Since the 1990s, powerful corporations have used the obscure and secretive process of trade negotiation and dealmaking to insert provisions, many unrelated to trade, that benefit them at the expense of the public. Countries must conform their domestic policies to these rules or face trade sanctions and other penalties. These agreements introduced new rights for foreign investors to challenge countries’ environmental, health, safety, and other policies before extrajudicial panels of corporate lawyers; granted extreme monopoly protections to pharmaceutical corporation to raise medicine prices; and banned Buy American, Buy Local and similar policies. With weak and unenforceable labor and environmental standards, these pacts pushed down wages and killed good jobs.
After decades of damage from such agreements, Americans demanded change. In 2016, the U.S. Congress refused to implement the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP), a deal based on the old model. In 2017, Congress would only approve a renegotiated North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) after some of these problems were remedied. It is now clear that trade deals must include provisions that protect good jobs, ensure a healthy environment, promote robust and fair markets where small businesses can thrive, and guarantee safe and affordable medicine, food, and goods. Any new U.S. trade agreement must meet these standards.
Rethink Trade closely monitors U.S. trade negotiations and provides expert analysis through reports, policy briefs, and events to educate the public and policymakers to promote agreements that prioritize the public interest.
