Among the many inappropriate tweets Drumpf gave last night (when he should have been monitoring Harvey), was one calling NAFTA “the worst trade deal ever.” Well, I’ve been a left of center critic of “free trade” and, especially, these large multi-cultural trade deals. I’ve been especially concerned with the way such deals undermine labor laws and unions and often override product safety and environmental laws of individual nations.
Well, H. Richard Niebuhr famously said, “History is the laboratory of ideas.” We’ve had 3 decades (more or less) to test NAFTA, and, the evidence seems decidedly mixed. Texas and many midwestern farm states seem to have done well under the treaty. However, along with other massive trade deals, NAFTA does seem to have accelerated the flight of high-paying, blue collar manufacturing jobs from the U. S.--the practice of offshoring. It has given rise to the maquiladoras, the poverty-stricken factory towns in northern Mexico (along our Southern border) run by U. S. (and Canadian) companies with cheap Mexican labor, few environmental regulations, no unions, terrible labor standards, and terrible worker safety records—making products to export back across our border cheaper than they could be made here. And the factory towns and communities in the U.S. have largely been turned into ghost towns in response.
But as Drumpf rails against NAFTA constantly (sounding, on this topic, much like Bernie Sanders!), it is worth reminding people, especially Republicans, that NAFTA was a Republican idea. Yes, Bill Clinton signed it. But it was negotiated by Ronald Reagan and George H. W. Bush. And to be ratified in the U. S. Senate, it needed far more G.O.P. votes than Democratic ones. Even moderate and blue dog Democrats have usually wanted to “improve” NAFTA. It has been Republicans, until Drumpf, who have consistently labelled NAFTA an unqualified success.
It’s also worth remembering that trade deals are seldom about trade alone. They represent ways that nations become more positively intertwined. When Drumpf cancelled TPP (the Trans-Pacific Partnership), for instance, the Asian nations who negotiated that nation with us moved away from our influence and into China’s and India’s and are making overtures to the E.U. Now, I was very critical of the TPP and, considering that Sanders, HRC, and Drumpf all campaigned on ending it, it seems to have been doomed no matter who won last November. But could that have been accomplished in a way that showed respect for the Asian partners we turned away? I want NAFTA re-negotiated—but I don’t trust Drumpf to do that negotiating—and his tweets keep insulting Canada and Mexico.
The problem with the “economic nationalism” espoused by Trumpists (besides the implied racist nationalism that goes with it) is that the economy is global. Drumpf sees the world as consisting always of winners and losers. He doesn’t recognize either win-win or lose-lose scenarios. He can economically punish Mexico and Canada—but he can’t do it without hurting many parts of this country—including the economies of the states that elected him.
I don’t how we restore strong labor practices globally, keep safety and the environment high and deal with an economy that will, going forward, always include large multi-nation trade deals. But history moves only in one direction. We have to find a way to design better trade deals, not simply cancel them altogether. My friends on the economic left will be as appalled by that statement as the Trumpists will. I don’t want a world that’s a “race to the bottom” full of abandoned factories and neighborhoods here and maquiladoras throughout the global South. But Trumpist protectionism isn’t the answer.
And NAFTA, despite Bill Clinton’s signature, was not a Democratic negotiation. If Trump’s base hates it, they need to remember to blame Republicans, especially Reagan and Bush I.