, there is a need for deeper consultation on democracy among the participants of this conference and for further North-South dialogues.

Thus the task for human rights is to improve the quality of and defend the right to life. The right to life is the source of all other rights, yet it is threatened everywhere by poverty and violence. North-South dialogue must concentrate on the defense of the right to life, economically as well as politically. The easy tolerance of death and destruction need to be exposed as negations of the right to life. Democratization both in the West and the East must be founded on the premise of defending the right to life.

The conference stressed the need for the implementation of human rights instruments.

GENDER

Patriarchy has permeated all aspects of the lives of women and gender discrimination has intensified in the age of globalization, as women have become increasingly absorbed into worldwide economic processes. While these processes may sometimes have opened up new economic possibilities for women they have also almost invariably lead to new and serious problems. These include such gender-specific forms of exploitation as trafficking in women; forced prostitution; feminization of labor; feminization of cheap labor; feminization of poverty; and feminization of migration.

Women have suffered some of the worst effects of globalization. These include the deterioration of public services as a result of privatization; other measures of structural adjustment (subsidy cuts); the transformation of the farming sector, including its ecological consequences; and the breakup of families under the economic and cultural pressures emanating from globalization. Work in the home and other forms of domestic labor continue to be economically and socially undervalued. Globalization and patriarchal culture entrench women in specific roles (domestic workers, plantation workers, entertainment workers, etc.) while treating their bodies as commodities.

There is a need to strengthen the discussion of gender issues in political communication dialogue and action. There is also a need to integrate gender perspective in challenging globalization, patriarchy and other oppressive systems as well as in building alternatives to them. Such an integration would also reflect the increasing role women play in the present economic and social struggles throughout the world.

CULTURE AND IDENTITY

The impact of globalization on cultures is complex and ambiguous. While on the one hand globalization has opened up new possibilities and opportunities (worldwide communication, exchanges among people, etc.), on the other hand it has created a lot of pressure on various cultures, including trends towards the homogenization of lifestyles as in consumption patterns; consumerist values; communication patterns; styles of urbanization; and the loss of some cultural systems. Homogenization does not exclude domination by centralized culture and the possibilities for abuse and manipulation of cultural identities for political purposes. Indeed, such manipulation seems to be increasing.

The issue of identity has to be considered fundamentally and in relation to our own work and environments. The negative effects of identity politics (pitting one social group against the other) can operate even within and among NGOs and people's organizations. Very often we are caught in the trap of dualistic discourse, structured by the distinction between 'them' and 'us,' between 'dominant' and 'dependent' cultures. There is a need to look for mutual respect and recognition and also towards open communication and creative interaction between cultures, recognizing that cultures are not static but have their own dynamics of change. Such communication and creative interaction do not imply glossing over conflicts of interest but could make it possible to spell them out more clearly. We recognize that culture and communication are affected by the constellations of political and economic power in which they take place.

We commend the struggles of indigenous peoples to maintain their cultural self-expression and integrity in the face of colonialism and neoliberal globalization.

CONCLUSION

Despite the often reiterated claims of its proponents, neoliberal globalization will not solve the problems of inequality. Nor will it feed, clothe, educate, and empower the majority of the world's people. On the contrary it has been a major factor in rendering increasing numbers of the world's people hungry, homeless, destitute, illiterate and powerless in all areas of their lives. What will empower people is their resistance to these processes and their participation in building viable political and economic alternatives. The conference takes note of the need to develop new development paradigms, ones challenging the dominant neoliberal thinking which relies solely on market forces. The conference also sees the urgency of peoples' movements and NGOs pressuring both national governments and international institutions for reforms focussed on people's welfare and basic needs rather than on policies favoring international capital.

Even as North-South issues have been sharpened, there is increasing need for those in both the North and South who suffer the consequences of globalization to act in solidarity with each other. Within this solidarity, first and foremost, the issues of those who are 'losers' in the process of globalization must be raised. But this by itself is not sufficient. The issues do not only concern 'losers' and 'winners' but are in the final analysis issues of unjust structures that demand alternatives to neoliberal 'business as usual' posturing. While solidarity incorporates the willingness for each to listen to the other and to respect the other's views it must be understood first and foremost as a question of justice and, with justice, of humanity.

The conference agrees on the necessity to develop varied and creative forms of alliance and strategy in the aid of genuine solidarity.

For the grassroots who are everyday resisting and fighting battles for survival, the urgent task remains: to organize, organize, organize. But in organizing, we have to build new forms of organizations, patterns of relationships that are more equitable and just, that integrate popular participation, and that generate new cultures that go against the logic of neoliberal control and manipulation and that generate fresh approaches to the question of alternatives.

New, creative, and effective strategies for resistance need to be continuously evolved. Cross-border solidarity and people-to-people alliances are most urgently needed. Such alliances are strengthened by the realization and growing consciousness that issues across borders may not necessarily be the same but they are often interconnected. We need to continue to strengthen international solidarity, including campaigns and joint action-alert mechanisms. We need, however, to radicalize the notion of alliance building so that it is not only limited to 'political projects' but become the basis for cross-cultural dialogues and inter-paradigmatic exchanges, thereby enriching not only the struggle for resistance but also the common search for viable alternatives.

We, the conference participants, express our appreciation to the convenors for this opportunity to explore and practice new and continuing forms of solidarity based on justice. We fully commit ourselves to work for this, through organization and action, from North to South, from South to North, from South to South and from North to North.

Hong Kong, 10 October 1998