Political Implications of Changes and Trade Ronald Rogowski. "Political Cleavages and Chang

In this article, Ronald Rogowski performs what he characterizes as a "thought experiment" in politics and economics. His concern is with the political implications of changes in external conditions which make international trade either easier or more difficult. Such external changes may be technological, as when nineteenth and twentiethcentury improvements in transport technology allowed goods to physically move more easily over long distances, or external political changes, as in the Depression era when a global economic slowdown and a general rise of trade barriers forced reduced trade even on nations which had no internal protectionist pressures.

Rogowski sets forth a set of simple political assumptions and somewhat more complex economic assumptions, both sets based on wellestablished theories. Put briefly, his political assumption is that as the members of an economic sector gain greater economic power, or foresee greater economic power, they will gain or at least seek greater political influence as well. His economic assumption is that the three main sectors correspond to the three factors of production, land (i.e., rural or landowner interests), labor, and capital. Nations may be rich or poor in capital  corresponding to advanced development or underdevelopment. In this simplified model (late

. . .
gowski's model to the present day to see if it applies, and if it does, to examine contemporary attitudes and events to seek evidence of causal mechanisms now at work. For this purpose, let us consider the impact of expanded U.S. trade with two controversial trading partners, Japan and Mexico. To begin with, we must determine where each of these three countries fits on Rogowski's grid. The U.S. and Japan are both advanced industrial countries, and therefore by definition are capitalrich. Underdeveloped Mexico is capitalpoor. Japan, with its little arable land and massive dependence on trade, must be regarded as landpoor (and therefore laborrich). The flow of illegal immigration from Mexico to the U.S., and the large role of the U.S. in world agriculture exports, indicates that Mexico is landpoor and laborrich, while the U.S. is the reverse. These three countries thus fill three of the four positions in the Rogowski grid. The U.S. is in position 1, Japan in position 2, and Mexico in position 4. A second grid (p. 1125) identifies the characteristic political response to be expected of a nation in each of these positions in the face of a greater exposure to trade. The U.S. situation, capital and land
. . .

Some common words found in the essay are:
Ronald Rogowski, Underdeveloped Mexico, American Japanese, Narita Airport, Finally Mexican, President Salinas, Democratic Party, President Bush, Agreement NAFTA, Dallas Dynasty, labor rich, class conflict, rich poor, rich labor, rogowski grid, land rich labor, american politics, japanese politics, land labor, poor land, president bush, rich labor poor, call class conflict,
Approximate Word count = 1565
Approximate Pages = 6 (250 words per page)