Should we start a campaign to end NAFTA?
Is it totally impracticable to try to join in a nationally organized campaign to dispose of NAFTA? Many say “yes” but:
1. All of us working in solidarity with the people of Latin America know that “free” trade is not at all free—-but centrally planned, not by some totalitarian country but by a powerful, global band of multinational corporations, neoliberal governments (with or without their people informed and agreeing), and their international financial institutions (again not at all democratically).
2. Most of us activists know—-and often proclaim—-that NAFTA has failed! It has created billionaires in all three countries but lead to the loss of thousands of good, manufacturing jobs in Canada and the US and created far worse poverty for 26 million Mexicans.
3. It is clear to many that the main cause of today’s immigration crisis in the US is NAFTA’s effects on subsidized US corn forcing millions of small farmers out of work in Mexico, and such retail giants as WalMart (700 of them in Mexico) forcing the closure of over a milliion small businesses there.
4. We know that NAFTA is undemocratic.
5. That it threatens national sovereignty.
6. That it serves as a dangerous model for new trade agreements, eg DR-CAFTA and now the US-Peru “Free” Trade Agreement, and also the sweatshop maquilladas from the Mexican-US border down into much of Central and South America.
FROM THE CENTER FOR INTERNATIONAL POLICY (CIP):
“It’s important to reject the erroneous and harmful free-trade model and demand a truly new trade policy for the nation. One thing we learned from the Peru vote is that accepting small modifications in the model allows the policy to proceed unquestioned….devastating to workers in developing countries and in the US. Only a coherent and principled stand against all NAFTA-style Free Trade Agreements and a demand to seriously evaluate and revamp international trade policy can bring about changes that promote development and labor rights for all.
FROM LORI WALLACH, PUBLIC CITIZEN’S GLOBAL TRADE WATCH:
There was little focus on the Peru NAFTA expansion deal in the Senate, but in the House an intense, multi-month debate resulted in a majority of House Democrats, including 12 of 18 House committee chairs, voting against the Peru pact and signaling that it is not an acceptable model for future trade agreements….”
Next step? We’ll ask the Alliance for Responsible Trade where their efforts stand. —-Peter Mott, Co-Editor, INTERCONNECT
— Peter Mott
Absolutely ask the ART and perhaps solicit the aid of the Democracy Now radio stations which were recently launched. * New stations broadcasting Democracy Now! *
WVVY 93.7 FM in Tisbury (and Martha’s Vineyard), MA is now airing
Democracy Now! at 5 p.m., M-F
WVVY, 93.7 FM in Tisbury, MA is now airing Democracy Now! at 5 p.m., M-F
= = = = = = = = =
* New stations broadcasting “Los Titulares de Hoy” (Democracy Now!‘s daily
news summary in Spanish) *
La Klave 92.1 FM – San Salvador, Weekly Summary Saturdays 7 pm and Sundays
8am
Radio Suchitlán 92.1 FM – Suchitoto, Saturdays from 12 to 1pm
Radio Monseñor Romero 92.5 FM – Ciudad Barrios, San Miguel, Daily Headlines,
12 noon
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— greencastle · Dec 11, 09:41 AM · #
Mexico’s per capita GDP growth under NAFTA has been about 1/3 its pre-1980 growth. See http://www.cepr.net/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=1187 for more on how NAFTA has impacted the Mexican economy.
— Dan · Jan 7, 06:45 PM · #
Why not a new campaign to defeat NAFTA? We have fresh allies in this struggle! In Chicago, on January 2nd Centro Sin Fronteras, a small but very vocal grassroots, community based organization staged a protest and press conference in the middle of Chicago’s financial district to oppose the disappearance of the last protective tariffs on the importation of basic crops like corn, beans, and sugar to Mexico. Their focus was the direct connection to the effects NAFTA has had and will have on immigration. I saw the local news coverage and it was pretty good. The reporter made the connection between NAFTA destroying the ability of farmers in Mexico to compete against US subsidized crops and the effect it has had on the number of immigrants from Mexico over the last 10 years. The reporter added that people in Mexico were left without any choices other than to migrate.
This may not seem historic as other groups are making this link but I think it’s significant that community based groups here (social movements in Mexico already made the connection years ago!) are now making that huge jump from local issues to global policies. I’ve been a community activist for many years. We can talk to folks on the street about education, health care, housing, immigration issues and get consensus pretty quickly for them to join a campaign for action around these issues that directly affect them. But when we speak about US foreign policy, we have to stick to middle class, or upper middle class circles. Usually folks at the grass-roots are too busy dealing with survival issues to tackle such far away or removed subjects. The connections from global to local are difficult. Or, I should say, we’re difficult. We have a real bread and butter issue in the current immigration situation that makes the connection for us easier.
I know folks have been working on NAFTA and for a long time and feel discouraged since this last phase of NAFTA went through without much opposition.
But I think 10 years of education and real facts on the direct effects of NAFTA have paved the way for a renewed effort to oppose this trade policy. ART, Public Citizen, CIP and other organizations have done excellent work in gathering the information anyone needs to discuss such lofty subjects as Foreign Trade issues around our kitchen tables. Let’s take this dinosaur down. We can do this. We just have to agree on two things that will unite the immigrant rights movement, solidarity, and labor and trade policies activists:
-We need an immigration policy that takes into account that our foreign trade policy has caused the increased numbers of immigrants and we have to take responsibility for this by creating a path to legalization for everyone here until the root cause is remedied.
-Get rid of NAFTA. We must redefine our development goals with trade agreements that will assure sustainable economic benefits for all our partners. Economic benefits that will strengthen their economies and that will eventually benefit the US by creating stronger partners and markets for the U.S.
— Peggy Valdés · Jan 8, 04:35 PM · #