Tal y como ha dicho el vicepresidente del Banco Mundial, «las guerras del próximo siglo serán por el agua». La reserva mundial de agua está cayendo en manos de multinacionales, que pugnan por controlar este precioso recurso. Los autores, activistas canadienses, denuncian el preocupante panorama de la realidad: las compañías multinacionales se benefician de la debilidad de los gobiernos, al tiempo que consumen las reservas de agua. En algunos países, el agua ha sido incluso privatizada, mientras las ventas de agua embotellada por parte de compañías como Perrier y Evian, y de refrescos como Coca-cola y Pepsi, se incrementan sin cesar. Finalmente, lo que en realidad está en juego es el poder de las multinacionales en un entorno económicamente liberalizado, frente al derecho de las personas a un elemento tan básico como el agua; la globalización, frente al cuidado y al respeto del medio ambiente y de los recursos naturales de la Tierra.
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BARLOW, MAUDE
Maude Barlow is the National Chairperson of the Council of Canadians and chairs the board of Washington-based Food and Water Watch. She is a founding member of the San Francisco-based International Forum on Globalization and a Councillor with the Hamburg-based World Future Council. Maude is the recipient of 11 honorary doctorates as well as many awards, including the 2005 Right Livelihood Award (known as the ?Alternative Nobel?), the Citation of Lifetime Achievement which she received at the 2008 Canadian Environment Awards, the 2009 Earth Day Canada Outstanding Environmental Achievement Award, the 2009 Planet in Focus Eco Hero Award, and the 2011 EarthCare Award, the highest international honour of the Sierra Club (U.S.). In 2008/2009, she served as Senior Advisor on Water to the 63rd President of the United Nations General Assembly and was a leader in the campaign to have water recognized as a human right by the UN. She is also the author of dozens of reports, as well as 16 books, including the international bestseller Blue Covenant: The Global Water Crisis and The Coming Battle for the Right to Water.<BR><BR>http://www.canadians.org/about/Maude_Barlow/
CLARKE, TONY
Tony Clarke (born 1944) is a Canadian activist. He grew up in Chilliwack, British Columbia, graduating from Chilliwack Senior Secondary School in 1962. He was class president. He studied at the University of British Columbia and did graduate work at the University of Chicago, obtaining a PhD in the history of religion. He presented a dissertation titled The Color Line and the American Metropolis: A Search for a Form of Ministry in the Aftermath of the Civil Rights Movement in Chicago (1974). After Chicago, he worked for the Canadian Conference of Catholic Bishops for 21 years, serving as Director of Social Policy.<BR><BR>Clarke was the chair of the Action Canada Network, a coalition of labor groups and activists to lead the battle against the 1987 Canada-United States Free Trade Agreement. These activists joined forces with anti-free traders from Mexico and the United States to oppose the North American Free Trade Agreement. As a result of his leadership role in the anti-free trade movement, Clarke was fired from the Conference of Bishops. As a response to his firing, Clarke wrote Behind the Mitre: The Moral Leadership Crisis in the Canadian Catholic Church (Toronto: HarperCollins, 1995), analyzing the role of the Catholic Church and Church-State relations in the previous two decades.<BR>In the years since leaving the Conference of Bishops, Clarke has continued his activism, working closely with Maude Barlow of the Council of Canadians. In 1997 he formed the Polaris Institute., and led the campaigns against the Multilateral Agreement on Investment, the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation, and the World Trade Organization.<BR>As a result of his activist work, he and Maude Barlow were awarded the 2005 Right Livelihood Award.<BR>As of December 2011 Clarke sits on the board of directors of the International Forum on Globalization.<BR><BR>Wikipedia