What we are seeing is fundamentally an American phenomenon. This concentration of capital and power has intensified in the course of the past 20 years, driven by the revolution in information technology. A further leap is about to be taken, powered by the new developments in genetic engineering. The privatisation of the human genome and a general patenting of life forms are opening new prospects for capitalist expansion. A major privatisation of all things related to life and nature is in the offing, opening the way for a power perhaps more absolute than anything the world has known.
Globalisation aims to conquer markets rather than nation states.
This conquest goes hand in hand with considerable destruction. Whole industries have been wiped out in every region of the world. Fifty million unemployed in Europe, one billion unemployed and underemployed in the world as a whole. Globalisation also means the plundering of our planet. By turning words and things, minds and bodies, nature and culture into commodities, we are further aggravating the world's inequalities.