Earlier today I wrote this comment over at Dawg’s Blawg in a post about the Conservative Party’s latest immigration fiasco.
I can’t fault Kenney or the Conservatives on these moves to tighten our borders. The left should have long ago insisted that Free Trade not only open up our borders to the free flow of goods but also the free flow of people.
I had planned to expand on this in a post of my own but fortunately while I was procrastinating The New Resilient did the heavy lifting for me.
Canadians need to understand the context of today’s announcement that Mexican citizens will require visas to visit Canada. We also need to understand the root cause of the rising number of Mexican refugees coming to Canada.
Food products—staples such as corn and beans—are flooding into Mexico. Since the 1995 implementation of NAFTA, US corn exports to Mexico have quadrupled. These products are flowing south at prices below Mexican farmers’ cost of production, and below the cost of production in the US. Subsidies enable farmers to produce below cost. NAFTA dictates that Mexico must allow this food in. The NAFTA timetable required that on January 1, 2008, Mexico remove its final restrictions on the imports of staple food products—opening its border completely to imports of corn and beans.
Mexican farmers have been devastated by low prices for corn and other crops. Farm families have been forced off their land, and forced to relocate to large cities and border-town maquilidoras. NAFTA’s body-blow to Mexico’s farm sector has meant a rapid rise in the number of Mexicans who are landless, unemployed, poor, and desperate.
Far too often the debate about free trade myopically focuses on how Canada does or does not benefit from it. What is rarely, if ever, discussed is the effect free trade has on the nations we sign agreements with. As the above example, which is by no means an isolated case, notes, free trade can have a devastating effect on the population of nations that are much poorer than the countries they’ve entered into agreements with. Because of this, it’s important that Progressives begin to tie immigration issues and the free flow of people across borders to free trade and its free flow of goods across borders. After all, people should at least have the same freedom of movement that your made in China DVD player does.
Correct. Of course, there are flows of people with capital who can move easily across borders. Again it is the rich and powerful. But they always were able to cross borders - trade deals just made it easier for their international goods to flow and keep state citizens trapped and thus easier to exploit.
Thanks for the repost. It’s quite clear that the opening of international borders is only to allow corporate interests breathing room. It is somewhat sickening that we say that it is fine for Mexicans to send cars over our borders–but the people who make those cars! Whew! Not a chance!