The global class war Book

Faux is not an academic--he is an anti-globalization activists although he would not be found in the streets of Seattle or Toronto during an archetypal clash between police and demonstrators as the G-8 comes to town. The story he tells isn't new--finance capital is loyal to itself and not to any of the states in which it may have branches. Risks have been socialized and profits privatized throughout the world and there is little ultimate difference between the privatization of the Mexican telephone system (Carlos Slim), Foxconn moving iPad production from China to Brazil or forced child labor on cocoa plantations in Sierra Leone.

"The Global Class War" focuses on the North American Free Trade Agreement. Faux is an expert on the politics of its passage in Canada, Mexico and the U.S and the dismal economic returns in each of these countries after the implementation of NAFTA and he tells the story very well. It is a bleak tale.

One of the difficulties in writing a more or less ripped from the headlines book is that events after it is published can make much of it invalid or at least suspect. This happens here in the second part of the book where Faux makes some policy recommendations, chief among them the creation of a true North American union much like the European Union with its common currency, open borders and strict rules regarding safety and health of workers, environmental protection and even a bit of human rights. While this looked great in 2006 when the book was published, trying to copy the EU and the Euro is a non-starter today, something like moving into a house that is on fire.