Civitas Blog

Historically, we had local value added economies with about five to seven levels of added value from raw product up through to retail. The Marshall Plan which helped restore Europe and Asia was based on local value added economies. This was based on the awesome industrial might of the USA that won WW2.
The U.S. after the war supported ways to duplicate this success in other lands. They did not chop up our economy and export parts of it around the world. The pundits of old warned that the nation that does not make or grow their own products that they would soon be under the power of the ones who do. The U.S. is not only sending the golden eggs laid by the golden goose but is now sending the goose itself.
For the most part, trade in the past was based on trading products directly. One nation traded items for the items they did not have. Moving factories and outsourcing labor was never considered to be trade.
Today the core of Free Trade are workers. They are the commodity being traded. When NAFTA was passed, out giant agricultural corporations with subsidies from the U.S. government put out the farmers in Mexico resulting into a bloody conflict. President Clinton sent billions of dollars to Mexico to shore up the Peso.
The USA start funding the moving of fatories to Mexico in 1956. It was supposed to be just a temporary measure to help the Mexican economy while supplying cheaper goods for consumers in the USA. The programs never really stopped and later the USA supported the Maquilador factories in Mexico. Besides going for cheaper labor, the USA companies sent part of the "dirty" manufacturing there to circumvent our environmental regulations. For example, the cooking and pouring of tar into electrical transformers is a "dirty" process that reguires pollution controls. This part of the process was sent to Mexico. The Maquilador factories grew just over the border. The U.S.A. acted as if there was some kind of wall up in the sky that blocked this pollution. Of course it did not. The same goes for China today with much of the "dirty" manufacturing sent there.
In the early days, the moving of factories was not called Free Trade. The first USA factories were moved to Asia. Many were moved back to North America to Mexico. Now many of these factories are now moving back to Asia. Each time, a burn out community and society is left behind. The society is left worst off than before the factories came.
There is a false assumption that factories stay in place to help people out of poverty and they do not. Even worst the little enterprises that were in place before the factories came are no longer possible to restore.
All of this preceded the passing of the unfair trade agreements in NAFTA and GATT. Free Trade has a history and it is a history of failure. Prior to NAFTA being passed, about 2000 USA factories were moved to Mexico. After NAFTA was passed, this number doubled to 4000. So there is also a history of failures since 1994. Still, the free traders call for more as if Free Trade is something new.
See Tapart News and Art that Talks at http://tapsearch.com/tapartnews/ http://tapsearch.com/globalization/
http://arklineart.fotopages.com
http://www.experiencedesignernetwork.com/archives/000636.html

@TapartNews:

"historically trade was based on trading products." Is'nt this also the main feature of trade today? If not, why then all the quotas, tariffs, customs etc. to 'protect' the own economy? Why prohibit sugarcane from brasil? Why condemn apples from NewZealand? Why protect Whisky from Scotland? So even trading of products is disputed and partly outlawed.

If even trade of certain products is at least a sin, often a crime, it's no wonder that "todays freetrade that is moving production, factories and outsourcing jobs" get's the same verdict. But the distinction between old and new free trade is an artificial one.
Of course free trade is also about moving production. But that's nothing new. Why should the British produce their own wine (and in consequence be forced to finance such operations via subsidies and even than pay high prices for their national Pinot Noir or Seyval Blanc) when at the same time the winemarket overflows with cheap and good quality wine from Spain, Chile or you name it? Or why should Shetlanders grow pineapples when they are more efficently produced in CostaRica? So, yes, production is moving, but it always has (when the political forces allowed it to) and hopefully always will.
To be consistent: If you're against moving production, factories and jobs out of your country into other countries, then the same principle should apply to all countries. The consequences: No HP or Ford Production in GB, no VW or Honda in USA, no Sony or Magna in Austria, and also no BMW investment in Rover (because that saves 'only' british but no german jobs).
But what about products that can be made in almost every location, jeans for example? Question here: Who is willing to pay double the price if their origin is the USA instead of Banglasdesh (assuming they are of identical quality and look)? If the answer is : 'Only a handful of nostalgic enthusiasts.' then the only choice for the american comp. is between going under or reducing their costs of production to be able to lower their prices to a level that the customers -You and I- are willing to pay.
So the first question to be asked is: What causes the high costs of production that then lead to all kinds of actions to reduce them ( automation, marketanalysis, outsourcing, etc.)?
I think everybody of us knows part of the answer to this question. Heavy taxes on employers (pay 50% more for every workhour exeeding the weekly 35h, pay for illness, pay for accident, pay for 5 weeks holiday, pay 14 monthly wages for 12 months work, pay minimum wages, pay social security, pay pensions), heavily taxed energy and transportation (electricity, gasoline, roadpricing...), exaggerated manager salaries, high demands of the workers combined with often only mediocre motivation and lacking interest in their work ('I'm only a poor unskilled worker/victim with a right to complain about everything' mentality). Asking the state for ever more handouts and helps for every conceivable ills and uncertainties. Everything should be free without cost (children, workplace, healthcare, traffic, schools, old age, housing). An on it goes..
So my conclusion is: It is always easy to blame someone else (the Free Traders, trans national corporations and elite groupings, NAFTA and GATT) for the problems of society and put oneself in the role of the victim of corporate evilship. It's not so, that the Government can or should secure our jobs (they can only produce uncreative bureaucrats who regulate and hinder people in their creative efforts and additionaly cost huge amounts of money). Rather the state sould abstain from regulating and desturbing the market so that business can flourish unhampered and peaceful. So that You and I can buy and sell what we want from whom, and when and at which price (yes, wages are prices) we agree upon. So that each of us can become a producer himself to serve one another without numberless hurdles and government redtape.

Thank You,
gerold

Historically trade was based on trading products. Today Free Trade is based on moving production, factories and outsourcing jobs. It is absurd to call Free Trade - trade. The real commodities are workers who are put on a world trading block as wage slaves in a new kind of economic slave trade. A new kind of economic colonialism is at play too.
The workers have no voice in the matter even though they are the core of all economies. The free enterprise system has become a mockery.
Free Trade is controlled by governments acting as power brokers and agents for vast trans national corporations and elite groupings throughout the world.
You do not need any conspiracy theories to know something else is steering economies rather than evolving in normal patterns. The US Government start funding the moving of factories outside the US in 1956 and kept the pace up until they speeded it up with NAFTA and GATT trade agreements. There is a long history of failures and still the Free Traders call for more. Workers everywhere have been betrayed by those in power who were supposed to protect their citizens' interest, the workday and human dignity.
For more information see Tapart News and Art that Talks real issues from the street of USA by those who lived the experiences. The major media channels do not cover these issues in any real way.
See http://tapsearch.com/tapartnews http://tapsnewstory.filetap.com
http://www.graphicsforums.com/public/list.asp?id=1247 ( and id=1250 )
http://pages.zdnet.com/arklineart.tapin featuring the Cross of 9/11 Tangle of Terror artwork by Ray Tapajna asking who will now untangle the terror Globalism and Free Trade have bred.

The reality is that even if free trade were to exist from tomorrow, most poor countries, particularly those in Africa, could not suddenly trade their way out of poverty. A major constraint is technological - Most poor countries simly don't have access to the kind of technology that drives industrialisation and ensures continuous innovation and value-added in the developed world. This is because they don't have the resources to invest in R & D, which underpins scientific innovation. As the Commission for Africa rightly argues, trade liberalisation must be accompanied by a learning period for poor countries, involving intensive capacity development. reeing up trade alone will hardly register a blip on the screen.

Many third world countries already have a favourable trading position. The ACP, the Africa - Carribean Pacific body, was originally an adjunct of the EU to continue these longstanding trade positions.

Now, Commissioner Mandelson has demanded that the subsidies end. They must reduce their trade barriers to us. But, they will recieve help in promoting industry that will then be tariff free to Europe and America.

This effect is likely to be disastrous. Africa is being clered for Agri-business to sell to Europe and America. But everything else is likely to collapse, they will not be able to support infant industries.

The other element is 'governance' the new G8 proposals will require stringent monitoring of society, business and the new privatised public services.

Foreign companies will make money running these services, the waBenzi, the big men will get jobs running it.

The debt that is being written off will now be used to get restructuring (apparently)
The new aid payments will be unrestrained in government hands. Much of it going to build military capacity so (apparently) Africa can deal with its own problems. Likewise for the credit facility.

Government will get richer, not people. Big business will get richer, not people. The guns will be used.

Yes, CA gets very confused over this free trade/fair trade thing.

They also need to explain how forcing people in African countries to pay over the odds or accept poor quality from local producers protected by trade barriers will help the population in those countries. Not only does the consumer suffer but so does anyone trying to do business there as it increases the cost of doing business locally and thus disadvantages other industries. In effect, you're trying to pick winners and we all know the track record of governments when they try to pick winners.

When all your predjudices are against capitalism, any problem you see in the world will be interpreted as a result of capitalism.

Evidence to the contrary is ignored. They are willfully ignorant

Quite right. The "fair trade" concept which the likes of CA propagandises is actually unfair trade and poor economics. However I believe CA has it's own leftist and statist agenda to promote and that's why FREE trade is not wanted.