Stepping back from the partisan and ideological struggle over international agreements and the heat over the Iran deal and the Trans-Pacific Partnership Agreement, I think it’s useful to reflect a bit on just how you go about evaluating the advisability of international agreements. Basically, I think there are two distinct factors, both of which need to be taken into account.
The first factor, obviously enough, is the actual agreement itself, its text, codicils, and any mutual understandings which may or may not be written into the actual text of the agreement. But there’s another factor that’s equally important and, I think far too frequently ignored.
That’s whether one or both parties are able to live up to the terms of the agreement. That’s why, for example, I don’t think an agreement with China on intellectual property is anything but a gag line. China doesn’t have the social, legal, or political structures that would be necessary to enforce such an agreement. It doesn’t have a robust system of civil law. How can you enforce intellectual property law in such an environment? You can’t.
That, for example, is why I’m interested in the details of what Japan has agreed to in the TPP agreement. We already have “free trade” agreements (actually managed trade agreements) in place with Australia, Canada, Mexico, and Singapore. We don’t have a pre-existing free trade agreement with Japan, we could really use one, and there are some things that neither we nor the Japanese can actually deliver regardless of what’s written on the paper.
