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Schuldencrisis in het mondiale zuiden, en radicale oplossingen (webinar, do 19 nov)

Op donderdag 19 november, 16 u: Crash Course over Schuldencrisis in het mondiale zuiden, en radicale oplossingen (voertaal Engels)

5 min leestijd

(Website Crash Course) (Sign up here for the webinar)

Dominic Brown zal de strategieën bespreken die worden voorgesteld door de basisbewegingen in het Zuiden om hun schuld het hoofd te bieden. Hij zal de huidige bewegingen belichten en hun eisen vanuit een historisch perspectief met een focus op Zuid-Afrika – zijn thuisland. Brown zal laten zien hoe de schulduitgifte in het Zuiden vaak wordt gebruikt om een neoliberaal bezuinigingsbeleid door te voeren, en zal bespreken hoe deze tendens van onderaf kan worden gestopt.

Is er een perspectief voor collectief verzet van de kant van de ‘zuidelijke’ landen tegen de nieuwe schuldencrisis die opdoemt nu de pandemie de economieën op slot zet? In hoeverre bouwen de huidige campagnes voort op de vorige? Welke lessen kunnen worden getrokken uit de Jubilee 2000-schuldkwijtscheldingscampagne? Hoe verhoudt de schuldenproblematiek zich tot andere kwesties, zoals ongelijkheid en armoede? En hoe verenigt de schuldenthematiek verschillende sociale strijden? Welke veranderingstheorie ligt ten grondslag aan al deze bewegingen die strijden voor mondiale rechtvaardigheid en verandering herverdelen?

Meer informatie hieronder (Engels)

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About Crash Course

Speaker: Dominic Brown, Alternative Information & Development Centre (AIDC)

Dominic Brown is Economic Justice Programme Manager at the Alternative Information & Development Centre (AIDC). AIDC was formed in 1996 in response to the democratic transition in South Africa and the new opportunities and challenges it brought those seeking greater social justice within the democracy.

Over the years AIDC has played a leading role in various civil society responses to ongoing inequality including facilitating the launch and building of the South African Jubilee 2000 debt cancellation campaign, and the Right to Work Campaign.

About the series

Debt crisis in the global south, and radical solutions:

In this series, we discuss the field of debt crises in the ‘developing world’, and the different aspects that determine the subordinate economic and financial position of the Global South and why this matters. Has anything changed since the 1980s debt crises when a global movement called for a debt jubilee? What are the prospects for change? And how can these kinds of debt crises be prevented in future?

The indebtedness of developing countries had reached alarming levels before the Covid-19 crisis. A wall of money, managed by investment funds seeking profits across the planet, had an endless appetite for investments in debt from the Global South. Once the panic hit capital markets in March 2020, financial flows to the Global South suddenly stopped. The drop in financial flows to developing countries was faster and larger than at any crisis seen before. Since May, money has started to flow back, leaving the Global South with even less means for coping with the consequences of the Covid-19 crisis.

This disproportionate mood swing of capital markets is a perfect illustration of the difficult position developing countries find themselves in when it comes to today’s financialised global economy. In this Crash Course series, we take a look at the different aspects that determine the subordinate economic and financial position of the Global South and why this matters. We will discuss the different mechanisms that produce unequal economic relations, and also the possible solutions for tackling the root causes of these inequalities.

In the 1980s we saw debt crises in many parts of the Global South. This was followed by ‘Structural Adjustment Programmes’ set by the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund (IMF): indebted countries had to pursue austerity policies, privatise state enterprises and liberalise their economies.

In the 1990s, global financial markets were further liberalised, creating opportunities for speculative funds to take advantage. This resulted in new debt crises in regions like East Asia. More recently we have also seen the controversial handling of the Greek debt crisis and the severe adjustment package imposed upon Greece, with the consequences that followed from it.

The Quantitative Easing (QE) programmes of central banks in the Global North injected trillions of dollars into the financial system after the global financial crisis of 2007, paving the way for another round of potential debt crises today. The surplus of capital and low interest rates in developed economies led to a rise in capital flows to developing countries. Then Covid-19 came along. Again we saw an unprecedented increase in money being injected into the financial system by central banks in the Global North. This rising tide of capital flows has the potential to result in a new period of ‘lost decades’, provoked by debt crises.

In this Crash Course series, we discuss the field of debt crises in the ‘developing world’. Has anything changed since the 1980s debt crises when a global movement called for a debt jubilee? What are the prospects for change? And how can these kinds of debt crises be prevented in future?

Speakers in this course:

Andrew M. Fischer (ISS), Ingrid Harvold Kvangraven (University of York), Ewa Karwowski (University of Hertfordshire), Dominic Brown (Alternative Information & Development Centre (AIDC))