FTAA-Free Trade, Anyone, Anything

FTAA"” Free Trade, Anyone, Anything The third Summit of the Americas, a grouping of all the leaders of the American continent (except for Cuba) took place on April 20-22, 2001 in Quebec City. This was the latest effort to unite the economies of the Western Hemisphere into a single free trade area (Free Trade Area of the Americas), hoping to strengthen economies throughout America in an attempt to rival our European counterparts. This FTAA pact would allow commercial companies the right to set up shop anywhere in America, and not pay any duty fees or extra taxes as it is the case now. This excludes the already present North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA, which allows Canada, the U.S.A. and Mexico to trade freely). What our government doesn't think of is the effect on its citizens that this agreement may have. Our living and working conditions will change as a result of this deal, and it is for the worst.

Romania, Germany, Canada, Hungary

United States

Canada

Free trade will diminish the amount of inexpensive labour left in Canada, thus leaving us with more unemployed personnel and a weaker economy. In a Capitalist economy, companies wish to have the cheapest labour cost to maximise the net gain that they can achieve. This objective will be more easily to attain than ever before with the FTAA agreement. Take for example, a fictional industry that produces an important material vital to the Canadian economy. Not wanting to pay the high labour costs of a fully developed country, the company decides to move down to South America and set up shop there. With cheap labour costs, they still produce the same relative amount of their product at a reasonable quality, and sell it at the same price as before, keeping the company shareholders content. What happens to those other workers that got left behind when the enterprise decided that they would fare better elsewhere? Nothing. They receive little or no compensation for their unemployment, and must go through the arduous task of finding another job. Of course, since the company that they worked for was not the only one that left the country, manual labour work is harder to find. The net effect on our economy is a general degradation of the lower class of society, and a greater gap between the rich and the poor is created. Briefly, with time our country will retrograde into a depression that may surpass the level of the one experienced in the 1930's.

"Trade not only spreads prosperity, but it also spreads freedom." George W. Bush.

What freedom is there in this trade? This contract between the American countries is not an option that we are given the honour of considering. Our supposedly democratic government has decided that they know what is best for us, when most of them will benefit from this deal (In terms of net gain) and more than a quarter of Canadian citizens will not. Imagine going to the dentist telling him that you have a toothache, except that he decides that he is going to rip out your entire jaw because it adds money to his pay check. You, having no choice in this operation, no freedom to choose, come out of there toothless and poor. Our elected officials are the dentists, and we are the paying customers in this deal. Officials who do not have our best interest in mind when they must make important choices flaw our democratic system, for this age-old procedure is supposed to allow us to represent our thoughts by means of elected politicians. The FTAA will do more damage and bring in far less supposed "advantages" than presumed to, but there is no input from the public that they even want the FTAA deal to go through. The public has no options to choose from, and the impact of Free Trade is well known. Freedom has been totally ignored in this case, letting the benefits of the rich cast a shadow over the losses of the inferior classes. Our leaders have put themselves into a communistic picture of our country and named it commercial-capitalism, trying to fool the public by telling them that what they are doing is for the good of society and for the healthy development of our nation. They decided this without asking what the small businessman wanted, or what the local industries thought of its (FTAA) worth.

What about the issue of the exploitation of children and women in under privileged countries? If the FTAA allows enterprises to set up shop in South America without paying taxes, we would unquestionably be bloodying our hands with illegal child labour. Our civic society is so used to the Charter of Rights that we forget what it was like before its legislation. Forced manual labour is the bane of any nation, especially when it is upon unwilling children, and an industrial company would not enter a foreign market for the scenery. Cheap labour at any cost, the motto and creed for any businessman wanting to make a profit. Capitalism has turned to a darker side of politics, no longer lingering in the background trying to influence politicians, but turning to the commercial sector for support. We pride our selves on being righteous and just, but our actions will ultimately destroy us all. If what the government wishes to do is to bring upon their citizens the destruction of social balance and bring civil unrest to our continent, so be it. "Hey boss, how about we force kids to do hard labour for us so we could save a couple grand? We won't even have to worry about any of those nasty ol' taxes anymore either. Canada made it FREE to abuse the rights of children for us, so that we could make more money. Now that is a thoughtful government." Is that what we have been reduced to? Already people protest for the rights of animals, saying that we have no proper authority to determine the fate of another being. What about the rights of our own race? Are politicians soulless enough to not care about other races and even our own? By entrusting near Olympian powers to a corporation, letting them choose what is ethical, the desolation of the West will become the pinnacle of humiliation of the known world.

"The leaders are more open to the views of the free trade foes than during the 1994 NAFTA (North American Free Trade Area) negotiations, which were held in secret. [That gave] the impression that people were ashamed of what they are doing." Vincent Fox, the president of Mexico.

On the contrary, the FTAA is something that they should be ashamed of. By publicly announcing the meeting, the leaders may give themselves an impression of self-righteousness, yet this very sentiment is fabricated, a façade designed to protect themselves from the hypocrisy of their own actions. The development of a nation is supposed to go forwards, to try tenaciously to attain a greater level of socio-economical utopia, when the actual direction Canada would be in would be falling back on our heels and hitting our heads.

Free trade may have been right for us in the past, it may be for us in the future, but as it is now, to allow the FTAA to continue on in its already lengthy life span would spell disaster as a four-letter acronym. Free trade, maybe for the politicians, but not for citizens.

English: A North American Free Trade Agreement (NA...

en map of NAFTA

Members of the Confederation of Indigenous Nationa...