How to make free trade fairer

It’s no secret that the Biden administration is trying to orchestrate a new global trade agenda. The White House had a setback in those efforts a couple of weeks ago when the US-EU steel and aluminium talks were pushed to end of the year. But it has another chance to make good on its promise of a “postcolonial” trade system at an inaugural summit of twelve countries within the Americas, being held in Washington this week. The Americas Partnership for Economic Prosperity (APEP) — which includes not only the US but Barbados, Canada, Chile, Colombia, Costa Rica, Dominican Republic, Ecuador, Mexico, Panama, Peru and Uruguay — was set up to put human rights and climate change at the heart of economic policy. One of the many topics up for discussion will be the investor-state dispute settlement process, or ISDS, and its threats to those goals. There are many ways in which the current global trade system is designed to favour large multinational companies over countries. But ISDS is one of th

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• Ruby Scanlon