Promising growth rates, increased trade, and competition among major global players for African resources have boosted the development and bargaining power of sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) in relation to the EU. However, Africa's least developed countries remain vulnerable to external shocks....

Market access is the most important liberalizing principle in the General Agreement on Trade in Services (GATS). It entails a general prohibition of quantitative restrictions, which however is conditional on commitments undertaken by Members in their respective Schedules of Commitments. Case-law...

Promising growth rates, increased trade, and competition among major global players for African resources have boosted the development and bargaining power of sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) in relation to the EU. However, Africa's least developed countries remain vulnerable to external shocks....

In this paper we argue that strong political economy forces explain the rush of the EU to expand eastwards. We use a model of vertical product differentiation in order to claim that technologically- advanced EU firms (residing in high-income member countries) prefer a mutual market-opening with...

In a three-country Customs Union (CU) formation game, I introduce international trade in intermediate inputs and Rules of Origin (RoO) restrictions. In the case of symmetric countries, I show that as countries become more involved in global supply chains, global free trade is less likely to be a...

We study, theoretically and empirically, how countries choose intra-bloc tariffs and preferential margins when they form Preferential Trade Agreements (PTAs). Our model indicates that countries should set systematically lower preferential margins when the bloc takes the form of a free trade area...

The Common Market for Eastern and Southern Africa (COMESA) is a Free Trade Area (FTA) regional trade agreement in Africa. Currently, Ethiopia is negotiating to join COMESA FTA. This study assesses the impact of three regional trade arrangements, COMESA FTA, customs unions, and the European...