Raghian is a third-year political science student and member of
the International Socialist Organization.
By Behzad Raghian
On April 20 and 21, political leaders from34 countries will be
negotiating the Free Trade Area of the Americas at the Summit of
the Americas meeting in Quebec City, Canada. The FTAA is an
agreement to extend the North American Free Trade Agreement to
encompass all of the Western Hemisphere, except Cuba, by the year
2005. The FTAA has come to be known by those in the
anti-globalization movement as “NAFTA on steroids.”
Now, if you don’t know much about the FTAA or
haven’t even heard about it, don’t be surprised. The
details of the agreement have been kept secret since its proposal
in 1994. But we do know that it is based on NAFTA, and for that
reason, to understand the potential impacts of the FTAA we have to
look at the devastating impacts of its predecessor.
NAFTA went into effect on Jan. 1, 1994, and within seven years,
its impact has been widespread and devastating. The treaty claimed
that the elimination of trade barriers (in all forms) would
eventually lead to a lowering of prices and the creation of more
jobs. Seven years later the free-trade cheerleaders have been
proven wrong. In fact, since Mexican tariffs on imported
agricultural goods were reduced under NAFTA, some one million small
farmers have been pushed out of business. The prices of basic
foods, like corn, are up in Mexico, not down.
The FTAA is expected to go much further than NAFTA on the issue
of privatization ““ the turning over of state-run industries
to the private sector. Governments would have to open up any and
all commercial activities to private competition ““ from
state-run utilities to government health care programs. It is the
workers in these countries that feel the full impact of these
measures, whether it is through the loss of irreplaceable union
jobs or the dependence on the uncertainties of the free market to
provide some of life’s most basic necessities. We don’t
have to look any further than our own backyard to illustrate this
point.
Since the deregulation of the electrical industry, we have seen
the price of electricity double in this state, with plans for
further rate increases in the near future as corporations like
PG&E file for bankruptcy. Along with this much of the state is
experiencing rolling blackouts and brownouts. People are being
denied access to electricity, one of life’s necessities,
because corporations want to exact as much profit as possible,
regardless of the impact on people’s lives.
So is it any wonder that the Bolivian people staged mass
demonstrations to stop an attempt by the International Monetary
Fund to privatize water in that country? We can expect more of the
same under the FTAA.
 Illustration by JARRETT QUON/Daily Bruin Intellectual
property is another issue raised by the FTAA. These are the
provisions that are currently being used to restrict the
availability of generic AIDS drugs to impoverished African nations.
In fact, 40 pharmaceutical companies, including U.S. companies, are
currently taking the government of South Africa to court over
whether the government of South Africa is interfering with these
corporations’ rights to make a profit by providing generic
AIDS drugs to its population to stave off what has become a
pandemic in Africa.
These corporations would much rather allow people to die so they
can exact a profit. Under the FTAA we can expect to see the same
attacks on Brazil, which has provided the same services to its
AIDS-afflicted population. But Brazil is a success story ““ it
has reduced the spread of AIDS by more than 40 percent. But
don’t expect that to last under the FTAA.
As if these weren’t enough to paint a horrific picture,
the FTAA would still go further. We have already seen the
devastating environmental impacts of the “maquiladoras”
in northern Mexico, as well as the attack on workers safety, pay
and ability to unionize. With “free trade” comes the
opening of “borders” to capital flows, but it also
means the militarization of the physical borders to
immigration.
Since the inception of NAFTA, Operation Gatekeeper, the
Immigration and Naturalization Service’s military-style
operation at the border, has caused the deaths of more than 600
people attempting to enter this country. This statistic, however,
doesn’t include the degree of racist scapegoating that
immigrants face once they have entered the United States. Maybe we
should ask ourselves if all of this would be necessary if NAFTA,
and the peso devaluation it caused, hadn’t plunged 60 percent
of Mexico into poverty while creating the first of a series of
Mexican billionaires.
As we enter into what is becoming a worldwide recession, U.S.
corporations and their political puppets are looking for new ways
to secure and protect profits in a world that is becoming
increasingly polarized into trading blocs.
Is it any wonder then that the approval and passage of the FTAA
is the number one priority of these corporations and politicians?
The FTAA would secure exclusive trading rights for U.S.
corporations in the Americas and fend off competition from the
European Union and Japan. The Americas represent a market of over
750 million people and currently account for more than 50 percent
of all world trade.
This is why we need to oppose the FTAA and its terms of
globalization. Globalization as a phenomenon is not something we
should oppose as long as its goals are to meet the needs of the
planet and its people. But globalization based on the FTAA puts
corporate profits before human need.
The real question, then, is who decides? Will it be the handful
of corporations and politicians who seek to make a profit
regardless of the human cost, or will it be the people whose lives
treaties like this directly affect?
What can you, as a student, do to get involved? Last week, the
International Socialist Organization, Conciencia Libre, MEChA and
the Environmental Coalition hosted a teach-in on the FTAA. The
event was intended to educate students to the effects of the FTAA
and the need to stop it as well as provide an opportunity for
students to mobilize for the FTAA demonstration.
On April 21 there will be an unprecedented cross-border
solidarity demonstration on the San Diego-Tijuana border bringing
activists from both sides of the border together. The demonstration
will take place along with a number of other scheduled
demonstrations throughout the hemisphere, most notably in Quebec
City, as people mobilize in the fight against corporate
globalization.
As students, we should be aware of the impacts of trade
agreements like the FTAA and the destabilizing effect they will
have on our lives and planet. Passage of the FTAA represents
nothing but a race to the bottom for people in the North and South.
It is a step backward on issues like workers’ rights to
unionize, workplace safety and environmental protection.
April 21 represents opportunities for students to get involved
in the anti-globalization movement and have an impact in shaping
our world. It is an opportunity to advance our agenda, one that
puts human need before corporate greed.
If you are interested in participating in the border action
demonstration of April 21, please contact the International
Socialist Organization, Conciencia Libre, MEChA or the
Environmental Coalition for more information.