Mobilization for Global Justice -- Call to Action

The International Monetary Fund (IMF) and World Bank will hold
their Joint Annual General Meetings in Washington, DC from
September 28 to October 4, 2001.

We call on people from all over the world to come to Washington
to expose the illegitimacy of these institutions, to stand in
solidarity with peoples in the global south, and to claim our
right to determine our future and the course of the world
economy.

A 10-day convergence filled with teach-ins, workshops, trainings
and actions begins on September 23rd.

Globalize Justice -
Another World is Possible!

If you are saddened by polluted land, water, and air;

If you have grown weary of representatives that do not represent
and institutions that do not serve people;

If your heart has grown heavy in the face of distinctions based
on power over others - sexism, racism, classism, homophobia;

If you are dismayed with participation in a system that brings
untold wealth to the doorsteps of a few by stealing bread from
the tables of many;

If you are appalled by excuses that place profits before the
lives of millions of people living with HIV;

If you know in your heart and mind that a just and nonviolent
world is possible, and you want to help create it;

Join us in Washington!

We call upon all people concerned for justice in their
communities to join with others around the world in shaping a
different globalization: a globalization of our rights to life,
to speech, to thought, to religion, to assembly, to a clean
environment, to food and medication, to freedom from fear and
freedom from poverty. We stand for the rights indigenous peoples,
of women, of people with HIV, affordable health care, strong
labor rights and social and economic policies that put people
before profits. This is not the globalization being forced upon
us. To that other globalization--the globalization of greed--we
stand chanting: Another World Is Possible.

The IMF and the World Bank meetings in Washington are the most
significant gathering of the proponents of corporate-led
globalization in the U.S. in 2001. It is imperative that
supporters of global economic justice send a clear message: the
movement for global justice continues to grow, and will not stand
for continuing efforts by these institutions and the G-8
governments to structure the world for the benefit of
corporations and the wealthy and to deny basic justice to the
majority of the world's people.

We demand that the World Bank and International Monetary Fund:

• Open all World Bank and IMF meetings to the media and the
  public.
  
• Cancel all impoverished country debt to the World Bank and IMF,
  using the institutions' own resources.
  
• End all World Bank and IMF policies that hinder people's access
  to food, clean water, shelter, health care, education, and right
  to organize. (Such "structural adjustment" policies include user
  fees, privatization, and economic austerity programs.)
  
• Stop all World Bank support for socially and environmentally
  destructive projects such as oil, gas, and mining activities, and
  all support for projects such as dams that include forced
  relocation of people.

We furthermore demand that the United States government, the
largest shareholder and most influential government in the World
Bank and IMF, adopt the above demands, and work vigorously to
compel the World Bank and IMF to implement them.

Continue the Struggle for Global Justice

For more information, or to endorse the Mobilization for Global
Justice, go to www.globalizethis.org

• 194 World Financial Institutions