Mexican Perceptions of Free Trade: Support and Opposition to NAFTA

Much of the debate around free trade and, in particular, much of the North American opposition to the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) has been framed in terms that would suggest that Canadian and U.S. losses will be Mexico’s gain. Even before an agreement was worked out, it appeared that, in aggregate economic terms, Mexico could be the partner that might benefit most from a free trade treaty. But while Mexico may improve its economic situation, undoubtedly many Mexicans will not. However, precisely which Mexicans-that is, which sectors of the economy and which social classes-will gain or lose ground was difficult to predict before the details of the bilateral negotiations with the United States were known. It is also difficult to establish who will benefit because the closed, authoritarian nature of the Mexican system has produced silence in precisely those places-the legislature and the press-where a vigorous national debate should be unfolding. As Adolfo Aguilar Zinser argues in his contribution to this book, the Mexican regime’s intolerance of dissent has largely stifled those dissident voices that, under other circumstances, would offer critical analysis and alternative proposals to the neoconservative project that underpins the official Mexican position on NAFTA. In the absence of critical public debate, it is not possible to predict who the Mexican beneficiaries will be. Indeed, the winners will not be known until the treaty is not only ratified but also implemented. Rather, I will focus on what Mexicans know about free trade, their perceptions of their prospects under such an agreement, and how those perceptions have led them to positions of support or opposition to the process of economic integration