Whatever you think of them, reform happens at the margins of politics.
Free trade has always been a tenet of libertarianism. After all, the unimpeded movement of goods across borders may be a paradigmatic example of the libertarian maxim of ‘Anything peaceful.’ It is then with trepidation that many libertarians have looked on at the debate surrounding free trade today. For them, the Trans-Pacific Partnership doesn’t look anything like free trade. Instead, it looks like just another arrangement between governments bestowing benefits upon their favored cronies at the expense of the rest of society. Yet, for whatever its controversy, if it is passed, the Trans-Pacific Partnership would be America’s largest trade agreement in effect and would thereby represent a marginal liberalization of trade across the region.
The Trans-Pacific Partnership, then, is an example for a central irony to libertarianism: Although libertarianism advocates anything peaceful, it is often in need for politicians to advance its agenda. Very frequently the very act of de-governmentalization itself requires government. What a government erects can very often only be demolished by a government. Although, many new technologies have and will emerge that can disrupt regulations and thereby increase the overall liberty of society by creating a space that has yet to be interpreted with, such disruption isn’t always possible. In the case of trade, new technologies may make certain tariffs and quotas irrelevant to the lives of consumers, many more will remain and, in some way, harm consumers.
No Uber-like company will emerge that can allow American consumers to find a way around the United States’ protection of domestic sugar producers. Doing that would require government. However iron-clad the arguments for free trade may be, to actually get free trade requires a government eliminating its own obstructions, just as the peaceful enjoyment of alcohol required it to repeal the Eighteenth Amendment. Bargaining, interviews, negotiations and speeches are all necessary parts of the process. Without political acumen, trade reform would go nowhere. Free trade needs crafty politicians who are aware of when the political stars align and who can seize the initiative to advance liberty-enhancing reforms at the margins.
Libertarians worry about whether the Trans-Pacific Partnership would advance crony capitalism, not free markets. Cronies have certainly taken an interest in the treaty. That much is indisputable. As The Guardian reports, for ever ‘yea’ vote tallied in the Senate to give the White House fast-track authority, the US Business Coalition for TPP gave an average of $17,676.48 to it. That negotiations of the Trans-Pacific Partnership is being kept secret, contrary to standard operating protocol, only compounds those suspicions.
Although President Obama has said that there is nothing to worry about with the secret negotiations, certainly the president is not unaware of how ironic it is for him to assert that while still keeping the supposedly innocuous records out of the public eye. The old quip, quis custodiet ipsos custodes, looms large. Combined with the amount of money that businesses have spent, the secrecy surrounding the Trans-Pacific Partnership is bound to pique the suspicion of many libertarians. Those opponents of the Trans-Pacific Partnership are, then, right enough since there certainly is plenty of crony capitalism in the Trans-Pacific Partnership.
Nevertheless, a sober assessment of the treaty and particularly its impact at the political margins of liberty should inform us that these are acceptable costs to a policy that will lead to an improvement of the overall liberty of all involved. It’s true that the Trans-Pacific Partnership wouldn’t lead to a system of perfectly free trade and, in doing so, would plenty of room for each nation’s particular cronies to prosper. But we don’t live in a world where such a system of perfectly free trade is attainable. We live in a world where the treaty is on;y an improvement at the margins and where those improvements are going to have to be made in a way that placates each nation’s many cronies. The Trans-Pacific Partnership promises just that: marginally freer trade, with all the benefits that marginally freer trade would have. The Brookings Institute estimates that the global gains that marginally freer trade would be in the vicinity of at around $295 billion each year.
By being self-aware that any liberalization of trade would require government action, libertarians can be very open about the costs of the treaty while at the same time confident that it will have a beneficial overall effect. To remove the barriers to trade that exist across the Pacific requires an act of government. That alone would introduce some cronyism to the reform. Worse, it requires an act of many governments, all with their own particular faults. Nevertheless, that any progress towards liberalization in trade is possible is itself a miracle. A miracle that is only possible because of crafty politicians in government today. It’s not everyday that their actions would have a liberty-enhancing outcome and so the opportunity shouldn’t be squandered by comparing our imperfect world to a libertarian utopia.
Overall, the Trans-Pacific Partnership reveals an irony in any hope of libertarian reform today: However much libertarians may properly distrust politicians, free-trade reform will only happen if the politicians in power are able to negotiate the restraints away. On this issue, the cause of liberty, therefore, is in the precarious and inextricable position of relying on government to remove government. Maybe they shouldn’t stop worrying, but libertarians should start to give the Trans-Pacific Partnership the modest love it deserves.
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