World Trade Organization
In Abdelal and Ruggie’s writing, The Principles of Embedded Liberalism: Social Legitimacy and Global Capitalization, the regulation of world trade after the free trade years after World War II, or from 1945-1970, was a huge topic of debate. Embedded liberalism is the core theory of Abdelal and Ruggie’s article, as it is to protect trade from being dominated by a select number of powerful nations. An organization that embedded liberalism is shown is the World Trade Organization that we as a class discussed. As a trading system it has involvement from most countries, with the non-members being around ten to fifteen third-world countries, and it has economic advantages to the United States. However, the World Trade Organization really is only beneficial to the multinational corporations themselves, and not necessarily the smaller, underdeveloped nations involved.
I see the World Trade Organization similarly to the recent Netflix show “Squid Game”. In the show, a group of old rich men are selling a game to a group of poor adults who need a second chance in life. It sounds like a good idea to the adults who try to make themselves money, yet all but one of the approximate five hundred contestants on the show end up dying without wealth. This is a similar comparison to the World Trade Organization, as in the World Trade Organization the United States, Germany, and China are comparable to the old men who lure the poor adults into joining the game. They are both already established, wealthy people or things. The slight difference is that the wealthy men in the show do not get to keep the money, whereas the United States, China, and Germany end up profiting most from the World Trade Organization. The similarity lies in the fact that both the game and the World Trade Organization seem to be fair as an equal opportunity to create wealth, but in both cases a large proportion of the money goes to very limited amounts of people.
The analogy of the Netflix show “Squid Game” was to draw attention to the fact that the poorer people in the game, or the poorer nations struggle to get wealth under both formats. The idea of free trade sounds great to the United States, Germany, and China, as they are large, wealthy nations. For countries with weaker, underdeveloped economies, free trade can prevent or negatively affect these countries trying to develop infant industries as well as diversify their economy. The free trade of the World Trade Organization greatly favors and serves the interests of multinational corporations. As we also discussed in class, this is why if I were to travel to Cuba tomorrow I could find a McDonald’s. Cuba, a very poor nation, could use that kind of revenue to their own economy for people to eat at a Cuban owned restaurant where the profits go towards them. Overall, while the World Trade Organization seems as if it is helping world trade due to its lower trade barriers, it is primarily helping the already wealthy nations, providing a bigger gap for wealth disparity between nations.
Austin, I find this analogy very interesting and agree with it for the most part. It is very out of the box to compare the World Trade Organization, an organization that is supposed to regulate and encourage trade between countries while supporting smaller economies, to a tv show that consists of children games to see adults get shot. I see the analogy, but wonder if it is a little extreme. I am one to assume the worst in someone's motives, so the fact that the WTO largely benefits those countries already in power just makes sense to me, and the fact that rich men enjoy seeing others purge for money seems typical in the tv show. However, I would argue that the World Trade Organization is a little more morale than those horrible rich men, and I truly believe the WTO tries to help countries in need looking for a brighter future economically. Even though the WTO does not seem like the most fair situation for many many countries, it is good for the most part, but could definitely be changed to benefit those less fortunate more.
ReplyDeleteOnce again, I really did like this blog post, and found it to be a very compelling comparison and somewhat pretty accurate, I would say, and hope, that that the WTO has better morals than being so selfish to the ultra-powerful countries it contains.
Also, Austin, your last paragraph mentioning McDonalds in Cuba has many good points. It is a shame that a SUPER present American fast food chain earns money in a very poor country while local shops and vendors are scratched of their living. I would not say that is a result of the WTO, but they could put restrictions on this kind of behavior where the rich are getting richer at the expense of locals in places that just cannot compete against the efficiency and prices of a giant like McDonalds.
DeleteHey Eli, thank you for your feedback. The analogy of Squid Game and the WTO was not exactly perfect, but I definitely wanted to get outside of the box a little bit. Also, looking back I definitely should have said that the WTO could be helpful by stopping transnational corporations such as McDonald's from having locations in poor struggling nations such as Cuba, so thank you for pointing that out to me.
DeleteI think these are really interesting points. I agree that while the WTO claims to be an organization to support the economies of every country, it really only benefits the wealthier nations of the global north. This is clear through your analogy of the Mcdonald's franchise and its presence in poorer nations like Cuba. Clearly, free trade benefits the wealthy far more than the poor. My question is, do you think that removing free trade altogether would benefit or harm the economies of all of these poor countries in the global south?
ReplyDeleteI think that eliminating free trade could potentially benefit poorer nations, as it could give their economies a chance to earn revenues. Under the free trade system most of the poorer nations are just a pawn in the wealthier nations chess game of trading.
DeleteThis was a wicked good analogy in my opinion, and I really like how it works on so many levels (i guess "like" isnt exactly the right word). Its very similar, such as when the debtors in squid games essentially have to buy in, just like in real life, where the underdeveloped have to sign up to be part of the world economy. I don't really have a question, I just really found this interesting.
ReplyDeleteThank you, it might have been a little bit of a stretch, but it was an analogy to try to help explain WTO.
DeleteThank you, it might have been a little bit of a stretch, but it was an analogy to try to help explain WTO.
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