We want our money back
Illicit financial outflows and political fragility as failures of global governance
Angry citizens want their nations’ money back and rightfully so. Banks should be curbed instead of allowed to enthusiastically facilitate the illicit outflow of money by dictators.
The overthrow of dictators in Arab countries has lifted the veil masking the massive and routine looting of their countries’ assets by these dictators and their associates. Also exposed has been the collusion of Western banks and other firms in moving monies offshore, and in channelling monies to secrecy jurisdictions offshore and in shaping rules in ways that make theft and tax evasion easy, invisible and even legal.
These global rules seriously frustrate equitable development and peacebuilding. Where states continue to lose the means to invest in public goods and thus to shore up popular legitimacy, the risks of fragility and instability rise. Hence, today's dictator- and corporation-friendly governance of global financial flows poses major obstacles to state resilience and sustainable peace. This article looks at this legalised transnational larceny and what can be done to end it.
Picture by Truthout.org
About the authors
David Sogge
Based in Amsterdam, David works as an independent researcher and writer. As an associate of the Norwegian think-tank NOREF, he currently focuses on public control over transnational flows affecting societies on the global periphery. Professional activities since 1970 provided a basis for books and articles on the politics of foreign aid, and on Africa, particularly Angola and South Africa. Evaluative research assignments have taken him to Vietnam, Eastern Europe and countries of the former Soviet Union. Trained at Harvard, David earned his graduate degrees from Princeton and the Institute of Social Studies in The Hague.
Recent publications from Public Services & Democracy
Privatising EuropeThis working paper and infographic provide an overview of a great ‘fire sale’ of public services and national assets across Europe that is providing profits for a few transnational companies but is often fiercely opposed by its citizens. |
Participatory alternatives to privatisationExperience worldwide shows that EC-imposed privatisation on crisis countries will not work. The alternative is not reinforcing the status quo, but using citizen power and labour to reinvigorate public services and democratically transform the state.
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The future of Public Enterprises in Latin America and the WorldAn international seminar in Montevideo, co-organised by TNI and the Uruguayan government, shared the latest learning and innovation by state-owned enterprises across Latin America and affirmed their importance as instruments for economic and social development. |
Something rotten in the ANC stateThe palaces of President Zuma and the massacre of miners at Marikana symbolise how the gulf between rich and poor has grown in the 18 years since the African National Congress came to power in South Africa. Hilary Wainwright reports on how formerly loyal ANC activists are turning against their government |
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