Free trade sparks debates
■ Free Trade Area of the
Americas leaves students and
community members trying
to understand the treaty
By Lisa Toth
Oregon Daily Emerald
In place since 1994. the North
American Free Trade Agreement
(NAFTA) could expand to be
come the Free Trade Area of the
Americas (FTAA) by 2005. And
with concerns that the FTAA is
destined to create a hemisphere
wide, corporate-controlled econ
omy, more than 100 students.and
community members gathered on
campus Saturday to learn how
the FTAA could affect Oregoni
ans.
The FTAA is a free trade and in
vestment agreement that 34 of the
35 countries in the Western Hemi
sphere may soon be negotiating. In
addition to learning about the po
tential effects of the FTAA, the par
ticipants also discussed ways they
can stop it from becoming a reality.
Both participants and organizers
said that over the past seven years,
NAFTA has caused environmen
tal, fiscal and social devastation.
Scott Miksch, a staff member of
the Committee in Solidarity with
the Central American People,
helped to coordinate the teach-in,
hoping to offer people “the tools [it
will] take to stop free trade in its
tracks.”
He said the mainstream media
and the government are not reveal
ing information about the FTAA.
“They don’t want people to
learn about it. We have to educate
ourselves,” Miksch said. “We are
hoping that the FTAA idea doesn’t
become a reality.”
Mick Garvin, a member of Al
liance for Sustainable Jobs and the
Environment — a group trying to
make corporations more account
able for their behavior — said he
hoped the workshops Saturday of
fered the public a chance to under
stand the issues surrounding NAF
TA.
“The only way we can manage
to get the power back is to educate
the public and fill them with a
sense of the loss of the sovereignty
of the people,” Garvin said.
Mike Miller, a sophomore at
Lane Community College, said he
came to the teach-in to learn
more about issues such as global
ization.
“It is important for people to
learn as much as they can because
it affects every aspect of people’s
daily lives,” Miller said.
He attended the “Privatization
and Sovereignty” workshop where
speakers addressed the erosion of
sovereignty and privatization of
education and prisons.
Miller said a downside of the
sessions was that the knowledge
reached people Who were already
active.
Lynn Stephen, a University
professor of anthropology, spoke
about the social and environmen
tal costs of free trade agreements
— and about NAFTA’s effects on
indigenous communities in
southern Mexico. After NAFTA,
she said, an increase in poverty
and a shortage of jobs caused the
indigenous “rural farmers” from
Mexico to immigrate to the Unit
ed States.
Stephen said people need to un
derstand NAFTA’s “vicious cycle”
that has caused an increase in the
number of undocumented indige
nous Mexican farmers in Oregon,
she said.
“I hope that people can see their
personal relation to their con
sumption and understand implica
tions of free trade agreements for
other people in other countries,”
Stephen said.
On April 21, which is “FTAA
Action Day,” President George W.
Bush, trade advisors and prime
ministers will meet in Quebec
City, Canada to hold a meeting
about the FTAA, Miksch said.
“The free traders believe that
this free trade is going to eliminate
borders, but they really mean elim
inating borders for corporations,”
he said.
Miksch added that for those peo
ple who cannot make it all the way
to Quebec City, demonstrations
will be taking place at the U.S.
Canadian and the U.S.-Mexican
borders.
The protest at the U.S.-Canadi
an border, or the “March at the
Arch,” will take place at Peace
Arch Park, home of the Peace
Arch Monument in Blaine, Wash.
The monument symbolizes the
cooperation between Canada and
the United States, and it has
served as a site for previous
protests.
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Professors
continued from page 1A
chitlekarn. It is also prevalent in
other departments.
Scott Optican, visiting assistant
law professor, has literally lived all
over the world. Born in New York,
he spent the first years of his life in
the States before moving on to other
•fjountries, such as Austria, where
he worked with the United Na
tions, and England, where he at
tended graduate school.
Since 1992, he has been teach
ing law at the University of Auck
land in New Zealand, although
this year he took a break to teach
in Eugene. This is his first time
practicing his profession in his
home country.
Because the law school runs on a
semester system, the academic year
ends next week, and Optican said
he can look back on the year and all
his experiences teaching in the
United States.
“It’s interesting to see the differ
ences teaching in a U.S. law
school,” Optican said.
While he said the experience has
been more than worthwhile, one
difference he had to get used to was
the age and education level of his
students. In the United States a stu
dent must have already earned
their undergraduate degree, but in
New Zealand, law students can be
undergraduates.
“You’re actually teaching people
right out of high school,” he said.
Optican said because students in
the States have to earn their under
graduate degrees before going on to
study law, they seem to have a bet
ter idea of what they want.
“Here, they know what they
want out of their law school educa
tion,”. he said. “But students are
students no matter what part of the
world they’re in.”
Optican said he also noticed the
pace of busy Americans’ lifestyles.
, “Everyone runs their own show,”
he said.
Optican said at the University of
Auckland, the law faculty comes
together nearly every morning to
drink tea and have a leisurely visit
with each other. He said this is
something he’s missed, so he suc
cessfully started the ritual among
the University’s law faculty as a
way for the professors to get to
know each other better.
“It hasn’t caught on quite as
much because people here are pret
ty busy,” he said. “But some of
them seem to like it.”
While Optican had the experi
ence of growing up in the United
States, Sergio Koreisha, a profes
sor of decision sciences in the
business department, had the op
portunity to live his childhood in
South America. He said living in
more than one country has en
abled him to appreciate each
country’s differences.
Koreisha was born and raised in
Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, until his fa
ther moved the family to the Unit
ed States when he was 12. He said
at the time, there was talk of nation
alizing industries and his father,
who was not a native Brazilian, was
afraid of losing his job.
“One day it was announced that
we were going to move,” he said.
“We boarded a plane and flew to
New York.”
The family eventually settled in
California, and although Koreisha
has lived in the United States ever
since, he said he still makes time to
visit his hometown.
“My life has been here,” he said,
“but I think I have the best of both
cultures.”
Koreis.ha said he tries to instill
an international flavor into his
daughters’ lives that he had grow
ing up. He said he has taken them
to many other countries, such as
France.
“I try to instill in them that
there’s another country’s perspec
tive, and we should try to consider
them,” he said.
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