When a multinational petroleum company attempts to secure a government permit to drill for oil who should be consulted? What if the proposed drill site is on the land of indigenous people? What if the site is on disputed territory? What if it is on sacred land? What if the government in question was financially unstable and the revenue from the drilling permit could improve the lives of many of the country's people? What if the government and the company worked together to form a close partnership of resource exploitation and profit that by-passed the needs of local people? What if local people, indigenous people spoke-out against the drilling? What if their lives were threatened for protesting? What could international supporters, especially youth supporters do to help local people faced with these heinous circumstances?

Youth Summit participants discuss campus organizing

These are just some of the questions that were raised during the Globalization and Human Rights panel at the Youth Summit on Globalization this January in Washington, DC. The workshop was designed to explore some of the issues confronted by human rights defenders in the face of unbridled economic globalization. Though oil companies are one of the most notorious perpetrators of human rights abuses in the name of globalized greed, they are by no means the only ones. The panel highlighted other powerful multinational companies and lending agencies, like the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund, that are working in close partnership with some of the world's most corrupt governments to homogenize the global economy and accelerate the great "race to the bottom."

So where are these globalization hot spots and what has been done? Nigeria, Burma, Colombia, Indonesia . . . sadly, the list goes on and on . . . And in all of these countries, there are not only economic and environmental impacts of resource extraction projects and "poverty reduction" schemes, but there are human impacts and political ramifications that often vault smaller localized conflicts onto the international stage.

Tibet is a good example and one that was highlighted during the panel. In 1999, the World Bank approved funding for a loan that would transfer nearly 60,000 ethnically Chinese people onto Tibetan lands. The China-Tibet project threatened to not only destroy the fragile ecosystem of the proposed area, but also to overwhelm and further disenfranchise local Tibetan and Mongolian populations living in disputed territory. When local Tibetans risked their lives to speak-out against the project, the Bank and China did all they could to undermine their concerns and to continue with implementation. Only after a 15-month international campaign succeeded did the plug finally get pulled on this ill-conceived project.

The harsh reality for the Tibetans, and for many other communities facing globalization issues in their backyards, is that governments, corporations, multi-lateral lending agencies, and other international agencies, rarely take the time to listen and consult with local people about their development needs. In most cases, it is only when conflict arises and the international spotlight shines on these areas, that decision makers are forced to re-think their agendas. This is one of the reasons that activism and solidarity movements are so crucial in defending human rights and the environment around the world. The efforts that young people make on behalf of local communities facing the harsh realities of globalization results in not only the short-term determent of abuses, but also in a long-term shift in the way that globalization evolves.