When I have read more careful critiques of NAFTA and the WTO, the more pungent point, including the unhappiness of US organized labor seems to end up focusing on free capital mobility. Although US auto and steel workers have had unpleasant experiences in recent decades with imports cutting jobs, what is holding back wage demands is the threat that the boss is going to close down the shop and move to (wherever).
Personally I have a lot of sympathy with the position of Jagdish Bhagwati: pro-free trade, anti-free capital mobility.
After all, Ross Perot was wrong. Unemployment did not soar in the US after NAFTA was adopted. Barkley Rosser -----Original Message----- From: Max Sawicky <sawicky at epinet.org> To: lbo-talk at lists.panix.com <lbo-talk at lists.panix.com> Date: Monday, September 27, 1999 11:14 AM Subject: RE: Marx on free trade
>JH:
>>I don't think that 'the worse, the better' is Marx's central point. . .
>
>Clearly not central, but plain enough and wrong.
>
>We should get straight from the outset that "protectionism"
>is the neo-liberal translation of any infringement on unregulated
>capital and merchandise flows across national boundaries.
>Buchanan gives them a chance to paint it in crypto-Nazi
>colors. BdL plays along with his 'nationalism of fools'
>reference.
>
>Labor's main thrust is to uphold labor standards. Obviously
>there is self-interest involved. But this is good for foreign
>workers too, and they know that. Specific unions are naturally
>interested in sectoral measures that they hope would benefit
>them directly, but this is a secondary focus.
>
>Up till now, labor and elements of the Right have combined to
>disrupt so-called free trade measures. The real test will come
>with the opportunity to construct positive trade agreements.
>We're not there yet. Rhetoric on the right about the New
>World Order and to some extent from some liberals (i.e., Nader)
>go against the principle of any trade agreements, or any
>international standards for commerce. So there is a fundamental
>difference between left and right on trade, in economic terms
>alone. The chauvinism and immigration just add fuel to this
>fire. There is no chance of any sustained alliance between
>labor and 'fractions of capital.' It is purely tactical,
>and can never be more than that.
>
>"Buy American" is a straw man; nobody's talking about that now.
>
>A valid criticism of the trade emphasis is that too much is
>made of it by labor, as a way of lessening pressure to do more
>in other, less safe areas.
>
>>>>>JF: . . .
>Anyway, as I understand Marx, the point of opposing protectionism
>was that its abolition would lead to a more rapid development of
>the productive forces, with the consequence that the proletariat
>would grow more rapidly in both numbers and power. This would
>in turn would lead to an exacerbation of the contradictions between
>capital and labor and hence eventually, so Marx hoped to revolution.
>I am not sure that Marx's point here is reducible to a simple
>immiseration thesis. . . .
>>>>>
>
>mbs: all the more reason to discount its current relevance.
>There's no issue of further development of productive forces
>or transition from agriculture to industry, as you say later.
>I hope we don't want to facilitate the transition from
>manufacturing to services unless we think that the worse
>things get, the better.
>
>Free trade in its neo-liberal, liberal, or "marxist" variants,
>is mostly another name for an unfettered market, or really
>unfettered ownership of capital, since the market-like nature
>of the result will be highly problematic. If regulating
>trade is bad, so too should regulating domestic markets. If
>a minimum wage is bad for Korea, it must be bad for the U.S.
>Throw in occupational health and safety, environmental regulation,
>etc. etc. Mix in the nostrum that globalization makes taxation
>difficult or prohibitively expensive and you're down to the
>anarchist fantasy of a minimal state.
>
>That's the slippery slope you folks are dancing along.
>
>Try listening to the workers on this one, why dontcha?
>
>mbs
>
>