If free trade were really on the table for the Americas, people would join goods and services atop an open borders buffet.
But when trade ministers talk tariff trimming and regulation reduction at Miami's upcoming Free Trade Area of the Americas meeting, immigration policy is strictly off the menu.
"It's a very politically sensitive issue," said Dan Griswold of the libertarian Cato Institute in Washington. "It's hard enough tackling sugar and citrus and steel without putting immigration on the table."
When it comes to immigration, free trade proponents and globalization critics find themselves in the same corner. Libertarians argue that free trade's promise of increased efficiency and prosperity can never be fully realized without easing the movement of workers, not just cargo and capital, across borders. Human rights advocates say that by ignoring immigration issues, free trade agreements lock out displaced and opportunity-seeking workers from the benefits of a more integrated hemisphere.
Those who favor stricter enforcement of immigration laws are disturbed by libertarian arguments that link economic progress with liberalizing immigration policies.
"Whereas trade brings in products which are eventually consumed and discarded, immigration is about human beings who are not discarded, but become parts of our community. These people have challenges and they incur costs," said John Keeley of the Washington-based Center for Immigration Studies. "We believe a sovereign nation with sovereign borders has the ability to say who can come in and in what numbers."
Congress has made it clear that it will not tolerate attempts to include immigration provisions in free trade agreements like the FTAA. Lawmakers raised a furor in July after the United States Trade Representative negotiated 6,800 professional visas for Chileans and Singaporeans into trade agreements with those countries. For now, the United States is pursuing open markets through commercial agreements that barely broach immigration.
"Nobody's lobbying mainly because most people realize that it's something that should be brought in at least gradually," said Max Castro, a researcher at the University of Miami's North-South Center, a think tank specializing in Latin America and the Caribbean.
"If you made that the first item on the agenda it would probably torpedo the whole thing because there are such differences in development from the north and south hemisphere."
The trade ministers won't be discussing the topic, but at a parallel meeting of civil organizations and academics, the America's Trade and Sustainable Development Forum, Castro hopes the immigration integration panel he hosts will spur proposals from those sectors .
The closest thing to open borders among nations is the European Union, where tens of billions of dollars have been invested in poorer member countries to strengthen industry and agriculture. Still, European countries restrict other Europeans from entering job markets with high domestic unemployment, said Robin Rosenberg, deputy director of the North-South Center.
"If it's not happening in practice in Europe, when could it possibly happen in the western hemisphere?" he said. "Now, it happens, de facto, because immigration policies are not enforced, like with Mexico, where it's out of control."
In promoting the North American Free Trade Agreement a decade ago, U.S. politicians promised that stimulating development would curb the illegal influx of Mexicans. Ten years after NAFTA passed, migration from Mexico to the United States has ballooned. More than twice as many undocumented Mexicans, 4.8 million by U.S. government estimates, lived in the United States by 2000 than the 2 million here in 1990.
NAFTA may not be to blame. Analysts agree the jury is still out on how free trade agreements like NAFTA will affect migration. Philip Martin, an agricultural economist at the University of California at Davis who has written on the subject, says he now believes NAFTA was oversold as means to reduce illegal immigration.
If trade and investment have increased, why have migration flows grown too?
A new comprehensive study, "NAFTA's Promise and Reality," released by the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace and the Migration Policy Institute, a Washington think-tank, finds the agreement's impact on illegal migration is likely negligible.The increase has more to do with Mexico's peso crisis, its population boom, a U.S. economic boom, and strong immigrant networks between Mexico and the United States, the study concludes.
"NAFTA is merely one force amid a lot of very large forces that are affecting migration," said Kevin O'Neil, a Migration Policy Institute researcher.
However, many immigration activists like Mexican-native Alberto Fernandez say something other than militarizing the border must be done to address those compelled to migrate as new trade rules shift industry and displace small farmers in favor of corporate agriculture.
"After 10 years of NAFTA and `Operation Guardian,' almost 2,000 people died trying to come to the United States. We think if we are going to talk about the movement of goods and services and products, we should include something about people," said Fernandez, of South Florida Jobs with Justice. "There's no balance."
Free trade agreements may lead to immigration solutions as they bring partner countries closer, analysts say. Such was nearly the case with Mexico, whose President Vicente Fox was in talks with President Bush about new border policies until the Sept. 11 attacks. Eventually such agreements may become more politically appealing again.
"Trade has migration consequences and ignoring them runs the risk of eventually having the migration interfere with trade," Martin said. "We didn't get that far yet."
Tanya Weinberg can be reached at tweinberg@sun-sentinel.com or 305-810-5029.
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