GEI Projects

4. The institutional framework for world trade: Challenges from regionalism and the East Asian NICS

AIMS AND OBJECTIVES

The research will investigate the implications for the international trading system of challenges to multilateral rules in a developed and developing country context.

The WTO is facing challenges that even the successful outcome of the Uruguay Round has not resolved. The research is focusing on the institutional changes required to deal with forms of regionalism which threaten the multilateral system.

The challenges are in terms of concept (the calling into question of the multilateral, liberal economic ideas on which the post-war system is now based) and of practicalities (Southern Africa is a region which is struggling between open and more closed forms of regionalization). The research aims to:

establish the extent to which the apparent challenges are borne out in reality;

identify the potential consequences for the existing multilateral institutions.

STUDY DESIGN

The research will be concentrated on desk-based analysis of tariff, trade, output and employment data; the terms of the Uruguay Round agreement and the principal accords; and an in-depth study of regional integration in a Southern Africa policy framework. This will be supplemented by interviews of officials, academics working in related areas, and journalists. Visits are proposed to London, Brussels, Geneva, Washington and Southern Africa for this purpose.

POLICY IMPLICATIONS

The assumption underlying the research is that public and private sector policy can and should adjust to deal with challenges to the multilateral trade system identified in the project. The aim of the research is to contribute to policy and practice in the regulation of world trade and in the advice given to countries on the reform of trade policy. This is to be achieved through one or more learned journal articles, popular articles (e.g. the Economist, the Financial Times), advice to UK and EC bodies (e.g. the House of Lords’ European Communities Select Committee) and consultancy work for international organizations and developing countries.