Market Integration, Regionalism and the Global Economy

Demonstrates how new techniques of economic analysis can be used to study the process of regional integration.

Richard Baldwin (Edited by), Daniel Cohen (Edited by), Andre Sapir (Edited by), Anthony Venables (Edited by)

9780521645898, Cambridge University Press

Paperback, published 26 August 1999

368 pages, 21 tables
22.9 x 15.3 x 2.4 cm, 0.59 kg

'This book is aimed at specialists. Its objective is to contribute to the study of the nature and policy implications of changes taking place in the 'global' economy in relation to trends in international economic integration. … [It] book will be used by specialists and graduate students as a part of the literature on international economic integration and globalization.' Miroslav N. Jovanovic UN Economic Commission for Europe, Geneva

A study of the nature and the policy implication of changes in the global economy in relationship to the process of regional integration, conducted using the newest techniques of economic analysis. The principal message drawn from these analytical and policy insights is that in a world characterised by trade distortions and nonlinearities, regional integration may or may not foster global integration, and may or may not advance regional or global convergence. The key is good economic policy based on sound economic analysis. Part one of the volume covers three international trade policy issues: regionalism and multilateralism; the political economy of trade policy; and trade income inequality. Part two (chapters 7-11) focuses on three 'domestic' problems faced by regional groups: labour migration; exchange rate arrangements; and real convergence.

1. Introduction Richard Baldwin, Daniel Cohen, Andre Sapir and Anthony Venables
Part I. Regionalism and the Global Economy L. Alan Winters: 2. Discussion Andre Sapir
3. Preferential agreements and the multilateral trading system Kyle Bagwell and Robert W. Staiger
Discussion Raquel Fernandez
4. Politics and trade policy Elhanan Helpman
Discussion Thierry Verdier
5. Globalisation and labour, or if globalisation is a bowl of cherries, why are there so many glum faces around the table Dani Rodrik
Discussion Alasdair Smith
6. Openness and wage inequality in developing countries: the Lation American challenge to East Asian conventional wisdom
Discussion Riccardo Faini
Part II. Market Integration and Regionalism: 7. Operationalising the theory of optimum currency areas Tamim Bayoumi and Barry Eichengreen
Discussion Jean Pisani-Ferry
8. European Migrants: an endangered species? Riccardo Faini
Discussion Richard Baldwin
9. Geography and specialisation: industrial belts on a circular plain Anthony J. Venables
Discussion Alisdair Smith
10. Convergence ... an overview Giuseppe Bertola
Discussion Daniel Cohen
11. Convergence as distribution dynamics (with or without growth) Danny T. Quah
Discussion Lucrezia Reichlin.

Subject Areas: International economics [KCL]