Assignment Task:
In 2002, the American Diplomat and Business Professor, Stephen Keat, wrote a paper defending and promoting a Free Trade Area of the Americas (FTAA), an idea promoted by U.S. Presidents from George Bush I to George Bush II for a free trade area to include all of the Americas, except Cuba.
Keat claimed, Negotiations to create an FTAA hold out the hope of profound economic integration in the Americas that could bring equally profound benefits to the peoples and governments of the OAS members... A failure to agree on an FTAA would ... be a setback to economic and political prospects for the region, harming the economic development of OAS member states and probably hindering overall cooperation in some other areas.
The FTAA ended in failure after negotiating states failed to reach an agreement by the 2005 deadline. The Brazilian government, in particular, resisted a free trade area with the U.S. because of continued U.S. subsidies for domestic agriculture, which Brazil claimed created an 'unfair' and 'unfree' trade relationship.
What do you think of Keat's argument about the benefits of the FTAA? Would the hemisphere be more prosperous, peaceful, democratic, and stable today if the OAS member states agreed to and entered into an FTAA by 2005?