Illinois and foreign affairs

Anatoly N. Gerasimov asks why there are no national norms for consumption in the United States. He cites studies that show if all humanity consumed at the level of U.S. citizens, raw materials would run out in 20 years. "Mankind will have to realize sooner or later that consumption must be limited, because resources are exhaustible," contends Gerasimov, first secretary of the Leningrad City Committee of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union.

Gerasimov gets no argument from Boyd Keenan, a political science professor at the University of Illinois at Chicago. "There has been among the general population a reduced interest in ecology over the last seven, eight or nine years," he says. Keenan adds later that at times talk of ecology is equated with "subversion."

The exchange took place during, but not at, the Moscow summit. It occurred in the Illinois Capitol. Nothing that transpired in Springfield altered the balance of power or thawed East/West relations, but it did illustrate that Illinois' place in the world transcends national boundaries.

The Springfield summit had all the trappings of a real summit. Proceedings were simultaneously translated by interpreters in a makeshift glass booth. The Russian delegation dined at the executive mansion, toured Abraham Lincoln's home and watched the Illinois Senate in action. The exchange brought to Springfield seven representatives of the Russian Soviet Federated Socialist Republic, the largest of the 15 republics in the USSR.

The idea of the exchange was hatched between the Intergovernmental Cooperation Commission and the University of Illinois at Chicago. John Lattimer, executive director of the commission, said that in view of Gov. James R. Thompson's trips abroad, his office felt legislators should have a role in global issues. Karen Minnice, coordinator of the Office of International Programs at the University of Illinois at Chicago, said that the original intention was to promote understanding of the way in which governments below the national level in the two countries resolve issues. "Illinois is in so very many ways a part of the world," Minnice says.

Indeed it is. There is growing recognition that the welfare of Illinois citizens increasingly depends upon events beyond the borders of the United States. The South American debt crisis may mean a layoff for laborers on the Caterpillar assembly line. Canadian demands for reductions in acid rain imperil markets for high sulfur Illinois coal. The world oil glut keeps Illinois oil field workers at home. Grain embargoes mean fewer markets and lower prices for Illinois farmers.

In economic terms Illinois has a global place, according to figures from the Illinois Department of Commerce and Community Affairs (DCCA). Its gross state product was $185.6 billion in 1984. If it were a separate country, Illinois would be the world's 14th largest economic power. Exports account for 19 percent of the sales by Illinois firms and meant 300,000 jobs for Illinoisans. And the economic role brings with it demands that Illinois state government get involved with questions like apartheid in South Africa and religious discrimination in Northern Ireland.

Increasingly the state is helping its businesses look to markets abroad. Gov. Thompson traveled to Moscow in April as a booster for Illinois businesses. "Both of our nations have taken significant steps to remove some of the obstacles to increased trade. As governor of the most American of all of the states, I'm here today to tell you we stand ready to assist this effort," he told the US-USSR Trade and Economic Council.

Thompson administration's efforts have been of two kinds. Illinois has attempted to attract foreign investments like Mitsubishi Motor Corp. in the Diamond-Star plant in Bloomington. And the state has sought to help smaller firms find markets abroad for their products. Hendrik Woods, director of DCCA's International Business Division, sees two reasons for an increased state role. First, governors even more than the Congress understand what economic development is all about, both the need to develop markets abroad and to attract foreign investment. Second, federal budget cuts have diminished the role of the U.S. Commerce Department and opened the way for states to fill the vacuum.

With that economic role comes the clout to shape, or to try to shape, global issues. Typical was a campaign to pull state pension investments from companies that do business in South Africa. Begun at the University of Illinois in 1978, the campaign ended in 1986 with a law that prohibited new pension system investments of this sort after February 1, 1987.

Steve Apotheker, Champaign, who served as downstate coordinator for the Coalition for Illinois Divestment from South Africa, acknowledges that the prospective divestment bill finally passed was watered down, but he still believes it was significant. Its passage, he says, provided the foundation for federal legislation, including a package of sanctions now before Congress. "The building movement was certainly there," he says.

The current parallel to divestment is the attempt to convince state lawmakers to adopt the MacBride Principles to end discrimination against Roman Catholics in Protestant Northern Ireland. The legislation would require annual review of the employment practices of firms in which state pension money is invested. This in theory would bring pressure to end discrimination.

The shrinking world is causing a growing sense of global issues in states like Illinois. But the influence is not great. The Illinois Senate's April 28 resolution urging the Soviet Union to free its Baltic States has gone unheeded.□

July 1988 | Illinois Issues | 33