Can Free Trade and Environmental Protection Coexist? An important issue in the international relations of the twentieth century involves whether or not free trade and environmental protection can coexist. The goal of a free trade economy is to increase the global economy, while environmental protectors try to find ways of reversing some of the negative effects that humans have inflicted upon the earth. Because of the increasing popularity of this “green movement,” many political leaders are trying to find ways to make the two drastically different ideas incorporated into one.
Many people have the perception that free trade and environmental protection is so drastically different that it is not possible for the two to coincide. Some people find both of these issues to be the cause of all our “most pressing” global, environmental, mental, human health, and democratic problems. Critics of the free trade agreement argue that free trade pretends to be value free, yet is fundamentally value driven.
Because of its significant source of national revenue, trade has been synonymous with states’ political goals since the early inhabitants of the earth first realized how to transport goods over long distances. At first, this early trading system was simply a way of enriching one’s personal fortune, yet it soon became an easy way for countries to gain money and power. Intellectual arguments in support of free trade began in the late nineteenth century, but the political drive promoting this global trade approach did not become a reality until the 1940’s—after the Second World War and the United States’ Great Depression.
This explosion of international trade occurred at this time because countries were then seeking ways of rebuilding their own (and the global) economy. This concept seemed like a highly logical way to improve the economy for all nations because......
