SPP - 20 Questions.

Summary: This bulletin is intended to be a first introduction to the topic of the SPPNA (hereinafter SPP), initials of a very undemocratic alliance between Canada, Mexico and the United States. On August 201, 2007, the presidents of Mexico and the US and the Canadian prime minister met in Montebello, Quebec, to discuss the SPP. Showing total indifference for democracy, the three governments are reaching crucially important decisions with no prior consultation or consent of civil society. The summit received almost no press coverage in the US, but got reasonably good exposure in Mexico and Canada. We present herein reasons why the citizens of all three countries need to follow SPP developments. 1. What does SPPNA mean? The initials stand for the Security and Prosperity Partnership of North America, a fairly new regional integration initiative that dates formally from March 23, 2005 when the presidents of Mexico and the United States, and the Canadian prime minister met in Waco, Texas. 2. Is the SPP related to NAFTA (North American Free Trade Agreement) that Presidents Carlos Salinas and Bill Clinton and Prime Minister Brian Mulroney signed in 1993? Yes, it is related and some analysts even call the SPP "NAFTA plus". But there are important differences. One crucial difference is that the SPP is not an "agreement" as is NAFTA. If it were, it would be subject to scrutiny by the federal legislative branches in the three countries. But under the SPP, the chief executives are signing so-called regulations, hundreds of them, according to some reports. These are similar to presidential decrees and are therefore exempt from legislative review. Civil society has been given very little information. 3. Why is it important that I know something about the SPP? Citizens of all three countries are concerned because our democratic rights and sovereignty as nations are being ceded to the US government and large corporations. At the behest, or insistence, of the Bush administration, the governing elites of the other two countries have worked rapidly to "securitize" the region which, at least in Mexico, has translated into increased militarization. The SPP is also part of the growing corporate takeover of activities and functions that used to lie in the public sector. Changes are being made in laws, norms, standards, regulations, practices, to facilitate international trade and so increase the profitability of certain corporations, but which in some cases weaken labor, consumer protection and environmental standards. Finding out about the SPP is a necessary first step in detaining its corrosive effects on democracy and national sovereignty. 4. Doesn't the SPP have to do with trade between our three countries? Yes, but it goes beyond trade issues. The Canadian citizens' organization Common Frontiers explains it as follows: The SPP initiative is intended to harmonize many Canadian and Mexican domestic and foreign policies with those of the U.S. Under the guise of protecting citizens from the threat of terrorism and also facilitating trade, this initiative would involve drastic measures such as a deeper integration of North American energy markets, harmonized treatment of immigrants, refugees or tourists from abroad, and the creation of common security policies. (Press Bulletin, Common Frontiers, 27-Mar-06) 5. Why so much emphasis on security? After the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, the pretext for many changes is "security concerns" in the face of "world terrorism". In keeping with this mindset, US government strategists are quietly demanding that neighbors Mexico and Canada enact or reform laws and measures to increase security. The elites in both countries have happily and even eagerly acquiesced. We believe that the SPP is also being implemented in anticipation of several phenomena. One phenomenon is the global warming crisis and the increasing shortage of water that all Earth's inhabitants will soon face. In response to the planet's increasing thirst, the US is working to control and assure sufficient water from nearby sources, a fact that puts pressure on water supplies in southeast Mexico and throughout Canada. Canada's water in particular has been tabbed a US national security issue by the Bush administration. A second phenomenon is the US's enormous appetite for energy resources. The access to abundant energy supplies and their control, preferably by US corporate giants, is perhaps the primary motive that explains US activities throughout the world, from wars of extermination to the negotiation of agreements and, now, the signing of regulations. The invasion of Iraq by US armed forces in 2003 is just the most recent example. Still a third phenomenon has to do with the trade war already being waged between the world's three main economic blocs. One of them is the European Union, the other is the Asian bloc headed by Japan and China, and the third bloc is essentially the United States. Each bloc is closing ranks with neighboring countries in different ways. We believe the US is positioning itself to control the Americas and the Caribbean in its trade wars with the other economic forces. The US wishes to control the continent's strategic natural resources to help guarantee mainly energy supplies (oil, natural gas and electricity), but also access to other resources such as land, minerals and the region's enormous biodiversity (Brazil, Colombia, and Meso-America are extremely species rich). Furthermore, the Americas are, or will soon be, a preferential market for US goods and services. The 34 countries of the Americas (all except Cuba) have a combined population of 800 million, 500 million of whom live outside the United States, and multinational corporations see the enormous potential of privileged access for their products in this region. In addition to trade and natural-resource issues, Washington has since 2001 exercised greater control regarding the security and militarization of the Americas. When the military takes on a greater role in the internal affairs of any country, the result is a tendency towards the criminalization of social protest (a fact of life now in Mexico). 6. Who's behind the SPP? Two main entities are pushing it forward. One is the US government which considers the SPP to be an ideal initial step in a strategy of integrating the American continent in key areas under the pretext of "trade facilitation". It is true that the SPP does have aspects related to trade, but there are others that many times go unreported in the mass media, i.e., the ones mentioned above--access to energy resources, security, militarization. When the mass media report on the SPP they often mention only the trade aspects and gloss over other important topics. Even the center-left press in the US falls into this trap. The Nation magazine recently reported that the SPP is a "relatively mundane formal bureaucratic dialogue" and accepted at face value Assistant Secretary of Commerce David Bohigian's claim that the SPP has to do with "simple stuff like, for instance, in the US we sell baby food in several different sizes; in Canada, it's just two different sizes". (The Nation, Aug. 27, 2007) The other actor pushing the SPP is the private sector, especially the large corporations that are eager to take advantage of the expansion of "free trade" and the access to natural resources that the SPP is promoting. 7. How is the control of natural resources to be assured? One way is through privatization. When a country's strategic resources are sold, corporations have an opportunity to buy and control what was once in the public domain. The corporations best poised to profit are from the US, but Canadian and some Mexican corporations will be winners too. As a general policy, the US government, either directly or though institutions it controls, e.g., the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund, has insisted for years in the privatization of state corporations. In Mexico these include the state oil company PEMEX and the Federal Electricity Commission, as well as water companies, health and educational institutions, etc. US "encouragement" led to the privatization during the 80s and 90s of other strategic state sectors (the telephone company, airlines, trains, mass media among others). Another way is through treaties such as NAFTA and "partnerships" such as the SPP that severely restrict a country's sovereign in matters of natural resource exploitation. For example, as part of its free trade agreement with the United States, Canada lost the right to reduce unilaterally its exports of oil to the US. Although Mexico did not formally agree to similar terms when it signed onto NAFTA, the Salinas, Zedillo, Fox and Calderón administrations have increased exports of oil when the US has so requested, for example, in the run up to the Iraq invasion. Guaranteed access by the US to Mexico's oil at bargain prices may be a matter that has been agreed to in the SPP regulations. Meanwhile Mexico's oil supplies are quickly being depleted with some estimates putting reserves at no greater than 15 years at current rates of extraction. A more recent example has to do with increased levels of pesticides that Canadians will soon have in their foods, when tolerances for residues are "harmonized" to US standards by SPP regulations. 8. What implications does the SPP have for indigenous or first-nation peoples? The SPP weakens the rights of first nations to inhabit and work their lands. In the case of Mexico, the country's neoliberal governments (since the times of President Miguel de la Madrid, 1982 - 1988), have tried to weaken any "limitation" on private investment. The right of the indigenous people to establish autonomous areas and decide on the use of natural resources located on their lands, recognized by the ILO's 169 Convention (see Article 15), is an aspect that the corporations would like to curtail. The same goes for laws and norms that have been established to protect the environment. We suspect that corporations are reaching agreements with governments within the SPP framework that first weaken and then eliminate these protections and rights. 9. What is the most egregious aspect of this new Partnership? Perhaps it is the total contempt that the forces behind the SPP have for ordinary citizens and their right to decide on how a country is run. The SPP is profoundly undemocratic. Citizens' control is being weakened and turned over to a minority, e.g., a few people and corporations who are using greater doses of violence to accumulate capital. Basic principles are under threat: a country's wealth should be used to address and solve problems related to education, health, housing, infrastructure etc. The tendency now, however, as expressed in agreements such as the SPP, is the opposite: wealth is being concentrated in a few hands and the people are experiencing ever-greater poverty and deteriorating services and infrastructure. 10. How does the SPP relate to the recent meeting held between the presidents of Mexico and the United States and the prime minister of Canada? Since the SPP began in 2005, the three chief executives have gathered several times. The last summit occurred on August 201, 2007, and featured talks between illegitimate presidents Calderón and Bush and Prime Minister Harper (all neo-cons) in the small town of Montebello, province of Québec. Little information on the summit surfaced in the US press (the New York Times dismissed the significance of the summit, see "No Breakthrough at Canada Talks", 22 Aug 2007, and "Bush's Talks with Neighbors Overshadowed by Storm", 21 Aug 2007). In the Mexican and Canadian press, and in activist circles, it was widely expected that the chief executives would sign additional SPP regulations. As posted at http://zapagringo.blogspot.com/2007/08/security-prosperity-partnership_30.html

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