At Mother Jones’ blog, Bradford Plumer riffs off of a Democracy Arsenal post and wonders why "free trade" and "fair trade" liberals can’t find political common ground.
Part of the problem, I think, is a simple trust issue. Whenever the "fair trade" crowd raises objections to this or that treaty, as with CAFTA, the neoliberal contingent thinks that certain caveats—labor standards, or environmental protections—are merely a stalking-horse for overt protectionism. In other words, that opposition to trade treaties are being made in bad faith, as an excuse to scuttle trade in general. Now certainly that’s true for some people…. But a good number of fair-traders are quite sincere about blending trade with the proper sort of labor protections that make the world a better and richer place.
Not to contribute to intraparty rancor, but I have to disagree. First, the lack of trust cuts the other way as well, and it’s odd that Plumer doesn’t mention the sense among the anti-globalization forces that arguments for free trade can’t be anything other than intellectual window dressing for nefarious smuggling in of corporate interests. Second, liberal free traders — at least this one — don’t doubt for a second the sincerity of the fair traders position on labor and environmental restriction; they simply think that the fair traders are misdiagnosing the problem and offering the wrong solution. Those who take seriously the case for free trade find fault not in the protectionist intentions behind certain measures, but rather in the protectionist effects. A measure that imposes labor and environmental standards acceptable to 1st world progressives may well halt development in many 3rd world nations. If this is true, then a compromise would be good for the U.S. domestic political scene, but detrimental to livelihood of many poor people across the globe. Conversely, if the fair traders are right in their diagnosis, every day we don’t have these regulations in place means more destruction of the environment and exploitation of workers. Third, Plumer’s analysis leaves out a telling part of the equation: the third world nations themselves. I’d hardly pretend that all of the political spectrum in these nations speak with one voice, but their representatives negotiating and militating for more open trade treaties tend to view regulation add-ons to treaties as protectionist in effect and perhaps intent. At the very least, their trust of U.S. and European progressives needs to be taken into consideration.
As with the relation of the environmental movement to the market (which the Economist highlights this week), trust is half the battle, but the ultimate disagreement still lies in incompatible models of the political economy.
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