Trade’s Progressive Opposition

• In Event: Who Supports—and Opposes—the Liberal International Order?

Abstract

While right-wing opposition to globalization has recently come to the fore, we describe the more enduring opposition to trade of US progressive groups. To do so, we collect original data on thousands of progressive groups’ opposition to US trade agreements over the past 25 years. We describe patterns in the interests of these groups across a new fifteen category schema spanning environmental activism, labor rights, religious organizations, and beyond. We also examine variation in lobbying, organization, and issues of interest across agreements. Overall, we find that progressive groups have been quite active on trade agreements with some important contributions to the dialogue surrounding globalization, although their overall influence on trade policy outcomes remains modest.

Author

• Iain Osgood, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor