Thomas Pogge's Lecture: Foreign Drivers of Domestic Injustice

Today Thomas Pogge delivered a lecture at the Department of Political Science, Delhi University. The lecture was titled " Foreign Drivers of Domestic Injustice". The post is a summary of his lecture.

Inequality of the kind that is a result of one's inborn condition is an expression of justice. Now not all inequality is injustice particularly if it's a result of one's choice.  But condition of inequality that is perpetuated and compounded because of being born into a specific economic class, social caste etc. is a case of injustice.

In India the gap between those at the highest rung of the economic ladder and those at the bottom is extremely wide. It's the widest in the world after Russia. But those at the top would want to perpetuate this gap. Now we need to ask why there are few at the top rung and many at the lowest rung of this economic ladder, and how they are able to sustain this gap. After all addressing injustice would mean working towards moving those at the lowest rung to the higher rung. Because only by going up the economic ladder, one can have better housing, education, healthcare etc.

Now those at the top rung are able to pull resources together to lobby the political powers and get tax laws work in their favour. The poor are unable to gather resources that way, and even if they try to make such an effort, the benefit they will get out of such lobby is not worth the effort. However, those at the top rung have such resources and even if they pull together 1% of their resources to lobby, the benefit they get out of such effort would yield them a benefit of, say, 10%. This way those at the top rung influences policy and frame rules and laws in their favour.

But how do foreign players perpetuate domestic injustice?

There are countries in the world that serve as parking lot for the rich's money. As the rich folks park their money in countries like Panama, Singapore, Mauritius etc., these folks evade paying taxes at home. This is illegal and yet it is done. Many a time the politicians at home refuse to take action or refuse to call these nations to stop this practice because the rich folks lobby with the government and are able to persuade the government not to act. Moreover, many politicians park their own money. This is one way foreign hands perpetuate and compound injustice in certain other countries.

There is also another way where foreign hands compound inequality at the domestic level. Rich countries invest money in research work and when finding is made, the medical knowledge/formula gets patented. Country like India requires cheap medicine to meet the requirement of its poor citizens. In the past Indian pharmaceutical companies were able to reproduce this medicine cheaply for its citizens by learning from those who have produced it. However, now with intellectual property rights becoming more rigid abroad, rich pharmaceutical companies abroad through their political leaders bargain hard with countries like India so that India would also have a much more rigid pharmaceutical laws. This rigid pharmaceutical law would in turn criminalise reproduction of patented medicine without permission. At the same time, there are rich Indian who would also like to export their produce to other countries. So, in exchange for a more rigid intellectual property rights at home, which would then not allow Indian pharmaceutical companies to reproduce cheap medicine, India would ask foreign countries to reduce its import duty so that Indian rich businessmen and businesswomen could export their produce to this foreign countries. The result is that the poorer section of the community in India become the casualty of such arrangement that came about through negotiation.

Thus, the rich ones will continue to seat at the top, while the poor ones suffer at the bottom... because the trading laws and policies have been framed to suit the interest of the rich while compounding the problem of the poor. This is how injustice is perpetuated.