The World, Inc.
  Of the 100 largest economies in the world, 51 are corporations; only
  49 are countries. General Motors is bigger than Denmark,
  Daimler Chrysler is bigger than Poland, and Shell is bigger than
  Singapore. The sales of each of the top five corporations in the
  world are bigger than the GDP of 182 countries. The top 200
  corporations combined sales represents 27.5% of world GDP.
  [Peter Brokensha, Australian Options, No 29, Winter 2002]

  An Age of Robber Barons?
  We... live in an age of robber barons. They are the greedy chief
  executives, bankers and accountants, some of whom have lied
  and cheated, misled investors, and looted companies for their
  own benefit... We are facing not so much a crash as a crisis of
  confidence.  Those responsible must fall on their swords, or be
  brought to book. [George Trefgarne, economics editor of the
  Telegraph, in London, reported in SMH 1.7.02]

The Consumers' Champion Under Attack
The big end of town wants to know what is driving the nation's most powerful regulator, Allan Fels, chairman of the Australian Competition & Consumer Commission(ACCC), as he lays siege to oil companies, airlines and telco's with a zealousness that has surprised even long-time Fels watchers. As tempers fray, Fels and big  business find themselves embroiled in one of the most important turf wars in Australian corporate history - one that has the potential to redefine our notion of fair competition. He has been attacked by the chairman of Caltex, Qantas, and Harvey Norman (among others)... Business leaders believe he has become too almighty for the nations ` good... [Cameron Stewart, Weekend Australian 8.6.02]
 
 
 

Current Contradictions of Capitalism

Modern consumer capitalism is wracked by a great contradiction...that must lie at the core of a new left politics. It is a contradiction between the promise of consumer capitalism and the modern social condition: despite the fantastic promises of material progress, and the extraordinary success of capitalism in delivering undreamt of wealth  for ordinary people - they are still not happy. In the USA real incomes have increased by 400% since 1946... yet the proportions of Americans reporting themselves to be very happy has declined from 35% in 1957 to 30% in 1988. Only 30% felt satisfied with their financial situation, compared with 42% previously.  The story is the same in Australia....  The growth project has failed but it is too threatening for people to admit it... The pursuit of wealth is not making us any happier... the process of economic growth has produced a seriously sick society... The richest people in the world are saying that they are miserable, that it is not worth it, and... the process of getting rich is the cause of the problems... At the dawn of the 21st century, the sicknesses we face are overwhelmingly the sicknesses of affluence... We see the diseases of boredom and alienation... an epidemic of drug use, pornography and... soft-core titillation...In the age of global consumer capitalism the defining predicament is not a lack of money, but a lack of meaning. [Clive Hamilton, Fabian Newsletter Vol 42, No. 3, July-Sept.2002]

The Global Environmental Outlook

A report compiled by the United Nations charts the environmental degradation of the past 30 years and looks forward to how the world might be in 2032. Its conclusion is that unless the world changes its current "markets first" approach, the increase in building of roads, power lines, airports and other infrastructure will disrupt wildlife breeding patters and wipe out species - particularly in coastal areas where most human settlement is concentrated.

Never send to know for whom the bell tolls... More than half the world will be afflicted by water shortages, with 995% of people in the Middle East with severe problems, and 65% in Asia and the Pacific. The Mediterranean coast will come under special pressure through urban growth, inadequate waste-water treatment, tourism, and intensively farmed crops... The report paints four possible futures for the world, including the current pattern  of free trade and short term profit at the expense of the environment, which leads to disaster. In the second scenario, security dominates, with fear of terror and mass immigration into rich areas, involving a world split into rich and poor, with freedom of movement restricted. The third option involves governments trying to protect the environment with international treaties, and the fourth, which is preferred, involves all decisions being based on sustainable development rather than short-term gain and greed. [Paul Brown, Guardian Weekly, 6.6.02]

Wall Street's Empire Looks at Corporate Misbehaviour

 The American Securities & Exchange Commission (SEC) has been urging more federal and state prosecutors to bring criminal cases against securities-law violations... The SEC has welcomed prosecutors because it believes criminal cases are a much greater deterrent than any penalties the SEC can impose. The SEC's other weapon is the bad publicity settlements create, especially for major public companies and senior executives... even the whiff of a SEC investigation will send a company's stock plummeting. [Michael Schroeder, AFR 13.6.02]

Brought To Account?

A US federal jury has convicted one of the world's largest and oldest accounting firms - Anderson's - of obstruction of justice. It lost 720 of its 2300 clients after being charged. The Australian arm was one of the many outposts taken over by rivals. Anderson Australia has announced a merger with Ernst & Young, which re-employed about 90% of the workforce. Anderson was accused of shredding documents related to its second largest client, Enron, a bankrupt energy company reputed to be close to the Bush Administration. It faces a fine of US$500,000, and five years probation during which it can no longer audit public companies. It admitted its employees had shredded key documents but said this was normal business practice. [Caroline Overington in New York, in SMH 17.6.02]

Mafia Millionaires

The US Attorney's Office in Manhattan maintains that during the 1990s five New York Mafia families operated through several firms to "pump and dump stocks". A billion dollars in discretionary funds is said to have been involved. [Ryan & Main, AFR,  20.6.02]

The US Corporate Scandal

In the aftermath of the terrorist attacks on New York came the business crime wave. The Enron scandal engulfed the reputation of corporate America, sparking a chain reaction... In its wake, Wall Street trembled, the accounting giant Arthur Anderson all but collapsed, and revelations of financial concoctions flattened the reputations of blue chips and tech stocks alike... As more reports emerge on the cause of the Californian energy crisis, it has become clear that Enron and the energy giants had more than a passive role, making vast profits as prices spiraled. [Pamela Williams, AFR 11.6.02]

Called To Account?

US President George Bush said he was deeply concerned about some of the accounting practices in America and would pursue executives responsible for the $3.8 billion falsification at WorldCom. The chairman of the US Securities Commission also vowed to jail executives signing misleading accounts. He said there was a deepening crisis of investor confidence in the wake of the rash of corporate accounting scandals.[Peter Hartcher & Luke Collins, AFR 28.6.02]
 

Trust, Falsehoods & Fiction

The US - indeed the world investment community - is running out of institutions to trust. The WorldCom disaster raises questions about the extent to which management can carry on an accounting falsehood... WorldCom, Enron, and Tycon are not about the last 10%. Their numbers were a complete fiction. And how many more litter the US and even Australia is unknown. [Elizabeth Knight, SMH 27.6.02]

Greed Wins

Business scandals are a by-product of an economic system that rewards the pursuit of self interest, according to Daryl Koehn, director of the Centre for Business Ethics at the University of St. Thomas, in Houston. What is new and disturbing she says is that corporations and boards of directors show a tendency to cater to the greed of their executives, and are turning a blind eye to conflicts of interest. [SMH 15.6.02]

The WorldCom Scandal Raises Rates

Accountants might refuse to process tax returns, or charge higher rates, as they face likely rises in professional indemnity, following the WorldCom scandal, industry bodies said... The chief executive of the Institute of Chartered Accountants said minimum increases had ranged from 25-40%, but the cost of cover had risen as much as 1000%. [Lucy Beaumont, SMH  28.6.02]

Corporate Fraud in USA: The Bigger They Are...

The crisis of confidence in US corporate accounts escalated when telecommunications giant WorldCom admitted falsifying profits by $6.6 billion over the past five quarters. It faces bankruptcy with debts of US$30 billion, and will sack 17,000 of its global workforce... The scandal adds to the growing evidence of widespread manipulation of US accounts, highlighted by the collapse of energy group Enron. That brought down accounting firm Arthur Anderson, which was also WorldCom's auditor. [Luke Collins, AFR 27.6.02]

The Biggest Bankruptcy?

WorldCom is in default on a US$2.65 billion bank loan, leaving financiers to decide whether this is the biggest bankruptcy in corporate history... It admitted it had engaged in a US$3.8 billion accounting fraud, involving some 30 banks... This could become the biggest failure in corporate history. [Luke Collins, AFR 28.6.02]

USA- A Crisis of Confidence

In America today, the old sureties are gone...there is a crisis of confidence in American institutions on a scale not seen since the Watergate scandal... A spokesman for the New York Stock Exchange,  Raymond Pellecchia, said: "There's real fears about the economy, tangible concerns about terrorism, questions about the integrity of the system - it's not just the financial system, it's much broader..." American capitalism itself is squirming under the microscope... there is a crisis of faith as much as structural issues... The New York Stock Exchange believes that restoration of confidence in the institutions of corporate government must begin at home... The immense soul-searching now taking place in America about its major institutions suggest that the world's economic engine is at a crucial crossroads...[Fortune  magazine ran a cover with the headline System Failure]  [Andrew Cornell in New York, in AFR 29.6.02]

Xeroxed

In yet another scandal to batter confidence in Corporate America, Xerox has been forced to restate five years of profit results and reclassify more than $6 billion in revenue. Investors had already been shaken by the revelation that WorldCom had inflated its profits by hiding nearly $4 billion in expenses... President Bush called on Congress to bar executives from making erroneous financial statements. [Reuters, SMH 1.7.02]

Bushed

President Bush vowed to jail corrupt executives who threatened the free enterprise system. He said the US economy was sound and strong, but acknowledged that "a few bad actors can tarnish the entire free enterprise system". Guilty executives could face jail, and lose "phony profits"...[Caroline Overington, SMH 1.7.02]

A New Bout Of Protectionism?

The world's largest economy, the USA, has gone backwards on trade policy... The world's second largest, Japan... continues to allow an inefficient and shrinking agricultural sector to veto any trade initiatives... The other global power on trade, the European Union, allows France and other protectionist states to adopt a defensive, spoiling posture in global trade negotiations. [AFR 1.7.02]

The New Pneumonics

The US financial press bible, Barron's, is reassessing the secret acronyms used by US executives. New entries to be considered by the Oxford Dictionary include:
EBITDA - Earnings before I tricked the dumb auditor. (i.e. Before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation)
EBI - Earnings before irregularities and tampering (before interest and tax)
CEO - Chief embezzlement officer (chief executive officer)
CFO - Corporate fraud officer (chief financial officer)
EPS - Eventual prison sentence (Earnings per share)
[AFR "Rear Window" edited by Lachlan Johnson, 2.7.02]
 

You Might Be Able to Bank on It

Directors and senior executives of banks face tough integrity tests aimed at improving consumer safeguards as part of new laws introduced into Federal Parliament... Senior bankers will have to pass a "fit and proper" test before being allowed to assume their responsibilities. [Morgan Mellish, AFR 27.6.02]

Banks Cartel Powering Away [Headline, AFR 18.6.02]

Over the past 12 months the financial services index has outperformed the market by a stunning 24% with all the banks trading at price-earning multiples from 3-15%. Banks are expected to show compound earnings of 10-13%... The performance of the banking cartel underlines its existing market power. [Chanticleer, AFR 18.6.02]

They Can Bank On It

Australians paid a record $7.1 billion in bank fees last year, nearly three quarters more than four years ago, triggering renewed calls for greater regulation... These revelations followed a record bank profit-reporting season, with the big four reporting a combined profit of $5.53 billion in the second half of last year. The Australian Consumers Association described the fees as outrageous, and called on the Federal Government to rein in the charges. [Matt Wade, SMH 21.6.02]

Banks Slow Learners?

It has taken Australia's banks an agonising long time to recognise the reality that the country's credit card system was an opaque oligopoly that could not be maintained. However, it is good to see that most banks have now come round to the idea that change has to occur - and  that it is more sensible to set about influencing the change than bitterly resenting it. [Editorial in AFR19.6.02]

The Ideology of Big Business

The Australian Business Council believes that Allan Fels, chairman of the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission, is difficult to deal with. He is a politician in the world of business, happily cultivating enemies... Fels, it seems to many...has taken it upon himself to interfere with the everyday business of business; he is an ideologue, an anti-capitalist campaigner and "size-ist" what's more... The Business Council believes Fels is out of control and that its members are under siege, while Fels believes the member of the council are either current or future monopolists and colluders, and that the ACCC is under siege. [Alan Kohler, AFR 11.6.02]
 

The Consumers' Champion Under Attack

Fels says it is business leaders who have become over zealous - tempted by the forbidden fruit of cosy oligopolies... as a way of meeting shareholder demands for greater profits...  His popularity in middle Australia has never been higher. In the suburbs, Fels is seen as a guardian against corporate greed and is applauded for his aggressive attacks on companies that exploit GST to hike prices... More recently, the stunning collapses of HIH, One Tel and Ansett have fuelled the public support for more vigorous regulation of corporate behaviour...But now Fel's corporate enemies see an opportunity to cut him down to size. After intense lobbying from the business community...the Government announced an independent review of the competition provisions of the Trade Practices Act. [Cameron Stewart, Weekend Australian 8.6.02]

The War With Big Business

This will be a fight to the death according to Katherine Murphy [AFR 3.7.02]. She argues that John Howard, during his last campaign, gave big business the enquiry it wanted - its best chance to muzzle the competition regulator. The P.M. unveiled the Dawson inquiry into competition. Allan Fels, the competition regulator, responded by arguing for a toughening of the Trade Practices Act. The message was that cartel activity is theft, and executives practising it should go to jail like other thieves. This was a war with big business - a fight to the death - the inquiry will be about who wins and who loses... Fels will continue to make the case for change, preaching to the public in a language they can understand... presenting as united a front as possible with the small business sector. [AFR 3.7.02]

Cardsharps Buying Time?

The world's most influential credit card "kingpins"...have been attempting to derail the Reserve Bank of Australia's regulatory changes that could destroy the credit card industry... The RBA has used terms like "price fixing", "secrecy", and "lack of transparency"... What happens in Australia over the next few months could set the agenda for international credit card regulation... Former head of American Express in Australia, Bob Gilman, said any time there is a threat to Visa, Master Card, or Amex, they tend to pursue their legal options to the fullest. They have got deep pockets, he said, and are funded by the banks, so if they take it to court and delay implementation, it will buy some time. [Michael Cave & George Lekakis, AFR 22.6.02]

OZ OK?

The Governor of the Reserve Bank, Ian Macfarlane, said Australians were too pessimistic about their economic future. He said the Australian economy has been one of the fastest economies in the world. A time-honoured reason for pessimism was the belief that there would be an inevitable long run decline in the Australian terms of trade, but the events of the past two decades had thrown doubt on it. There has been growing concern that Australia will become a branch office economy, but there has not been a big rise in direct foreign investment. [Toni O'Loughlin, SMH 26.6.02]

Some Reservation?

HIH  Insurance's gap in reserves at the end of 1998 exceeded all the profit it had ever made, the royal commission into its collapse was told. [Andrew Main, AFR 22.6.02]

Independent Auditors?

A parliamentary inquiry is considering radical solutions to recover public confidence in the independence of auditors after a string of corporate collapses. "We need something innovative to bring back public confidence", said Bob Charles, Chair of the Review of Independent Auditing. [AFR 22.6.02]

How To Keep Growing and Green

The real problem is not that we have to give up economic growth, nor that the cost of fixing the damage would be huge... It is that we can't agree on how the tab should be provided, i.e. the problem is political.  For example, the figures for land degradation through salinity show most is in WA, as a result of past practices. The costs of it could rise to $700 million a year by 2020, which sounds a lot of money but is only 1% of GDP today. Environmental economists say the things we must do to fix the environment are not particularly expensive, and the only real difficulty is getting ourselves organised politically. [Ross Gittins, SMH 22.6.02]

Howard At The Pinnacle of Global Conservative Ideology?

Prime Minister Howard's appointment as newly elected chairman of the International Democratic Union represents his rise to the pinnacle of global political influence. Seated next to George Bush at a White House dinner, he accepted accolades from this conservative leaning network of political leaders, who believe in what the US President has described as "democratic capitalism"...  This appointment... represents his elevation to the heights of Centre-Right politics at a time conservative ideology is in the ascendancy... His foregoers include Margaret Thatcher and Ronald Reagan, whose mission... was to promote the virtues of free enterprise and defeat the perceived evils of socialism and command-driven economies.[Steve Lewis, chief political reporter, The Australian, 12.6.02]

International Trade a Dog Fight

International trade is a dog fight, and its local implications may be beneficial or disastrous. Its organisation cannot be put on automatic pilot, or dictated purely by functionaries in World Trade Organisation type commissions. Trade Patterns cannot be removed from political determination. [Evan Jones, Professor of Political Economy, University of Sydney, in ERA Newsletter, Vol 2, No. 23 May-June 2002]

Terrorism And Economic Policy

At a time when the Centre Right is sweeping to power in elections across the globe, Mr. Howard has become the longest-serving contemporary national leader of Tory persuasion... But there are dangers in its ascendancy... There is a fine line between admirable fortitude in the face of terrorism and cynical politicalization of the terrorist threat... The war on terror, or the drum of insecurity can easily become a substitute for sound economic policy... It is also too easy to assume only right-wing political parties are behind the war on terrorism.. In Australia, a Labor government led by the hawkish Kim Beazley would surely have kept Australia supporting the US. [Editorial in The Australian, 17..6.02]

Australian Anti-Terrorist Laws Fascist?

A newspaper advertisement authorised by the Citizens Electoral Council of Australia likened proposed anti-terrorism laws here to a decree that gave Nazi Germany unlimited powers... Signatories included former Labor politicians Jim Cairns and Joan Coxsedge, and they  noted the points made in the 1933 Nazi decree and the anti-terrorism bills are virtually identical. They said the proposals were fascist and must be thrown out... The Federal government said such talk as "incorrect, inflammatory and irresponsible". [AFR 13.6.02]

Concentration of Joblessness

One in six children in Australia now lives in a household where no-one has a job - the third highest incidence in OECD economies. Professor Dawkins and his colleagues at the University of Melbourne suggest that individual level unemployment measures are understating the extent of social distress caused by an absence of work. They think the causes of the growing concentration of joblessness include geographic factors, with employment growth concentrated in pockets of Australian society; and disincentives to work because of the tax and social welfare systems. [Mark Davis, AFR 28.6.02]

Fall In Long-Term Unemployed

The number of people out of work for over a year fell by 9,100 to 143,000 - the lowest since November last year. The long-term unemployed now make up 23% of the total. The Hunter region of New South Wales had the highest unemployment rate, at 11.1%. The lowest rates were in Melbourne (3%) and Sydney (3.4%). The national unemployment rate is 6.3%.[Morgan Mellish, AFR 14.6.02]

The Lonely Crowd?

Australia is moving away from the traditional family model of two children and a home in the suburbs, towards a more multicultural society in which people live in apartments, marry later, and have fewer dependents. The 2001 Census shows how Australia's demographic foundations are shifting towards a society based on the individual rather than the family... The nuclear family is losing its place in Australian households, but the dream of owning a home is alive and well... 88% of people live alone, compared with 5.5% in 1971... Over a quarter of people who live alone, live in flats or apartments... One-person households are expected to increase. [Paul Cleary & Cheville Murphy, AFR 18.6.02]

Rising Star of the ALP?

Welcome to the public life of Bill Shorten, friend of cardboard box king, Dick Pratt, son-in-law of former Liberal Party MP Julian Beale, leader of shearers, labourers and miners, rising star of the ALP. In the eyes of many Shorten is an enigma: a Jesuit educated Catholic from the Labor Right who sides with militant unions from the hard Left in industrial disputes and ALP forums, a committed Labor man who married into a Liberal Party dynasty, and boasts allies and friends among the Melbourne business elite.[Stephen Long, AFR 8.6.02]

Australian Unionist Honoured

Helen Creed, Vice-President of the ACTU, has been elected chair of the Women's Committee of the International Confederation of Free Trade Unions [ICFTU]. She began her career in 1976 as a social worker in the mental health sector in Victoria. [Trade Union World, April 2002]

Natural Justice?

When Justice Gaudron's replacement is named, the Howard government will have exercised more influence over the High Court's make-up than all but four of the governments since Federation.  [The Hawke government made only three appointments] ... However, lawyers say it is by no means certain that a conservative judge would deliver what the government wants... [Kate Marshall, AFR 28.6.02]

Those Were the Days...

High Court judge Michael Kirby lamented the economic stress imposed on university students, which is forcing many to work part-time to pay off debt and make ends meet... He contrasted his relatively carefree student life at Sydney University - in which vigorous debate, involvement in student politics, and sheer curiosity, were regarded as an essential part of university life - with the "disengaged" students of today. He said that intellectual debate would no longer be the hallmark of university experience.[Kate Marshall, AFR 17.6.02]

The Fifth Estate

The Centre for Independent Studies (CIS) is today the most influential think tank in the country, its unique brand of social conservatism and neo-classical economics now largely mirrored in Coalition government policy. However, Greg Lindsay, who founded it, thinks that supporters of regulation are still there. Hence conservative think tanks are redoubling their efforts against re-regulation and the slowing of reform. Dr. Mike Nahan, director of the right-wing think-tank, the Institute of Public Affairs (IPA) agrees. He says: "The old institutions of big government and socialism have crumbled. But I think the Left are coming back more strongly than most people realise". Such think-tanks call themselves the Fifth Estate - a 20th century addition to democracy's pillars of the executive, the legislature, the judiciary and the media... The influence of these well-funded and largely unaccountable ideas factories has been nothing short of phenomenal. No think-tank is as quoted as the CIS, the champion of the New Right. Most of its ideas derive from the Austrian economist Von Hayek, (1899-1992) who argued for a market economy with minimal regulation, and rewards for the pursuit of individual gain... His ideas have been enormously influential - Margaret Thatcher dubbed his treatises as masterpieces. Hayek was the economist most cited by President Reagan.[Wilson da Silva, Financial Review Magazine, July 2002]

Economic Scholarship and the Invisible Hand(s)

Over a quarter of President Reagan's economic advisers were  members of the Mont Pelerin Society - an influential but secretive group established by Hayek in 1947. It played a key role in igniting the New Right revolution. The Sunday Times called this group the most influential think-tank of the second half of the 20th century:

"Hayek and the Mont Pelerin Society are to the 20th century what Karl Marx and the First International were to the 19th century". [Susan George, AFR Magazine, 26.6.02]

Starting from a tiny embryo, the neo-liberals and their funders have created a huge international network of foundations, institutes, research centres, publications, scholars, writers and public relations hacks to develop, package and push their ideas and doctrine relentlessly. They made neo-liberalism seem as if it were the natural and normal condition of humankind.

The Extreme Right Returns

The destruction of the Soviet Union has opened the door to the re-emergence of the extreme right in world politics... We witness the spread of a new kind of unilateral engulfing of the globe, which seeks to penetrate all walks of life, eradicate all traces of a socialistic ideology, and threatens recalcitrants with physical extermination... [Vera Butler, Australian Socialist, Vol II, No.1, 2001]

Smoking Right?

Philip Morris, the tobacco company, has emerged as a major backer of the Liberal and National parties, donating $330,000 to the Coalition during 1998-2001, according to the records of the Australian Electoral Commission. Simon Chapman, professor of public health at Sydney University, says that, historically, the Liberal Party has enjoyed the favour of the tobacco industry. He said his research showed that tobacco companies appear to have good connections with various party figureheads.[Lisa Allen, AFR 14.6.02]

Holy Smoke?

A team of scientists funded by the World Health Organisation has confirmed the links between smoking and lung cancer, and found evidence of other cancers.[Freya Petersen & Jonathan Pearlman in SMH 21.6.02]

Aspirin Good Medicine?

Taking aspirin could help reduce by more than half the risk of developing the most common form of lung cancer, once smoking, the biggest threat of all is removed from the health equation.[ James Meikie, Guardian Weekly, 4.7.02]

Sin Wins

A new study from Melbourne University has found that socially responsible investments do not deliver the best returns. It found that, over a period of seven years the "sinful" industries outperformed the broad market by 9.8% a year. These industries included alcohol, armaments, pornography, and tobacco. Wine in particular has shown spectacular growth in recent years. [Leon Gettler, SMH 20.6.02]

Mobile Prison?

Mobile phone radiation could promote the leakage of toxic substances into brain cells, an international study has found. Government scientists in Finland exposed brain cells cultured in laboratories, to the maximum officially allowed for mobiles for one hour. We need further study to see if the blood-brain barrier is affected, said Professor Lescyznski, of Finland's Radiation and Nuclear Safety Authority.Å@[SMH 21.6.02]
 
 

...They Do It Unto Me? Suffer Little Children

In the USA the Roman Catholic Church has removed 218 priests from their positions this year because of allegations of child sexual abuse, but at least 34 known offenders remain in church jobs, according to a survey of Catholic dioceses across the USA, by the Washington Post. The survey found that at least 850 US priests have been accused of sexual misconduct with minors since the early 1960s;  more than 350  of them were ousted from the ministry. The number... suggest the scope of the scandal rocking the church in the USA. [Alan Cooperman & Lena H. Sun, Guardian Weekly, 13.6.02]

Sexual Abuse: Too Much Understanding?

A  Catholic Church report on sexual abuse by its clergy unearthed a number of very uncomfortable truths. So it was quietly buried, according to Kelly Burke... Almost three years on, however, this damning document has failed to generate even a single recommendation for change. In the wake of damaging evidence aired at the Wood Royal Commission in April 1996, the Australian Catholic Church Bishops' Conference (ACBC) formulated an ambitious nine-point strategy to tackle mounting accusations of sex abuse cover-up within the church. Entitled Towards Understanding, which took three years to complete, the report has never been released, presumably because it was so critical. It acknowledged that the Catholic Church had engaged in minimisation, denial, and cover up of sex abuse allegations, and had frequently given priority to its reputation, insurance and liability concerns, over those of the victims...

A clear and resounding message received in the course of this research study centred on those elements of the culture of the Catholic Church which contribute to a lack of respect for women and subsequently their subservient role in the life of the church.[Kelly Burke, SMH 15.6.02]

The Boss Is Watching

Today workplace surveillance is embedded in technology and virtually invisible. Companies can count the number of keystrokes per day on a worker's computer to monitor how hard they are working, or monitor the mobile phone to track movements during the day. "Surveillance  seems to have snuck in under the radar because it is embedded in the technology we use every day", said Dr. Sewell, an expert in the Management Department at Melbourne University. [Michael Cave, AFR 14.6.02]

 Cry For Me, Argentina!

In the Plaza de Mayo in the Argentine capital, speeches and protests go on all night, and you sense, above all, that the destitution, squalor and social decay of the shanty towns, so long kept in the margins of this vast city, are coming into the centre... Argentina's history is that of a melting-pot nation, drawing in Europeans, Jews, Levantines, and Koreans; but its future is as a cooking-pot backwater, haemorrhaging its own people. [Chris Moss, Guardian Weekly. 13.6.02]

Market Forces At Work

Over the past 4 years Argentina has been transformed from the blue-eyed boy of Latin American globalisation into a country imploding economically, politically and socially. Unemployment is 25%, the economy is contracting at 15% p.a., the central bank is running out of foreign currency, and a quarter of its children are suffering from malnutrition in a country so rich in farmland that it produces enough to feed 10 times its population. Having been used as a test-bed for free-market ideology,  Argentina is now the laboratory mouse for what to do when these ideas go badly wrong.[Larry Elliott, Guardian Weekly 13.6.02]

Wall Street''s Number is Up?

The WorldCom scandal has undermined faith in the US economy and in President Bush... He knows that there are political and economic ratifications of the perception that Corporate America is run by a bunch of greedy crooks who have been using their money and influence to buy political favours... This explains why the US President... was urging that those guilty of corporate crime should do time in jail rather than face financial penalties. [Larry Elliott, Guardian Weekly 4.7.02]

A Great Speculative Mania

One of the great speculative manias of all time is in an advantaged stage of collapse and its consequences will be with us for several years yet. So far only a few city workers and "goatee-bearded dot-commers" have felt the impact of shrivelling shares. But we are in the third year of a bear market, a performance unseen since the 1930s, and soon the draught will be felt in the real economy... Just about every one of the recent problems to hit financial market has been caused by individuals acting incompetently, fraudulently or dishonestly... [George Trefgarne, economics editor of The Telegraph in London, reported in SMH 1.7.02]