The Global Marshall Plan Initiative works towards a worldwide Eco-Social Market Economy by the means of a Global Marshall Plan. Global Marshall Plan News is the means to inform all supporters about the latest developments.

What is the Global Marshall Plan?

The Global Marshall Plan aims at a "World in Balance". To achieve this we need a better design of globalization and the global economic processes - a worldwide Eco-Social Market Economy. This is a matter of an improved global structural framework, sustainable development, the eradication of poverty, environmental protection and equity, altogether resulting in a new global 'economic miracle'.

A World in Balance

The Global Marshall Plan includes the following five core goals:

implementation of the globally agreed upon UN Millennium Goals by 2015.

raising of an additional 100 billion US$ a year required to achieve the Millennium Goals, to enhance worldwide development.

fair and competitively neutral raising of these necessary resources, also by burdening global transactions.

gradually establish a worldwide Eco-Social Market Economy with an improved global policy framework through the interlinking of established rules and agreed upon standards for economic, environmental and social issues (WTO, ILO and UNEP standards).

new forms of appropriation of funds directed to the grassroots level, while at the same time fighting corruption.

Why do we need a Global Marshall Plan?

Because today's global situation is scandalous, and because the current conditions of globalization produce the complete opposite of what is constantly demanded in rosy speeches. Poverty, the north south divide, migration, terror, wars, cultural conflicts, and environmental catastrophes are all problems, which can no longer be resolved nationally under the conditions of a widely unregulated globalization process. Therefore, we need an improved and binding global framework for the world economy, that brings economy into harmony with society, culture, and environment.

Millennium Development Goals and Worldwide Eco-Social Market Economy

The Global Marshall Plan considers the realization of the United Nations Millennium Development Goals, which were signed by 189 nations in 2000, to be an important first step. The following goals should be achieved by 2015:

The Millennium Development Goals

Eradicate extreme poverty and hunger

Achieve universal primary education

Promote gender equality and empower women

Reduce child mortality

Improve maternal health

Combat HIV/AIDS, malaria and other diseases

Ensure environmental sustainability

Develop a global partnership for development

In order to create a World in Balance a worldwide Eco-Social Market Economy with globally binding social, ecological, and cultural standards is required. The Global Marshall Plan combines a functional and coherent global governance structure with appropriate reforms and intelligent interlinking of UN, WTO, IMF, World Bank and ILO and UNEP standards with the raising of an additional 100 billion US$ a year in order to co-finance development. The enlargement process of the European Union serves as a conceptual model for combining co-financing and the compliance with eco-social standards. This enlargement, however, requires a better financial support than it is the case in the current enlargement round.

Conference to Seek International Economic Consensus

San Francisco - The first steps in an unprecedented move to create global consensus on reforming international trade and financial organizations will be presented Monday, August 20, at a conference in San Francisco.

Speakers at the public event will include leading U.S. representatives of a Global Marshall Plan Initiative that began in Germany and Austria four years ago. Backing the plan are world leaders such as British Prime Minister Gordon Brown, President Lula da Silva of Brazil, and Franz Fischler, a former commissioner in the European Union. The new Marshall Plan will pursue an innovative path to create consensus for its policies through business, government and civil society around the world. It will use an interactive Internet site to write and rewrite documents spelling out ways of reforming the World Bank, the International Monetary Fund -- even the United Nations -- to achieve a more effective
approach than now exists to ending world poverty and addressing our environmental crisis. Members of thousands of non-governmental organizations (NGOs) are expected to add their voices to the final product. One aim of the Initiative is to create a tax on international transactions that would fund sustainable development. Another aim is to reform global trade and financial institutions so that developing countries can share more equally in the benefits of globalization. "The destructive turmoil in today's financial markets makes it clear that we need a far more stable and equitable structure for the global economy," said James Quilligan, US Coordinator of the Initiative. If successful, the plan could result in a tenfold expansion of the global domestic product in 50 to 100 years, its backers claim. The free, day-long conference in San Francisco, co-sponsored by a local chapter of the Network for Spiritual Progressives, is the first of several that will be held to gather public support for the Initiative, leading to an international conference in 2010.
The San Francisco event will be held on Monday, August 20, from 10 a.m. to 10 p.m. at the Cultural Integration Fellowship building, located at 2650 Fulton Street, across from Golden Gate Park

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