PUBLIC MEETING: Who's going to pay for the financial crisis?

dublin | miscellaneous | event notice Wednesday June 17, 2009 16:43 by Debt and Development Coalition Ireland

Dangers and opportunities for global justice

Will the global financial crisis provide an opening for radical change? Lidy Nacpil of Jubilee South, Andy Storey of Afri and Mark Malone of the Seomra Spraoi Collective join a discussion chaired by Ailbhe Smith.

Hosted by Bloom: Movement for Global Justice

DATE AND TIME:

7.30pm, Thursday 25th June

VENUE:

Central Hotel, Exchequer Street, Dublin

Speakers:

Lidy Nacpil (Jubilee South, Philippines)

Andy Storey (Afri)

Mark Malone (Seomra Spraoi)

Chair:

Ailbhe Smith (UCD School of Social Justice)

As the world faces the biggest economic crisis since the 1930s, the battle to determine who will pay the price has already begun in earnest. The neo-liberal agenda promoted by the World Bank and the IMF have been totally discredited by the global financial meltdown. Led by the United States, the world’s richest countries have scrapped the “Washington Consensus” rule-book they imposed on the global South for so many years.

There is a great opportunity for radical change, breaking with the failed policies that have dominated the world economy for the last two decades. But there are worrying signs that global elites are determined to continue with the same disastrous model. The International Monetary Fund has already taken advantage of the crisis to carve out an expanded role for itself as a lender to struggling economies, using its power to impose austerity programmes that punish the poor for the failings of the rich. The G20 summit excluded most of the world’s countries from a discussion that will affect them all.

Ireland has often shirked its responsibility to stand up for an alternative economic model that allows countries in the global South to control their own destinies. It’s time to correct this failure - we have the chance to break ranks with the big powers that have dragged the world economy into a hole and promote a new approach that gives top priority to the needs of the world’s poorest people.

Lidy Nacpil is the international co-ordinator of Jubilee South, a network of anti-debt coalitions in more than 60 countries. Lidy has a long experience as a campaigner for economic justice and will bring a grassroots perspective from the global South.

Andy Storey is the chair of Action from Ireland (Afri) and a lecturer in development studies at University College Dublin.

Ailbhe Smith is a lecturer in Women’s Studies at UCD and has been active in the Irish feminist movement for many years.

Mark Malone is a member of the Seomra Spraoi collective

Bloom: Movement for Global Justice is an alliance of four campaigning organisations: the Debt and Development Coalition, the Africa Centre, Comhlámh and the Latin America Solidarity Centre