Blayne Haggart, Associate Professor of Political Science at Brock, wrote a piece recently published in The Conversation about the United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement.

Haggart writes:

The emerging conventional wisdom around the United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement (USMCA) seems to be that it’s a mediocre deal for Canada, driven by an American president who mostly cares about the agreement’s name.

However, the emerging wisdom goes, the deal “essentially represents the status quo with a few wrinkles” and could have been much worse: It’s “a good deal for this country, especially given the circumstances.”

The underlying assumption is that “the circumstances” are U.S. President Donald Trump, and that things will get back to normal once he finally departs.

This perspective dramatically misreads our current situation. The famously ignorant Trump may not understand trade policy, but in all the ways that matter, this deal was driven by American interests, reflecting many longstanding bipartisan U.S. objectives related to the knowledge economy.

Far from maintaining the status quo, the USMCA, if ratified, would fundamentally alter North America’s political and economic structures, increasing American dominance over its neighbours.

Continue reading the full article here.