What the G20 should, but won't do

The G20 are meeting this week to discuss the total mess that they have made of the world economy and then arguing about how to fix it, before claiming at the end they had a construstive discussion with a lot of ideas presented on the way to go forward, but not actually coming to any agreement, or having anything at all come out of it, as it always does. They will still come out of this G20 conference, persuing the failed, debunked neo-liberal policies that led us into this global economic disaster.

The G20 countries will be too scared of upsetting the very people responsible for leading us into this crisis, the rich bankers, and the elite, and they wll be too timid with any propoals to change this system. What is needed is a radical rethink of the global economic system.

At the moment it is too unsustainable, the vast majority of the world's wealth is in the pockets of a handful of people, policies are designed around the idea that greed is good and that profit should be put before people, they have put the rich before the everyday person, and have encouraged debt and irresponsbile leanding.

The politicans, from both the left and right, must start to move away from the idea that greed is good, and consumerism works, greed is the main cause of the current finincal crisis, the greed of rich bankers, wanting to make more money, and not caring about the conquences of their actions, indeed Gordon Brown backed the "light touch" regulation approach, which, in part, was based on the flawed idea that greed by bankers was a good thing.

What is needed now, is a finincal system which places responsibility at it's heart, responsibility not to the stock holders and share holders, but to everyone, to society by enlargre and to the global community. Bankers, must learn that they now have a responsibility to society, and to helping ensure economic stablility. Politicans too much learn that they too are responsible to looking after all in society, not just the rich, and not just themslves. They must now have the guts to abandon the neo-liberal global consensus that led us to this mess.

The have to be willing to regulate the finincal sector, to ensure that such a sitution cannot happen again. The idea that regulation doesn't work and damages the economy has now been disproven on a global scale, the neo-liberal agenda has been debunked on the same global scale.

The governments must be more willing to take a more active role in the economy, and be more willing to get invovled with the market, being quick to correct it where it goes wrong, and ensuring that enough regulation is in place so that the system works for the poorest in society.

They also must be more willing to nationalise indstries providing a key service for all, such as utilities, who are over charging customers with ridiculously high, unjustifiable prices, which is hurting the most vunerable in society, and putting them into fuel poverty

If the politicans don't learn the mistakes from this disaster, then it will only repeat itself again and again, and next time, it will be worse. What is needed is a global society where the busineesses, governemtns, finincal insitutions and indivisuals all realise they have responbilities beyond that of narrow self-interest, that we all have responsibilties to the wider society as the whole.

We now have been given the opportunity to start down that path, but I fear that the politicans will not take the opportunity for a better world, that has presented itself to them.