North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA)

What are the Social Impacts of Neoliberal Free Trade

Agreements?

What is Neoliberalism?Views markets as self regulatingActively restructures governments to

eliminate regulatory oversight of economiesRestructuring of public sector (health,

education, sanitation, etc.) accelerates entry to wage-economy

NAFTA’s Impact on MexicoForeign Direct Investment (FDI) – investment

arriving from outside the nation-state – increased from $4.4 billion in 1993 to $10.2 billion in 1998.

Increased wage employment in labor intensive factory work

Short Term FDI Speculation Increased Instability in Financial Markets

Long Term FDI Increased for building of factoriesExports to U.S. Increased from $49.4 billion in

1994 to $109.7 billion in 1999. Number of employed in factories increased: from

420,000 in 1990 to 1.3 million in 2000.

NAFTA’s Negative Impacts on MexicoWages in Mexico declined from 40 to 50% the

first year under NAFTACost of living increased 80%Over 20,000 small and medium business have

failed1,000 state owned enterprises have been

privatizedIncrease in Foreign Debt

What is at Stake?

Gender & Transnational Migration

Transnational MigrationThe study of transnational migration is largely

under a male-centered lens (andocentric) (Pessar and Mahler 2003).

Transnational migration has excluded the study of refugees and other exile groups (Al-Ali et al. 2001).

Pessar, Patricia R. and Sarah J. Mahler. 2003. "Transnational Migration: Bringing Gender In." International Migration Review 37:812-846.

Al-Ali, Nadje, Richard Black, and Khalid Koser. 2001. "Refugees and transnationalism: the experience of Bosnians and Eritreans in Europe." Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies 27:615-634.

State MasculinismJuridical-legislativeCapital FinanceLabor The Police/Military

Informality2/5ths of economically active population in

developing worldIn Latin America the informal economy

employs 57% of the workforceTwice as many domestic workers were

working in LA in 1990 as in 1980.

Mike Davis, “Planet of Slums,” Verso, New York 2007.

Hondagneu-Sotelo, “Domestica,” UC Press, Berkeley 2001.

Race & Gender“Third World women constitute the majority of

migrants seeking jobs as maids, vendors, maquila operatives, and service industry workers.

“Women [of color] also pay the highest price for cuts in education, health, and housing programs, food and energy subsidies, and increases in their unpaid labor”

Miriam Ching Yoon Louie, “Mexican Immigrant Women Workers,” 2003.