Standardizing Globally, Responding Locally: The New Infrastructure, ISA 14000, and Canadian Agriculture

Neo-conservative ideology and the power of capital have increased significantly over the past two decades. Trade relationships and trade agreements between advanced capitalist nations have been negotiated largely in secret and with input limited to large corporations and trade associations. More recently, the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) attempted to develop a Multilateral Agreement on Investment (MAI) and the World Trade Organization (WTO) established a committee to study a Multilateral Investment Treaty (MIA). These initiatives, which would grant corporations the unrestricted right to buy, sell, and move their business at their discretion, would reduce and/or eliminate the rights of countries to limit foreign investment and to impose reasonable standards of behaviour on investors.