Documents trade liberalization 202 results

"The paper tests predictions of a traditional intra-household bargaining model which, under reasonable assumptions, shows that lack of bargaining power in the value chain significantly reduces the capacity for obtaining benefits from increased product demand arising from trade liberalization and therefore is positively associated with child labour. Cross-sectional and panel negative binomial estimates in a sample of emerging countries support this hypothesis. They show that proxies of domestic workers' bargaining power in the international division of labour (such as the share of primary product exports) are significantly related to child labour, net of the effect of traditional controls such as parental income, quality of education, international aid, and trade liberalization. The positive impact of the share of primary product exports on child labour outlines a potential paradox. The paradox suggests that trade liberalization does not always have straightforward positive effects on social indicators and that its short-run effects on income distribution and distribution of skills and market power across countries need to be carefully evaluated."

"That the global economy has been hugely successful over the past 50 years is unquestionable. A major underpinning of that success has been the open multilateral system, which has enabled the emergence of a truly international financial system, reciprocal reduction of trade barriers, and the emergence of many previously poor countries into the status of ‘emerging markets' or even ‘developed'. The open multilateral system, however, is increasingly under-appreciated and taken for granted. Preferential trading arrangements have proliferated, and with them the possibility of discriminatory arrangements for capital flows. The absence of an international regime for capital flows permits this development and poses a threat to the system, as do all of the issues on which countries' governments assert ‘their' interests, and ignore their interests in the overall health of the system. It is to be hoped that the benefits of multilateralism are more greatly appreciated, and that the current trend toward increasing regionalism and departures from the post-war system is reversed."

"This paper first briefly describes the role of the WTO and its history. It then lays out a simple bargaining model of international negotiations, which can be used for understanding the Doha Round of talks. Using this, we distil what we regard as the major potential explanations for the difficulties in these talks. We then discuss a number of the systemic questions that confront WTO members. We suggest that the WTO should concentrate on market access, rather than on promoting a development agenda or on further expanding its coverage to deal with regulatory issues or with other domestic policies."