Contents
Acknowledgements
1 Introduction. The Brandt Commission and the Multinationals: Two Planetary Perspectives and the Great Transformation in the 1970s and 1980s
The rationale and the world stage
The actors on the world stage: The Brandt commission
The backstage distorters of development: The multinationals and their planetary vision
The planetary perspective
2 Development vs. Dependency
Decolonisation, the Third World, and UNCTAD
Development and the concept of underdevelopment
The liberal development approach
The neo-Marxist dependence approach
At the crossroads
3 Distorters of Development: The Multinational Corporations
The agents of change
Distorters of development
Resistance
The UN as an arena
Flower season
4 The G77 and the NIEO: The Contours of a New World Order
The oil and the power and powerlessness of the poor
The new international economic order
The limits to growth and reshaping the international order: Arguments for one world
The Lomé Convention
The reactions to the NIEO in the North, and the North/South “Dialogue” in Paris
The ambiguities of the NIEO
5 The Great Transformation of the 1970s and 1980s
The great transformation between 1965 and 1990
Reconceptualisation for a new trade regime
The reconceptualisation and reorganisation of labour markets
The dollar and the unfettering of monetary and financial markets
The trilateral commission and the road to low-intensity democracy
6 A Commission Against World Poverty
The origin
Convincing the Third World
The commission and its secretariat
7 A Commission for a New World Order
Work on the idea
The first commission crisis
Consolidation and conflict lines
The second commission crisis
Completing the report
8 Proposal for a New Keynesian World Order but Where Are the Multinationals?
A programme for survival
A programme for survival of who?
The reception
The Brandt Report in its time
9 Cancún: From Utopia to Apology. The Opening towards a Neoliberal Global Market Order
Towards Cancún
Cancún
Report 2: Common crisis
From Utopia to apology
10 The Follow-up Commissions for Planetary Policies and the Final Farce
The follow-up commissions
The Palme Commission
The Brundtland Commission
UNCED 1992 and Agenda 21
The Report of the socialist international: Global challenge
Julius Nyerere's South commission
The Carlsson-Ramphal Commission on global governance
The UN millennium development goals
The second Brandt: The neoliberal counterpoint as the final farce
The Brandt equation
11 The Brandt Commission and the Global Corporations Today
The contentious construction of the future: Futurologists, futurists, metaplanners, and Interfutures
The Brandt commission's vision of the future
The global corporations' vision of the future
Interdependence
The continued relevance of Brandt
The question of how to monitor capitalism for the good of planetary cohabitation
12 Planetary Perspectives: One World to Share. An Interview with Shridath Ramphal
Index