The Public Diplomacy of Trade
University of Southern California
PUBD 599
Spring 2008
Dr. Pamela K. Starr
Office:
Office Hours:
Phone: 740-4122
Email: pkstarr@usc.edu
Course Description and Content
The global debate on trade has shifted significantly during the past 25 years ago. For
most of the post-World War II decades, developing countries hesitated to embrace the idea of
open trading relations, favoring instead a strategy of protecting their domestic economies from
foreign competition. This changed markedly during the 1990s when Eastern Europe and Latin
America led the move among less-developed countries to embrace freer trade. Even as voices
decrying the shortcomings of free trade grew stronger at the end of the century, agreements
establishing more open trade ties among countries continued to be signed. This dynamic was
particularly pronounced in Latin America where the 1990s and early 21st century have been
marked by an explosion of regional free trade agreements and the creation of an alternative, nonmarket trading regime, the Bolivarian Alternative for the Americas.
This course looks at these developments from the perspective of Public Diplomacy. It
looks at trade agreements as a tool of public diplomacy and considers the use of public
diplomacy and soft power in the formulation and maintenance of trade agreements since the
early 1990s. It is obvious that Latin America’s embrace of freer trade -- with the United States
and Canada, with extra-hemispheric actors, and among themselves – and the recent growth of the
Bolivarian alternative to market-based free trade cannot be understood independent of hard
power drivers. What is less obvious is the central role of the public diplomacy strategies
employed by a wide variety of actors in the regional trade debate. This is the piece of the story
we will emphasize.
This class unfolds in three phases. The first three class sessions introduce briefly 1) the
foundations of the historic debate about free trade, especially as it relates to developing
economies; 2) the origins and character of the post-World War II international economic order
which has framed this debate for a half century; and 3) the “victory” of free trade over
protectionism as the dominant global trade strategy in the early 1990s. The second section of the
course looks at three regional free trade agreements in the Americas – the North American Free
Trade Agreement (NAFTA), Mercosur, and the Free Trade Area of the Americas – to illuminate
the role of Public Diplomacy in the negotiations that defined their structure and in their ultimate
approval or rejection and the role of the negotiations and the treaties themselves as public
diplomacy in each participants broader foreign policy agenda. The final section considers the
regional backlash to free trade during the last decade. It looks at how opponents of free trade
have used public diplomacy to strengthen their position, the growing role of China in this trade
debate, the emergence and content of the Bolivarian Alternative, and what all this means for free
trade in the Americas and beyond.
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Course Requirements
Attendance and Class Participation:
All students are required to have completed the assigned readings before class each week
and to participate in the class discussion. Students writing a review paper for that week will
begin the discussion and the rest of the class must be prepared to join in the discussion. Since
participation in these discussions is an integral portion of the course, attendance is key to
students successfully completing the class.
Short review papers/presentations:
During weeks 4-12 of the course (the sections on “Hemispheric Free Trade” through
“The NAFTA Backlash in the US”), each student will write two short papers (1500 words) on
the assigned readings. Each paper should summarize the main arguments presented in this body
of work, highlighting the role of soft power and public diplomacy in the free trade debate, and
draw conclusions about the relative effectiveness of these policy tools. Topics for the review
papers will be assigned during the first week of class.
Student presentations:
During weeks 5 and 12 of the course (the sections on “Selling NAFTA” and “The
Backlash Debate”), students will analyze the use of the media in the free trade debate in the
Americas. The conclusions of their research will be presented to the class and should be based in
a clear argument about the use of public diplomacy in the debate and supported by video and
print sources.
Research paper:
Students will write a short, original research paper (2500-3000 words) on the role of
public diplomacy in the current trade debate in the Americas. Each paper will analyze the role of
in the trade policy of at least two actors (state or non-state, hemispheric or extra-hemispheric)
attempting to shape the regional debate and holding different policy positions. The object of this
exercise is to draw conclusions about the relative effectiveness of the policy tactics employed by
the actors analyzed. Why was a particular tactic or set of tactics either effective or ineffective
and how might they be improved?
Grading
Participation:
10%
Short Papers:
30% (15% each)
Presentations:
30% (15% each)
Research Paper:
30%
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Topics and Readings
January 17: Introduction
The Debate
January 24: The Market
Robert Heilbroner and Lester Thurow, Economics Explained (1998), section 3:
“Microeconomics: The Anatomy of the Market System”.
Thomas Lairson and David Skidmore, International Political Economy: The Struggle for
Power and Wealth, chapter 2: “The Economics of the International Political Economy”.
Pamela Starr. “Perfecting Reform in Latin America: What Role for the State?” Latin
American Research Review, 37:2 (2002): 183-199.
The History
January 31: Making the world safe for free trade
Thomas Lairson and David Skidmore, International Political Economy, chapters 4-5.
“The Political Economy of American Hegemony” and “Globalization and the World Economy”.
Enrique V. Iglesias, Reflections on Economic Development: Toward a New Latin American
Consensus. Washington, DC: Inter-American Development Bank, 1992: chapter 1 (pp.1-24).
G. John Ikenberry and Charles Kupchan, “Socialization and Hegemonic Power”.
International Organization 44:3 (Summer 1990): 283-315.
William Kamman, “US-Latin American Relations”, OAH Magazine of History (Fall
1992). http://www.oah.org/pubs/magazine/foreignpolicy/kamman.html
Richard Feinberg and Javier Corrales, “Why did it take 200 years? The Intellectual
Journey to the Summit of the Americas”, in Richard Feinberg, Summitry in the Americas,
Institute for International Economics, 1997: 7-38.
Free Trade Triumphant
February 7: Globalization trumps Protectionism
Jeffry Frieden, “Globalizers Victorious”, chapter 17 in Global Capitalism: Its Fall and
Rise in the Twentieth Century, W.W.Norton, 2006: 392-412.
Enrique V. Iglesias, Reflections on Economic Development, chapters 2-3 (pp. 25-80).
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Pamela K. Starr, “Pax Americana in Latin America: The Hegemony behind Free Trade”,
in Jorge I. Dominguez and Kim Byung-Kook, eds., Between Compliance and Conflict: East
Asia, Latin America, and the “New” Pax Americana, Routledge, 2005: 77-109.
Glen Biglasier, “The Internationalization of Chicago’s Economics in Latin America”,
Economic Development and Cultural Change 50 (2001): 269-286.
Soledad Loeza. “The Changing Face of Mexican Nationalism”. In M. Delal Baer and
Sidney Weintraub eds. The NAFTA Debate: Grappling with Unconventional Issues, Lynne
Rienner, 1994: 145-157.
Henry J. Aaron, et al., “Preface to the Studies on Integrating National Economies”, in
Stephan Haggard, Developing National and the Politics of Global Integration, Brookings, 1995:
xiii-xxvi.
Negotiating Free Trade Agreements
February 14: Hemispheric Free Trade and NAFTA: The Idea
Joseph Grunwald. “The Rocky Road Toward Hemispheric Economic Integration”. In
Roy Green, ed., The Enterprise for the Americans Initiative: Issues and Prospects, Westport, CT
1993: 123-141.
Peter Hakim, “President Bush’s Southern Strategy: The Enterprise for the Americas
Initiative”, The Washington Quarterly, 1992.
Carol Wise, “Introduction”, in Carol Wise, ed., The Post-NAFTA Political Economy,
Penn State Press, 1998: 1-23.
President George H.W. Bush, “Remarks Announcing the Enterprise for the Americas
Initiative,” 27 June 1990. http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/ws/index.php?pid=18644
Carlos Salinas, Remarks made during visit to the United States, October 1989.
Brian Mulroney, Remarks at NAFTA signing ceremony, San Antonio, Texas, 7 October
1992. http://northernblue.ca/canchan/cantext/speech3/1992muna.html
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February 21: Selling NAFTA: The Arguments
Howard Wiarda. “U.S. Domestic Politics”. In M. Delal Baer and Sidney Weintraub eds.
The NAFTA Debate, Lynne Rienner, 1994: 117-143.
Barbara Franklin, “The NAFTA: Challenging Its Critics”, Speech given at the heritage
Foundation, May 6, 1993. http://www.heritage.org/Research/TradeandForeignAid/HL448.cfm
Toss Eisenstadt. “The Rise of the Mexico Lobby in Washington: Even Further from
God, and Even Closer to the United States”. In Rodolfo de la Garza and Jesus Velasco, eds.
Bridging the Border: Transforming Mexico-US Relations, Rowman & Littlefield, 1997: 89-124.
Jesus Velasco. “Selling Ideas, Buying Influence: Mexico and American Think Tanks in
the Promotion of NAFTA”. In Rodolfo de la Garza and Jesus Velasco, eds. Bridging the
Border: Transforming Mexico-US Relations, Rowman & Littlefield, 1997: 125-147.
Roberto Salinas-León, “A Mexican View of North American Free Trade” Cato Institute,
Foreign Policy Briefing no. 9, May 1991. http://www.cato.org/pubs/fpbriefs/fpb-009es.html
Jorge Castaneda. “Can NAFTA Change Mexico?” Foreign Affairs (September-October
1993).
Ralph Nader, et al. The Case Against Free Trade: GATT, NAFTA, and the Globalization
of Corporate Power, North Atlantic Books, 1993: chapters 4, 6, & appendix 2.
Richard Rothstein, “Exporting Jobs and Pollution to Mexico”, in New Perspectives
Quarterly 8:1 (Winter 1991).
Thomas Donahue, Testimony before Senate Labor and Human Resources Committee,
1993.
February 28: Selling NAFTA: Student Presentations
Byron Dorgan. “The NAFTA Debate that Never Was”, Columbia Journalism Review,
January 1994.
Gore-Perot Debate over NAFTA, 10 November 1993.
March 6: The Rise of Regionalism in the Americas
Stephan Haggard, “The Political Economy of Regionalism in the Western Hemisphere”,
in Carol Wise, ed., The Post-NAFTA Political Economy, Penn State Press, 1998: 302-338.
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E. Mansfield and Helen Milner, “The New Wave of Regionalism” in International
Organization, 53:3 (1999): 602-608.
M. Marchand and M. Boas, “The Political Economy of New Regionalisms”, in Third
World Quarterly, 20:5 (1999): 897-911.
Monica Hirst, “Mercosur’s Complex Political Agenda”, in Riordan Roett, ed., Mercosur:
Regional Integration, World Markets, Lynne Rienner, 1999: 35-47.
Rafael Sanchez, “Rebuilding the Central American Bloc in the 1990s”, in Finn Laursen,
ed., Comparative Regional Integration, Ashgate press, 2003: 31-52.
Andre Drainville, “Social Movements in the Americas: Regionalism from Below?”, in
Mace and Belanger, The Americas in Transition: 219-237.
March 13: From NAFTA to FTAA?
Gordon Mace, “The Origins, Nature, and Scope of the Hemispheric Project”, in Gordon
Mace, Louis Bélanger, and contributors, The Americas in Transition: The Contours of
Regionalism, Lynne Rienner, 1999: 19-36.
Text of Press Briefing by vice-President Al Gore on the Summit of the Americas, 8
Devember 1994.
Remarks by President Clinton in Final Plenary Session of the Summit of the Americas,
11 December 1994.
Statements of Latin American leaders prior to and during the Summit.
The debate about the Summit in the media.
Peter H. Smith, “From NAFTA to FTAA?” Paths toward Hemispheric Integration”, in
Edward Chambers and Peter Smith, eds., NAFTA in the New Millennium, Center for USMexican Studies, UCSD, 2002: 471-496.
Robert B. Zoellick “Free Trade and the Hemispheric Hope”, Prepared Remarks, Council
of the Americas, Washington, DC (May 7, 2001).
Rubens Antonio Barbosa, “A View from Brazil”, The Washington Quarterly 24:2 (Spring
2001): 149-157.
March 20: Spring Break
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The Free Trade Backlash
March 27: The Dream Turns Sour in Mexico
Paul Rich, “NAFTA and Chiapas”, Annals of the American Academy of Political and
Social Science, Vol. 550, NAFTA Revisited: Expectations and Realities (Mar., 1997), pp. 72-84.
Denise Dresser, "Falling from the Tightrope: The Political Economy of the Mexican
Crisis", in Moises Naim and Sebastian Edwards, eds., Mexico 1994: Anatomy of an EmergingMarket Crash, Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, 1998.
Robert Blecker, NAFTA and the Peso Collapse: Not a Coincidence, Economic Policy
Institute, briefing paper, May 1997. http://www.epinet.org/briefingpapers/1997_bp_nafta.pdf
Steven D Morris and John Passe-Smith, “What a Difference a Crisis Makes: NAFTA,
Mexico and the United States”, Latin American Perspectives, 28:3 (May 2001): 124-149.
Monica Araya, “Mexico’s NAFTA Trauma”. p. 59-78.
Jerry W Knudson, “Rebellion in Chiapas: Insurrection by Internet and Public Relations”,
Media, Culture & Society, vol. 20, 1998, 507-518.
Harry M. Cleaver Jr., “The Zapatista Effect: The Internet and the Rise of an Alternative
Political Fabric”, Journal of International Affairs, 51:2 (1998): 621-640.
Geri Smith, “Was NAFTA Worth It?”, Business Week, 23 December 2003.
www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/03_51/b3863008.htm
Monica Araya, “Mexico’s NAFTA Trauma”, in Carolyn L. Deere & Daniel C. Esty eds.,
Greening the Americas: NAFTA’s Lessons for Hemispheric Trade. MIT Press (Fall 2002).
(chapter 4)
April 3: Regional and Global Backlash to Free Trade
Anthony Faiola, “Argentina Doubts Market Wisdom: Crisis Weakens Region's Embrace
of Capitalism, Many Say”, Washington Post, August 6, 2001; Page A01
Pamela Starr, "Argentina: Anatomy of a Crisis Foretold", Current History 102 (February
2003): 65-71.
James E Mahon Jr., “Good-bye to the Washington Consensus?” Current History, 102
(February 2003): 58-64.
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“The New Trade War”, Economist (4 December 1999) and Pauline Hwang, “A View
from Ground Zero”, The Globe and Mail (3 December 1999).
William K. Tabb, “After Seattle: Understanding the Politics of Globalization”, Monthly
Review 51:10 (March 2000). http://www.monthlyreview.org/300tabb.htm
Chakravarthi Raghavan, “After Seattle, world trade system faces uncertain future”,
Review of International Political Economy 7:3 Autumn 2000: 495–504.
John Lloyd, “Attack on Planet Davos” Financial Times (24 February 2001).
Walden Bello, “Battling Barbarism”, Foreign Policy, 132 (Sep.-Oct. 2002): pp. 41-42.
Roberto Patricio Korzeniewicz and William C. Smith, Protest and Collaboration:
Transnational Civil Society Networks and the Politics of Summitry and Free Trade in the
Americas, Agenda Paper 51, Coral Gables: North-South Center (September 2001).
April 10: No Class.
April 17: The NAFTA Backlash in the US
Howard Wiarda, “After Miami: The Summit, the Peso Crisis and the Future of US-Latin
American Relations”, Journal of Interamerican Studies and World Affairs 37:1 (Spring 1995):
43-68 (skim the “road to miami” and “at the summit” sections).
Jeffrey J. Schott, Gary C. Hufbauer, “Whither the Free Trade Area of the Americas?”
World Economy, 22 (6), 1999: 765–782.
Bradford DeLong, Christopher DeLong, and Sherman Robinson, “The Case for Mexico's
Rescue: The Peso Package Looks Even Better Now”, Foreign Affairs (May/June 1996) 8-14.
Paul Blustein, “NAFTA: Free Trade Bought and Oversold”, Washington Post,
September 30, 1996 http://wpni.com/wp-srv/politics/special/trade/stories/tr093096.htm
Patrick J. Buchanan, “Mexico: Who Was Right”? New York Times (25Aug 1995): A27.
NAFTA debate in the media, 1997-1999.
Sherrod Brown, Myths of Free Trade: Why American Trade Policy has Failed, The
New Press, 2006. Chapter 1.
Robert B. Zoellick, Speech before National Foreign Trade Council, 26 July 2001,
Washington, DC.
Public Opinion Polls: Polls compiled by WorldPublicOpinion.org
on Support for Free Trade:
http://americans-world.org/digest/global_issues/intertrade/environment.cfm
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on Reservations about the effects of free trade:
http://americans-world.org/digest/global_issues/intertrade/reservations_trade.cfm
on NAFTA:
http://americans-world.org/digest/global_issues/intertrade/nafta.cfm
http://www.worldpublicopinion.org/pipa/articles/brlatinamericara/161.php?nid=&id=&pnt=161
(move to last session)
on Trade and Jobs:
http://americans-world.org/digest/global_issues/intertrade/helpingworkers.cfm
on Trade and the Environment:
http://americans-world.org/digest/global_issues/intertrade/environment.cfm
The Future of Trade in the Americas
April 24: China and the Bolivarian Alternative: The Debate in Latin America
Sean Burges. “Building a Global Southern Coalition: The Competing Approaches of
Brazil’s Lula and Venezuela’s Chavez”, Third World Quarterly 28:7 (2007): 1343-1358.
Congressional Research Service, “Brazilian Trade Policy” (excerpt from 2006 CRS
Report, #RL33285).
Michael J. Bustamante and Julia E. Sweig, “Buena Vista Solidarity and the Axis of Aid:
Cuban and Venezuelan Public Diplomacy”, The ANNALS of the American Academy of Political
and Social Science 616 (March 2008): 223-256 (focus on Venezuela).
Teresa Arreaza. “ALBA: Bolivarian Alternative for Latin America and the Caribbean”
(2004). http://www.venezuelanalysis.com/doc/339
“Magic, or Realism”, The Economist, 29 December 2004.
He Li, “China’s Growing Interest in Latin America and its Implications”, Journal of
Strategic Studies 30:4 (2007): 833-862.
Yiwei Wang, “Public Diplomacy and the Rise of Chinese Soft Power”; The ANNALS of
the American Academy of Political and Social Science 616 (March 2008): 257-273 (skim).
Latin Barometer Survey: 2001, 2005, 2007 (as summarized in the Economist)
In Class:
Student presentations on the PD of trade in the Americas
Video selections including Hugo Chavez, Evo Morales (on Jon Stewart), and Vicente Fox
(on Larry King)
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May 1: The Future of Free Trade in the Americas
Sherrod Brown, Myths of Free Trade: Why American Trade Policy has Failed, The
New Press, 2006. Chapters 7-9. (skim chapter 7, focus particularly on chapter 9)
“Free Trade Agreements Get a Mixed Review”, Pew Research Center: The People and
the Press, (December 2006). http://people-press.org/reports/display.php3?ReportID=299
Louis Uchitelle “NAFTA should have stopped Illegal Immigration, Right?”New York
Times, 18 February 2007.
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/02/18/weekinreview/18uchitelle.html?pagewanted=print
Colombia FTA debate in the media and Heritage Foundation editorial on Colombia FTA
David Brooks and Jonathan Fox, eds. Cross-Border Dialogues: U.S.-Mexico Social
Movement Networking, Center for US-Mexican Studies, UCSD, 2002: pp. 341-374 & 386-401
(e.g. selections from chapter 19)
In Class:
Video selections of Hugo Chavez, Lula, and Felipe Calderon; and from Lou Dobbs and
the presidential campaign.
Review web pages of US Embassies in Mexico, Brazil, and Colombia. What are they
doing related to the public diplomacy of trade in the Americas?
Review web pages of Colombian and Panamanian Embassies in Washington. What are
they doing to promote Congressional approval of FTAs and trade policy more generally?
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