After a phase of stagnation in East-West trade lasting several years, both sides have more recently been at pains to intensify economic relations between East and West, the reasons being both economic and political. What part can the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT) play in this regard?

The trade of the Western industrial states with Eastern Europe has been the object of keen political interest in the past year or two although it accounts for no more than 5–6 p.c. of the total foreign commerce of the OECD countries. The current discussion about the future of the economic...

Trade between eastern and western industrial nations amounts to barely 4 p.c. of the total foreign trade of the latter, yet the interest in this part of world trade is disproportionally great. A number of many-sided studies have been devoted to East-West trade, and their results have given...

Direct cooperation between manufacturing firms on both sides has been recommended as a new approach to overcoming the problems of traditional trade between West Germany and the COMECON states. In spite of a high degree of activity for promoting East-West cooperation, its volume, however, is...