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THE SEATTLE LEGACY

By HUBERT BEYER

VICTORIA - Activists the world over are celebrating what they consider their
success in shutting down last week the World Trade Organization's
ministerial meeting  in Seattle.

Two observations are in order: One, the derailed meeting doesn't mean the
death of the WTO. Two, good thing it doesn't.

The protests in Seattle and the subsequent insistence by President Bill
Clinton that trade issues be tied to environmental and human rights concerns
were the two main factors in throwing the trade talks off track, but that
doesn't mean the issues the WTO was to deal with are going away.

Seattle was a speed bump, a necessary speed bump, thrown in the way of the
WTO, an organization that isn't used to public scrutiny and accountability.
Nor has I paid much attention to matters other than trade. Seattle has
changed that dramatically.

The WTO will no longer be able to deliberate and make decisions in the
shadows of secrecy. The mass protests in Seattle have made an indelible
impression on those who have given the WTO its powers - parliamentarians of
the organization's member countries.

It is the parliamentarians who must and, I am certain, will now press for
changes in the makeup of the World Trade Organization, moving it from the
twilight of bureaucratic secrecy into the sun.

The first signals of change are already here. Pascal Lamy, Europe's trade
commissioner, summed up the WTO's central problem by asking how the
organization can find a balance between openness and efficiency.

The Europeans, shrewd negotiators on tough issues such as agriculture,
finally proposed one of the most interesting ideas of the Seattle
conference - creating a parliamentary body affiliated with WTO that would
bring elected representatives into the system.

That would be a good first step. Only the hotheads call for the dismantling
of the WTO when they should be devoting their genuine enthusiasm to making
the organization work for people, all people, not only those of the six or
seven rich member nations.

Maybe the anarchists have a plan for replacing the WTO with something
better. If so, I haven't heard of it.

We certainly shouldn't flirt with the kind of protectionism that used to
embroil nations in bloody wars.

Global trade rules are not a bad thing in themselves. What is bad is when
the rules benefit only one segment of society And the WTO has done little to
dispel the general public's impression that it serves mainly the interests
of corporations.

So, should we welcome Clinton's threat to impose sanctions on WTO member
nations who don't live up to our standards of environmental protection and
human rights?
I'm not so sure. Developing nations believe lower wages are the only
competitive advantage they have to gain access to world markets.

They see the rich nations imposing labor standards that will only make their
poverty worse. Many delegates left Seattle believing Clinton had used the
WTO for a clever, domestic ploy. Maybe it  wasn't such a high point in
Clintonian diplomacy.

Among the losers of the derailed Seattle talks were Canada's grain farmers.
They had hoped for progress on he elimination of European and, to a lesser
degree American subsidies for agricultural products which make it all but
impossible for our farmers to export to Europe and the U.S.

Was WTO's Seattle meeting a failure? From the organization's point of view,
it certainly was. But its work continues, hopefully in a more open and
transparent fashion.

An for the benefit of those who were outside protesting, thee was some talk
inside about better representation of minority voices, of letting
responsible outsiders in, of bridging the gap between rich and poor.

The WTO isn't yet what it can and should be, but it got a loud wakeup call
last week. And ultimately, the protesters will have done as much to change
the way the WTO does business as the delegates watching the melee.

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Hubert's regular columns can be found at www.HubertBeyer.com