Miss out on the puppets, tear gas, and bullhorns last weekend in Quebec? Not to worry. United for a Fair Economy (UFE) will sponsor a workshop next Wednesday at the Cambridge Center for Adult Education to discuss the free-trade showdowns of the past year and a half (starting with the World Trade Organization–inspired “Battle in Seattle”) and the movement against globalization. Thanks to the North American Free Trade Agreement, says UFE organizer Tomas Aguilar, employers have fled to Mexico, where corporations can profit from a lower pay scale. “That’s left a lot of people here without the jobs they were paying their mortgages with,” he notes.

In the past year, UFE and local activists staged protests against Boston-based Fidelity Investments, which was the majority shareholder in Occidental Petroleum, an oil company drilling in a region of Colombia populated by the indigenous U’wa tribe. “All of a sudden — ooh! — there might be oil there,” says Aguilar, “so they displace native people.” (Fidelity has since sold 60 percent of its stock in the company.)

UFE has also targeted Pfizer Pharmaceuticals in Cambridge, which manufacturers AIDS-treatment drugs that UFE believes should be distributed inexpensively or free to patients in Africa. Because of the Boston area’s concentration of high-powered companies, the group believes it’s possible to raise awareness about the consequences of wanton globalization right here at home.

“We hope that by applying pressure, we’ll at least be in the debate and have a seat at the table,” says Aguilar. “Right now, we don’t. A lot of people characterize this as anti-globalization, but it’s not. We know it’s happening, and we want a voice in how it’s happening. Will it be people-centered, or corporate-centered?”

“The Global Economy and You,” presented by United for a Fair Economy, will take place this Wednesday, May 2, at 8 p.m. at 56 Brattle Street in Harvard Square. The cost is $5, and space is limited. To register, contact the Cambridge Center for Adult Education at (617) 547-6789, ext. 1.

Issue Date: April 26 - May 3, 2001