Regionalism and the Multilateral Trading System

Abstract

Regionalism and the Multilateral Trading System: The Role of Regional Trade Agreements is a discussion about the new reality and the evolution of the reduction of international barriers to freer trade under the World Trade Organization (WTO) formerly the General Agreement on Trade and Tariffs (GATT). The chapter devotes time to the two largest regional trade agreements (RTAs), the European Union (EU) with 28 countries and North American Trading Agreement (NAFTA) with three countries account for half of all world trade (WTO, 2017a). The US set a course post World War II as the proponent of globalization and freer trade. RTAs at that time were failing or inconsequential. In response to the EU trading block, the US committed to a (Free Trade Area) FTA with Canada and subsequently the NAFTA with Canada and Mexico the rest of the world began to become concerned about being shut out of a preferential trade deal. The main theme of the chapter is that trade liberalization is moving forward because of Regional Trading agreements, not the WTO which is stalled and may never restart in its current form.