The Fair Trade Manifesto 2014

"Everyone thinks of changing the world, no one thinks of changing themselves"  -Leo Tolstoy

According to the Fair Trade Manifesto they were seeking candidates for the European Elections in May this year

Potentional candidates should pledge to:

"Promote a people-centred economy and people-centred businesses where people come first and economic activities support sustainable livelihoods for all."

As one running a people-centred business in the UK for the last 10 years, it comes as a surprise to learn that someone is to be our champion.

It was in 1996 that our founder's position paper introduced the concept of people-centered economics to the US President. This had led to sourcing an experimental initiative in Tomsk Russia in 1999.

People-Centered Economic Development was introduced to UK government and the social enterprise community in 2004, with a business plan to tackle poverty.  

"Enterprise for the primary objective of poverty relief, localized community economic development, and social support became the business model which guided P-CED’s efforts and development at a time in the US when terms such as ‘social enterprise’ and ‘social capitalism’ had not yet been coined.

Traditional capitalism is an insufficient economic model allowing monetary outcomes as the bottom line with little regard to social needs. Bottom line must be taken one step further by at least some companies, past profit, to people. How profits are used is equally as important as creation of profits. Where profits can be brought to bear by willing individuals and companies to social benefit, so much the better. Moreover, this activity must be recognized and supported at government policy level as a badly needed, essential, and entirely legitimate enterprise activity.”

A people centred business is not a cooperative, it goes further in that no surplus is distributed to shareholders or members, while at least 50% of surplus is invested in developing the local economy. On the other hand. a community benefit society could be people-centred as could a CIC limited by guarantee.   . 

A people-centred business derives 100% of its revenue by means of trade. Fair Trade UK would not qualify to describe itself as a people-centred business on this basis.

Earlier this year Fair Trade had been crtiticised for failing to meet the needs of the poor.  A key feature of a people-centered business is a living wage policy.   As I have argued, requiring this of one's suppliers would go a long way toward avoiding another Rana Plaza.

Definitions and adherence to them take on increasing importance with a Labour Party pledging to create a legally binding definition for social enterprise, mere statements of "social purpose" have given profit maximisers access to government contracts..   

I've written this week to the EU Ombudsman to describe the experience of sharing a proposal for people-centred economic development with the EU for the Citizens Consultation of 2008. The paper described as a 'Marshall Plan' for Ukraine set out a blueprint for local economic development with a primary focus of childcare reform.  It was very clearly a people-centred strategy:

"This strategy places adequate funding for social benefit under control and management independent of government and the very obvious vicissitudes and conflicts inherent therein.

"This is a long-term permanently sustainable program, the basis for "people-centered" economic development. Core focus is always on people and their needs, with neediest people having first priority – as contrasted with the eternal chase for financial profit and numbers where people, social benefit, and human well-being are often and routinely overlooked or ignored altogether. This is in keeping with the fundamental objectives of Marshall Plan: policy aimed at hunger, poverty, desperation and chaos. This is a bottom-up approach, starting with Ukraine's poorest and most desperate citizens, rather than a "top-down" approach that might not ever benefit them. They cannot wait, particularly children. Impedance by anyone or any group of people constitutes precisely what the original Marshall Plan was dedicated to opposing. Those who suffer most, and those in greatest need, must be helped first -- not secondarily, along the way or by the way."

I've shared ny concerns with the EU Ombudsman because the EU's promotion of people-centred business as a "concept" is typical of the way intellectual property is hijacked. An exclusive gathering such as the meeting in Brussels last year, declares this "new thinking" to justify more public expenditure and a new carriage for the gravy train.    

Commissioner Michel Barnier is now in a very awkward position. Having first denied knowledge of our work on people-centered economic development , he had suggested scope for future cooperation. Clearly this was not intended.

Through this kind of denial the founder of People-Centered Economic Development was marginalised and excluded. As were the disabled children in institutions he spoke up for. The pretense that something does not already exists cost them their lives. As he said:

"In fact, Ukraine CAN afford to do more than let these children die. To date, to this moment, Ukraine has not bothered to try.

"That is a fact that I will defend with my life.

"The why and wherefore behind that fact is a tale of neglect and horror indefensible in any presumably civilized country."

Those we appealed to for support were prepared to see him do just that and he may well have written his own epitaph:

"Allowing that some people do not matter, as things are turning out, allows that other people do not matter and those cracks are widening to swallow up more and more people. Social enterprise is the first concerted effort in the Information Age to at least attempt to rectify that problem, if only because letting it get worse and worse threatens more and more of us. Growing numbers of people are coming to understand that “them” might equal “me.” Call it compassion, or call it enlightened and increasingly impassioned self-interest. Either way, we are all in this together, and we will each have to decide for ourselves what it means to ignore someone to death, or not."

One can imagine the comfortable ignorance in which this MEP will sit with a generous salary and expenses package, established on the backs of those who determined to be the change.

 

 

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