We describe recent work on the theory of trade agreements that speaks to the purpose and design of GATT. Our discussion proceeds in three steps. First, we examine the purpose of a trade agreement. In both the traditional economic and the political-economy approaches to the study of trade...

This paper empirically examines recently declassified data from the GATT/WTO on tariff bargaining. We document eight stylized facts about these interconnected high-stakes international negotiations. We use detailed product-level offer and counteroffer data to examine several questions about...

We discuss China's stance in the WTO post-accession, noting the many issues with implementation of China's accession terms by 2007. We evaluate how much benefit China can realistically receive from WTO membership given current problems with dumping actions against China and trade restrictions...

East Asian countries have become much more active in utilizing the WTO dispute settlement system to assert their legal rights. The dispute settlement experience so far for these countries has shown strong tendency of domestic governments to defend economic interest of major industries. Their...

This paper uses 68 measures of trade policy and trade liberalization to ask if membership in theWorld Trade Organization (WTO) and its predecessor the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT) is associated with more liberal trade policy. Almost no measures of trade policy are significantly...

Between December 1994 and March 1999, Mexico, Thailand, Indonesia, Korea, Malaysia, Russia and Brazil experienced major financial crises which were associated with massive recessions and extreme movements of exchange rates. Similar crises have threatened Turkey and Argentina (2000 and 2001) and...

In this article I first describe the basic principles that parents employ in disciplining their children. The description is based on a survey of parents, the major results of which are that parental sanctions are premised on wrongdoing--not on the mere causation of harm; that parental sanctions...