Social Consequences

In Latin America, the capital invested and the profits obtained by the multinationals have directly caused a devastating undernutrition. In countries like Brazil, where income distribution is very limited and unemployment very high, the majority of the children of poor families, malnourished and easy prey to illness, are suffering a mental retardation that is reaching alarming proportions, as illustrated, for example, by recent studies made in the Brazilian northeast.

The multinational companies represent the very essence of racism, unscrupulous economic, social and cultural plunder of non-white populations, under the pretext of white 'supremacy' and unlimited 'paternalism', the latter a front to hide their profound scorn for the countries that are the producers of raw materials and a cheap work force.

Racism continues to play its role in economic and social exploitation. Enterprises and governments practice racism with the objective of dividing the people, in the developed as well as in the underdeveloped countries. Thus the multinationals resort to the myth that the underdeveloped countries represent 'an inferior form of cultural development' and are greatly in need of 'the technological greatness' and the 'cultural values' (chewing gum, comics, Coca Cola) of the industrialised countries in order 'to have access to the civilised world.'