Privatization & Procurement

Across the country, corporations are privatizing the commons -- water -- so they can sell it. Now one town is fighting back in a powerful new way: Barnstead, New Hampshire, has become the first municipality in the U.S. to adopt a binding local law that bans certain corporations from withdrawing water within the town. To protect their local law, Barnstead residents have also voted to strip corporations of their claims to constitutional rights and powers. This is not your father's old "regulatory" approach. Read More

Amnesty International today assailed the United States' use of military contractors in Iraq as "war outsourcing" and said the behavior of some contractors had diminished America's moral standing. Read More

Bolivian authorities plan to scour the financial records of foreign energy companies and have threatened explicitly for the first time to seize company assets if new contracts giving the state greater control can not be negotiated. Read More

President Evo Morales ordered soldiers to immediately occupy Bolivia's natural gas fields Monday and threatened to evict foreign companies unless they sign new contracts within six months giving Bolivia majority control over the entire chain of production. Read More

As of last week, 30,000 children had been dropped from the Childrens Health Insurance Program since Accenture, LLP began running the call center in December. Read More

Venezuela has taken control of two oil fields operated by French firm Total and Italy's Eni. Read More

A government decision to cut food rations has hurt poor Iraqis who cannot afford high prices on the open market, say economists and Baghdad residents. Read More

Water rights groups say transnational corporations are increasingly sinking their teeth into Latin America's water services, but studies by the United Nations and other experts point to the contrary: these companies are backing off, and may not come back any time soon. Read More

Voice for Humanity recently sold tens of thousands of pink and silver audio players to the United States government to teach Afghan villagers about democracy. Critics say that the project was a waste of taxpayer dollars. Others say it is a perfect example of the covert "information war" conducted in the "war on terrorism." Read More

The ports of Dubai make up some of the busiest commercial hubs in the world for the "global war of terrorism." Conveniently located between the Afghanistan and Iraq, Dubai is the ideal jumping-off point for military contractors and a lucrative link in the commercial supply chain of goods and people. Read More