Progress in multilateral negotiations to liberalize trade under the
World Trade Organization (WTO) has become more difficult since newer members
are generally developing countries with different interests than the United
States, the European Union and other industrialized countries.
More than 250 free trade agreements (FTAs) have come into effect since 1948.
Partly as a result of the WTO impasse, over 130 FTAs have been ratified just
in the past ten years; each agreement has been designed to eliminate trade
restrictions and subsidies between the parties involved. Almost all of the WTO
Members participate in one or more FTAs (some Members are party to twenty or
more).
Most books on FTAs are country- or region-specific, while others deal with the
subject from a particular perspective. This timely work – produced by some of
the world’s leading experts in their respective fields – employs a broader
approach exploring FTAs from the interdisciplinary perspectives of
international law, political economy, culture and human rights.
PART I Multilateralism, Regionalism and Bilateralism.
Multilateralism: The Doha Round and the Hong Kong Declaration; The
Honourable Christine Lagarde. Trade and Security Tango; The Honourable
Tim Fischer
PART II Policies and Strategies for Trade
Liberalization. The Prisoners’ Dilemma and FTAs: Applying Game Theory toTrade
Liberalization Strategy; Meredith Kolsky Lewis Japanese Policies toward
East Asian Free Trade. Agreements: Policy and Legal Perspectives; Mitsuo
Matsushita. The RTA Strategy of China: A Critical Visit; Henry Gao.
Stepping Stones and Stumbling Blocks: Vietnam’s Regional. Trade Arrangements
and WTO Accession; Lisa Toohey
PART III Established Models and Emerging. Models of FTAs.
Regional Trade, the WTO and the NAFTA Model; Maureen Irish. The
Australia–United States Free Trade Agreement; Andrew D. Mitchell
The Beginning of Economic Integration between East Asia and North America? The
US–Korea FTA; Yong-Shik Lee
PART V Impact of FTAs on Specific Areas. Services and
Investment in the Free Trade Agreements: Liberalization, Regulation and Law;
Chris Arup. The Legitimacy and Purpose of Intellectual Property Chapters
in FTAs; Susy Frankel. Developing States, the Generalized System of
Preferences and Trade Measures to Enhance Human Rights; Dr Anthony E
Cassimatis Preferential Trade and Cultural Products; Michael Hahn.
Dispute Settlement under PTAs: Political or Legal?; David Morgan
Further Reading. Index