What's new?
Why the world needs a body like the GBRI
By Adrian Pepper
When privately funded, public policy-oriented research foundations
were first started in the middle of the twentieth century, the world
was very different to the one we know today. Back then, the state
was overreaching itself in many Western countries as well as those
in the Soviet bloc to the East. Much of the work of the economic
"think tanks" concentrated on what Governments had to do to free
their countries' economies and set them back on the road to prosperity.
As a consequence of the work of those early think tanks, liberal,
free market ideas have been in the ascendant across much of the
world for the past quarter of a century. And in practice too, free
markets have undermined planned economies. In place of centralized
government control, businesses are more free to produce and trade
what they want and consumers have more choice.
In many of the world's most prosperous countries, power has shifted
from government to people. It follows, then, that the changes in
the shape and structure of the free market prosperous economies
will be dictated by the choices of millions of consumers and the
actions of those supplying goods and services to them. If people
can change the nature of their economy by trading in their own country,
then, by extension, people can change the nature of the global economy
through world trade.
We know that world trade makes people more prosperous both in rich
countries and in poor ones. Every deal struck is struck because
it benefits both parties to the deal. Lots of deals make lots of
people, whether they live in a rich or poor country, better off.
So what is the challenge? Put simply, it is to help more people,
and that often means more businesses, trade with each other.
How do we meet the challenge? We try persuade the governments of
all countries to stop planning and start freeing their economies;
we campaign harder in countries where free market institutions are
not deeply rooted; we provide business with information tools to
make it easier to strike deals; we educate people about doing business
with those from different countries and different cultural backgrounds;
we provide businesses and consumers with a voice advocating open
markets and free competition; we encourage businesses themselves
to become active advocates of free markets; we publicize the benefits
of trade and foreign investment to all. It is a big agenda.
And where does the GBRI fit in? Rather like those mid- twentieth
century think tanks, the GBRI must work to keep liberal, free market
ideas in the ascendant. But in the twenty-first century, our goals
have to be more ambitious. For our audiences are not only governments,
NGOs and the media, but the new agents of change in the global marketplace
- businesses and customers too.
Adrian Pepper is the Editor-in-Chief of the Global Business Research
Institute. You can contact Adrian by email at: adrian@gbri.org.
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