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Paul Bremer, head of the Coalition Provisional Authority, promulgated four orders that included ‘the full privatization of public enterprises, full ownership rights by foreign firms of Iraqi businesses, full repatriation of foreign profits….the opening of Iraq’s banks to foreign control, national treatment for foreign companies and…the elimination of nearly all trade barriers.’ The orders were to apply to all arenas of the economy, including public services, the media, manufacturing, services, transportation, finance, and construction. Only oil was exempt (presumably because of its special status and geopolitical significance as a weapon of distinctively US control). They also extend, it goes without saying, to the labor market. Strikes are forbidden and the right to unionize restricted. A highly regressive ‘flat tax’ (an ambition long held by the US conservatives) was also imposed. These orders were, as Naomi Klein points out, in violation of the Geneva and Hague Conventions since an occupying power is mandated to guard the assets of an occupied country and has no right to sell them off.
— David Harvey, Neoliberalism and the Restoration of Class Power (via newleft)
