[governance] reality check on economics

[Guru गुरु]

On 21/05/12 01:41, Milton L Mueller wrote:
>> -----Original Message-----
>> have not researched it myself, that in many areas in Asia and Africa,
>> and perhaps some in the Americas and Europe, large parts of the
>> population are captive of one company or another, i.e some of these
>> companies get local monopoly, for some definition of local.
> [Milton L Mueller] Well, that's a very important distinction. How you define a market very strongly affects what level of competition is found to exist in it. But of course it is true that there are localized monopolies. I am surprised by Guru's conclusion (below, in response) that the answer to local monopolies is global regulation of business.
I did not say that.  There are local and global monopolies and we need 
local and global regulation ... the nature/extent etc of each is a 
matter of specifics and requires analyses of the concerned markets. You 
also need to read Angela Daly's and Jeremy's mails for their views on 
how in the digital space, concentration of power has several other 
aspects which traditional competition law is unable to address.

I was asking Avri how she would implement her 'all actors are equal' in 
policy making, which she is insistent to apply to global policy making, 
at her national level... and if it would not work at national level, how 
could she expect it to work at a global level.

> Let me try to concretize for Guru what this means. Let's say there is a cartel or monopoly of some kind over telecom equipment production for the international market in an Indian state. That monopoly - if indeed it has monopoly power - is likely to be politically popular and politically protected locally. (Need I remind you of the controversy over allowing multinational retailers into India's cartelized local scene?) That is, the monopoly profits that are being made can easily be directed to local politicians, may create higher than market wages for the local workers and higher local tax revenues.
>
Cartelized local scene in India ??? you are moving even further away 
from reality than you began :-)

The India retail sector today is the second biggest employer (after 
agriculture) and is overwhelmingly made of small shops. The entry of 
Walmart will simply decimate this group, as it has succesfully done in 
some countries ... neo-liberal economics is good at manufacturing 
poverty.... Faoud made some thought provoking points regarding the 
local-global connections and power inequalities wrt Internet as well...
..
> If the consumers of these services, who pay too much, are diffused all over the world, and the suppliers/beneficiaries of market power are concentrated locally, then yes, it is unlikely that local political and regulatory institutions will respond properly.
>
> So, we need global institutions.
>
Do you realise that your point that *'it is unlikely that local 
political and regulatory institutions will respond properly", applies 
_first and foremost_ to US defacto global policy making, *based on its 
local political and economic priorities, which are harmful to the 
interests of developing countries...

> We do have institutions for global regulation of business now. One of them is called the World Trade Organization, which tries to prevent national governments from discriminating against foreign entrants. But somehow, I get the feeling that the WTO is not too popular among the economic populists calling for global regulation of Internet businesses. But, maybe I am wrong, perhaps Parminder has discovered (belatedly) the virtues of neoliberal economic policies and is seeking to expand these benefits to the Internet domain.
>
Again reality is far more nuanced and complex Milton... global 
institutions are needed to replace current uni-polar domination... and 
then they need to be democratic - two issues which you are collapsing 
into one
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://lists.igcaucus.org/pipermail/governance/attachments/20120521/a93d036a/attachment.htm>
-------------- next part --------------
____________________________________________________________
You received this message as a subscriber on the list:
     governance at lists.igcaucus.org
To be removed from the list, visit:
     http://www.igcaucus.org/unsubscribing

For all other list information and functions, see:
     http://lists.igcaucus.org/info/governance
To edit your profile and to find the IGC's charter, see:
     http://www.igcaucus.org/

Translate this email: http://translate.google.com/translate_t