Stronger together? Canada-Mexico relations and the NAFTA re-negotiations

ABSTRACT

The election of Donald Trump and his promise to rip up or renegotiate the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) posed a fundamental challenge to the already shaky relationship between Canada and Mexico. This article discusses the implications of the talks to re-negotiate NAFTA, which resulted in the Canada-United States-Mexico Agreement (CUSMA). The first part of the article reviews the evolution of Canada-Mexico relations before and after NAFTA, then discusses the re-negotiation process. The relationship between the two subordinate partners in the agreement was severely tested in the course of the negotiations. The Trump administration’s attempt to divide the United States’ two partners in the agreement was ultimately largely unsuccessful, however, paving the way for stronger cooperation. The election of leftist president Andrés Manuel López Obrador (AMLO) also creates new opportunities for fruitful collaboration, if the Canadian state is adept at exploring them.

RÉSUMÉ

L’élection de Donald Trump et sa promesse de déchirer ou de renégocier l’accord de libre-échange nord-américain (ALENA) ont constitué un défi fondamental pour les relations déjà fragiles entre le Canada et le Mexique. Cet article aborde les implications des discussions de renégociation de l’ALENA, qui ont abouti sur l’accord Canada-États-Unis-Mexique (ACEUM). Dans sa première partie, l’article passe en revue l’évolution des relations entre le Canada et le Mexique avant et après l’ALENA, puis aborde le processus de cette renégociation. La relation entre les deux partenaires subordonnés dans l’accord a été sévèrement éprouvée au cours des négociations. Finalement, la tentative de l’administration Trump de diviser les deux partenaires des États-Unis dans l’accord a échoué, ouvrant cependant la voie à une coopération plus forte. L’élection du président de gauche Andrés Manuel López Obrador (AMLO) crée aussi de nouvelles opportunités de collaboration fructueuse, si l’État canadien est assez habile pour les explorer.

Acknowledgments

I thank the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada for their financial assistance. I also thank the two anonymous reviewers of this article for their helpful suggestions.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes on contributor

Laura Macdonald is a Professor in the Department of Political Science and the Institute of Political Economy at Carleton University. She has published numerous articles in journals and edited collections on such issues as the role of non-governmental organizations in development, global civil society, social policies and citizenship struggles in Latin America, Canadian development assistance, Canada-Latin American relations and the political impact of the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA). Her recent work looks at transnational activism in North America around labour rights, migration, and human rights in Mexico, and policies to reduce crime and violence in Mexico City.

Correction Statement

This article has been republished with minor changes. These changes do not impact the academic content of the article.

Notes

1 Another factor was the antagonism between the Obama and Harper administrations over the Keystone pipeline.

2 While these figures show a strong increase in trade relations in quantitative terms, as a percentage of Canada’s total exports with the world, exports to Mexico grew from only 0.46% in 1996 to 1.48% in 2016.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada [grant number 435-2017-0871].