This weekend could be one for the history books. A major meeting, the outcome of which could greatly impact all of our lives for the next few decades, is about to take place in Washington. Still-President George Bush has summoned world leaders to spend the weekend deciding on how to reorganize the world’s financial system. This is a desperate effort by world leaders to protect their economies as the pyramid-scheme known as modern banking collapses around them. Some are referencing this weekend as the start of “Bretton Woods Two.” I’m having a hard time understanding just what that is supposed to mean. My eyes glaze over as I try to make sense of documents written in economist jargon and bureaucratese. I don’t know what the leaders are going to come up with, or what it is going to mean for the rest of us. I can hope that the meetings bring about fair and just monetary reform that improves the lives of people. I suspect however, that the politicians will do everything they can to prop up the status quo. It is probable that they will fight for the interests of the coalition of criminal-syndicate banks and multi-national corporations who got us into this mess in the first place. My own instincts and intuition tell me that this summit has big evil written all over it. If the meetings don’t collapse under the weight of the hubris and arrogance of its participants, (still a very good possibility) a big change will be coming, and it may not be the kind of change we need.
The following are some resources that you might look into to better understand what is going to happen.
Bretton Woods 2 FAQ
European Network on Debt and Development
The G20 Leaders Summit on Financial Markets and the World Economy
University of Toronto Munk Centre for International Studies
Bretton Woods Sytem Bretton Woods II
Wikipedia
Group of 20
Financial Times
A New Bretton Woods
The Guardian UK