Effects of the global process
Interview with the the Master –, through Benjamin Creme
by Patricia Pitchon

The growth of global corporations and the World Trade Organization may provide the structure for eventual redistribution of the world's resources, thereby ending starvation and poverty.

The World Trade Organization

Many decisions affecting millions of people and producing powerful and often very destructive social, environmental, economic and political impacts can no longer be made by local and national governments. Any decision challenged by a World Trade Organization member nation is referred to a group of unelected trade officials in Geneva who work for this newly created global agency. Benjamin Creme’s Master kindly agreed to answer questions on the effects of globalization.

Patricia Pitchon: What, in the Master’s view, are the worst dangers lurking in the wake of creating such a deeply undemocratic structure as the WTO?

The Master: Left to itself, the unfolding of these “trade arrangements” would lead to total catastrophe and the breakdown of normal relations between nations, but this is not necessarily going to take place. Inevitably in any such arrangements, intelligent leaders build into all agreements safeguards and checks. This will inevitably be the case in the present agreements. The reality is that no nation, not even the biggest and the strongest, wants to be the victim of its own miscalculations.

PP: Currently, European corporations challenge American laws they don’t like, and US corporations challenge European laws they don’t like. Both do the same with their Japanese counterparts. Corporations appear to win in any case by weakening citizen protection laws. What does the Master think about this type of corporate activity?

The Master: This is an exaggeration of the effect of globalization of corporate trade. In practice, the protection of self-interest among the nations will result in the checks and balances mentioned in my previous answer. Precisely those controls will develop which will be seen to be necessary for self-interest. What seemed “easy gains” may have dubious consequences for themselves as well as for others.

Conglomerates or mega-corporations

In previous centuries, vigorous oversight of corporations was practised by the citizenry in North America. For example, no corporation could own another corporation. Yet today we have conglomerates representing an awesome accumulation of power. One such, just to illustrate this situation, is General Electric. It is involved in stock broking, banking, manufacture of plastics and medical diagnostic equipment, it owns NBC, it makes electric motors, turbines and aircraft engines. It keeps a permanent watch on legislation in the US and employs around 22 political lobbyists and extra staff when needed in Washington.

PP: To what extent, in the Master’s view, are politicians ‘in the pockets’ of large corporations in the United States, Japan and Western Europe?

The Master: It varies, of course, but a broad figure of 75 per cent control of the politicians in America and Japan, and generally 75 per cent control of the political decision-making in the G7 countries (these include Western European countries and Canada).

[Benjamin Creme added at this point that this figure of 75 per cent referred to the thinking and decisions or actions of the politicians, who were “learning to play the commercial game”. Interestingly, he referred to Maitreya’s affirmation some years ago that “commercialization was more dangerous than the atomic bomb” and admitted that it had seemed a somewhat dramatic statement to him at the time. I agreed that this was the way it had also struck me then, but now that the dangerous effects of the commercialization of so many aspects of life were becoming much more visible, Maitreya’s view seemed entirely accurate. We then discussed briefly Mr Creme’s view that the politicians have not seen far enough ahead to the implications of having created rigid trade enforcement mechanisms and he agreed with the Master’s view that the dynamics, as things are tried out and seen to be working poorly or disadvantageously, will be modified through processes of trial and error.]

PP: Should conglomerates be broken up to restore better public oversight and reduce this concentration of power?

The Master: It will not happen. In effect, what the global corporations are doing is creating the mechanism (without knowing it) for the distribution of the world’s resources. The structure can allow very practical and rational redistribution of the world’s resources. So it is not a question of dismantling but of using these structures for different ends. These include physical links such as roads and other transport links, communication and information networks, and the ability to move money rapidly around the world. [Benjamin Creme added that there are now corporate moguls who are singing a different tune, such as George Soros, for example.]

PP: To what does the Master attribute this change of heart?

The Master: The change of heart of men such as these and others is due to different factors. One is the intelligent realization of the effect in global terms of that which they have helped to set in motion. More powerful is the influence of the new energies which are sweeping through all strata of society. A new light plays upon the world. The energy of Equilibrium, focused through Maitreya, is cleansing the world of the old divisions and hatreds and many high-powered executives who up till now have developed their life toward the fulfilment of their personal ideals and ambitions are responding to this new energy. In this way, the mechanism of change can be seen as already in place. Many such executives are powerfully influenced by these energies and will become willing partners in the reconstruction which will inevitably take place. Many will be potent advocates of the necessary changes.

PP: Does the Master wish to add anything?

The Master: There is a time factor in this. The changes must take place in a manner not so fast as to overwhelm and destroy the present arrangements but to be sufficiently radical as to implement the aspirations of all men of good will.

From the July 1997 issue of Share International