From the start of the free trade debate, expert trade analysts from Pierre Berton to the Ontario English Catholic Teachers' Association have warned that the phased removal of tariffs over the next 10 years spells the end of Canada.

It's more than simply a matter of the complete elimination of public education, unemployment insurance, pensions, regional development and bilingualism. Mel Hurtig advises it will also lead to nuclear-tipped ICBMs being installed on Banks Island. Sheila Copps sees swarms of American lawyers crossing the border in search of surrogate mothers, whose services will be cheaper because of medicare.

To Margaret Atwood, it means we'll get U.S. gun laws and crime rates; everything else from slacker pesticide rules to bigger potholes to torrents of pornography naturally follows. I leave it to Canadian Labor Congress president Shirley Carr to sum up: ''The Americans want to disrupt and disturb everything we have and bring us down to their level.''

The principle is harmonization: because the American economy is 12 times larger than ours, and because we are desperate to make a deal, we will have to conform our laws and values to those of the U.S., in the name of the ''level playing field.'' It's all very depressing and quite frightening. And, it seems, inevitable.

But, this principle of harmonization - what if it could be used for Good, and not for Evil? We may be done for, but in the time we have left, we could turn this powerful force to our advantage, as an instrument of Canada's traditional progressive foreign policy.

Like the U.S., we should seek out nations that are much smaller than we, that are desperate to sign a trade deal, and whose laws and values we would like to conform to our own. You may already have guessed where this is headed. I'm talking about the boldest, most innovative foreign policy move since Suez. That's right: free trade with South Africa.

While our population is slightly less than theirs, our economy is three times as large. And if you think we're eager to sign a trade deal, take a look at South Africa. We're worried we might be shut out of the U.S. market. They're being shut out of everyone's markets.

A Canada-South Africa Free Trade Area admittedly would represent something of a reversal of our present policy of economic sanctions against the apartheid state. But the link between domestic policies and trade is established. With sanctions running out of steam, it's time to impose total and comprehensive free trade on South Africa. Call it ''destructive engagement.''

In the months of grueling, high-pressure negotiations, we would demand that every trace of apartheid be stripped away, in the name of a level playing field. We would argue that the political and economic subjugation of South Africa's black and colored citizens allows its employers to pay lower wages, so conferring an unfair competitive advantage.

It's just possible this might not work. After all, the Americans achieved surprisingly little - all right, let's be frank, nothing whatsoever - in this regard in our own talks. This is where stage two kicks in: the clincher, the fail-safe. After the treaty is signed, South African business will demand that apartheid be scrapped, because it puts them at an unfair competitive disadvantage, because of the higher cost in taxes to pay for it. Armored vehicles quelling unrest in the townships, an all-embracing apparatus of censorship: these things cost money.

You might wonder how the same program could give an unfair competitive advantage to both sides at the same time, but if so, you don't understand the theory of harmonization.

Or you might think the value of the rand would simply adjust to reflect cost differences, so ensuring that trade remains in rough balance over time, without need of harmonization. You might also point out that there is no such thing as a ''level playing field,'' that it is a mercantilist invention having nothing to do with free trade.

AT OUR MERCY

In economic terms, you would add, it doesn't matter whether an industry is uncompetitive because the other country has more abundant resources, lower wage rates or higher subsidies: ''unfair'' as it may seem that the comparative advantage is the work of man rather than fate, that is a matter of metaphysics, not economics. It still pays the country to import the product, you might say, rather than make it.

Stage three, then. This is sure-fire. Even if the South African regime decides it is possible to maintain high-cost domestic policies independent of trade policy, once the treaty is in place we'll have them where we want them: the threat of abrogation will put them at our mercy. Their economy will have adjusted to the new free trade environment; they'll be locked in.

Of course, it's just possible that an opposition party might come to power vowing to tear up the deal, which would make this something of an empty threat. If we did scrap it, it's true that South Africa would be in no different position, except their economy would be a lot stronger. And no, this has never actually happened in any of the dozen or so free trade arrangements already in place worldwide . . .

It was just a thought.