Since NAFTA and trade have been on the lips of both Since NAFTA and trade have been on the lips of both Obama and Clinton in Ohio for the past two weeks, and I was pointing out the value of reevaluating the labor and environmental standards, I should direct you to a fair point by Sebastian Mallaby in the Sunday Post. He rightly notes that Dems would be wise to recognize some of the better results of the international trade pacts of the '90s. Namely, the formation of the World Trade Organization as a entity to keep a check on corporate power on the international level:
The WTO, particularly its dispute-settlement tribunal, represents a rare triumph in the management of globalization. While money, goods and people flow in ever-greater quantities across national borders, governments remain stubbornly local, and efforts to bolster multinational governance are generally unsuccessful. The launch of the WTO in 1995 was the exception, but it remains politically fragile. The coming argument over "green tariffs" -- to offset other countries' failure to cap or price carbon -- may end up in front of the dispute-settlement tribunal, and those who don't like the tribunal's decision will question its legitimacy. Primed by the Clinton-Obama attacks on trade, it may not be long before we hear echoes of former senator Bob Dole, who once proposed a panel to second-guess WTO rulings that went against the United States.
Sure, the WTO in its current incarnation is beholden to these corporations and often makes really poor decisions as such. But that doesn't mean it can't be improved upon, and in an age where multinational corporations run the world, there needs to be this type of multinational body governing them. The WTO as a concept is entirely capable of doing that and doing it well, and needs to, especially when it comes to things like environmental standards.
--Kate Sheppard
