“If we disrupt the interests of multinationals, they will exit our countries, and that will worsen unemployment, and the goods and services they provide will be lost; isn’t this bad for our economies?”
I am surprised at how often this question comes up. This reveals how deeply we have internalized the false premise that multinationals are drivers of economic growth, instead of recognizing what should be obvious; that they reduce competition, undermine local industry, and drain economies. We do not need multinationals, they need us.
While multinational corporations can increase demand for skilled labor in a host country, and perhaps create jobs in manufacturing and production; bear in mind both that this demand could just as feasibly be created by state support for local industry, and that the ultimate beneficiaries of multinational manufacturing jobs are the companies themselves…the profits are exported out of the host country. You are working for a foreign firm; for its prosperity, and to increase the wealth of its shareholders. You are not contributing to economic growth in your country.
The experiment of globalization has resulted in a drastic increase in wealth disparity all over the world; the monopolization of wealth in the hands of fewer and fewer people at the top of the economic. Because that is why multinationals come to your country…to make profit for their owners; not to boost your economy. That is the way the system works. If you are identified as a potential manufacturing hub for multinational corporations, it is because you are poor, and can overtybe reliably kept poor, so wages can stay low. Only a consumer economy needs a population with disposable income. If you are being integrated into the global economy as a producer for multinationals, your eligibility for that role depends on the sustainability of your poverty. The only way to be a prosperous export economy is if the products you manufacture and export are produced for local companies; not for General Motors, Nike, or Unilever. If you are a manufacturer for multinationals, you are just an offshore slave plantation; I don’t think this is difficult to comprehend.
Now, having said that, i do not believe that, in most cases, disrupting the interests of multinationals will cause them to exit the country; particularly not if that disruption is accompanied by specific demands which, if met, will end the disruption. Within their own psychopathic logic, corporations are highly rational. They have already made significant investments, and are unlikely to simply cut and run, to set up shop elsewhere. That would be more costly than acquiescing to rebel demands, and countries like Egypt are just too strategically important to discard.
I believe that the corporate response to disruption will go through a few phases, the first being, of course, pressuring the regime to intensify repression in the hopes of ending disruption by force. But disruption is simply impossible to prevent at every point in any corporate system, so if rebels persevere, the companies will have no alternative but to negotiate with them and concede to their demands. they may threaten to exit the country, but that would just be a bluff. They can’t, and why should they when there is a profitable option to remain?
However, if they do depart, it is important to understand that this would not be a disaster. If multinationals leave your country, you have a shot at gaining real economic sovereignty and political independence in the absence of their interference. You can draft economic policies that support local business, protectionist trade measures, currency controls, wealth redistribution through tax policies, wage regulations and laws governing corporate ownership, and so on.
You ave nothing to lose by disrupting corporate power, and you have everything to gain…and frankly, I do not see another realistic way to advance the goals of the revolution