An Alternative Trade Policy
Presidential Hopeful Aims to Sustain a Middle Class

By Robert L. Borosage 06/26/2008

Where is Sen. Barack Obama on trade and globalization? ...

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The challenge is defining a sensible strategy to sustain a prosperous middle-class America in a global economy. ...

Obama, for all of his mixed signals, seems to get this. He argues broadly that U.S. trade strategy has to be “good not just for Wall Street, but also for Main Street.” He criticizes trade accords for serving special -- read multinational corporations and banks -- interests and not working families.

In fact, Obama, in a piecemeal fashion, has laid out elements of a major alternative strategy.


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Recognizing that the benefits of globalization have not been widely shared, Obama uses the state to adjust the scales. He’d increase taxes on the wealthy to pay for affordable health care for all.

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This domestic agenda would be reinforced, according to Obama, by changing the U.S. posture on global standards and negotiations. The Illinois senator pledges to seek global rules that protect the concerns of workers and consumers and small investors – labor rights, environmental and consumer protections, greater financial transparency and limits on excessive speculation. He is talking about lifting standards up, not allowing multinationals to drive national standards down.

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Bill Clinton understood that the central post-Cold War security challenge was economic, not military. But he got the mission wrong. He thought his job was to champion the global market, when multinational corporations and banks were already forging it. The challenge instead was to create rules around it and national policies that would insure globalization worked for working people.

This challenge now faces the next administration. McCain appears satisfied with repeating the homilies about free trade. Obama has laid out elements of an ambitious new course. The coming debate may enable him to address the concerns of the vast majority of Americans, while leading the country toward a strategic discussion it can no longer afford to ignore.