The United States has often been criticized for protectionist measures taken against developing country products. Yet, average agricultural protection has reemained practically nil in the U.S. over time, while rising in the European Common Market (E.C.M) and, even more, Japan. It further appears...

The authors examine the wide-ranging and fundamental trade reforms undertaken in 16 Latin American and Caribbean countries in the 1980s. These reforms have dramatically altered the nature of the trade regimes in these countries and are particularly significant because they were undertaken during...

This paper considers the challenges and opportunities facing the Central American countries and explores the choices open to them for fuller integration into the world economy. The paper presents a brief historical account of the origins and evolution of the Central American Common Market...

The unconditional extension of the fruits of trade negotiations under the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT) is giving way to bilateral and other discriminatory trade agreements. Led by the United States, GATT has taken a strong position against discrimination: the benefits of...

Regional integration agreements (RIAs) are examples of second best and have an ambiguous impact on welfare, contend the authors. They build a model in which RIAs unambiguously raise welfare by correcting for externalities. It assumes that trade between neighboring countries increases trust...

Preferential trading agreements (PTAs) are increasingly including elements of"deep"integration--efforts to agree on common regulatory regimes. The author explores what the PTA experience suggests about the relationship between shallow integration--attaining unconditional intra-area free trade...

The theoretical literature on trade follows two different approaches to explaining the endogenous formation of customs unions: 1) The terms-of-trade approach, in which integrating partners are willing to exploit terms-of-trade effects. Using the terms-of-trade approach, one concludes that...

The Pacific Rim members of the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) group have different views about the role each should play in fostering further trade liberalization. But at the November 1994 APEC meetings in Bogor they committed themselves to forming an APEC free trade area. The authors...

The authors explore the argument that trade between the Mercosur countries should be stimulated by preferential policies because of their geographic proximity. That is, that the Mercosur countries are candidates for natural integration. They find that, on average, transportation margins on trade...

In the early 1980's, faced with a mounting debt crisis, most highly indebted developing countries increased trade barriers to generate more foreign exchange; but in the last three to four years, they have reversed course. Almost all highly indebted countries have undergone real devaluations and...