The Political Economy of the World Trading System: The WTO and Beyond

The Political Economy of the World Trading System is a comprehensive textbook account of the economics, institutional mechanics and politics of the world trading system. This third edition has been expanded and updated to cover developments in the World Trade Organisation (WTO) since its formation, including the Doha Round, presenting the essentials of trade negotiations and the WTO's rules and disciplines.

The authors focus in particular on the WTO's role as the primary organisation through which trading nations manage their commercial interactions and the focal point for cooperation on policy responses to the rapidly changing global trading environment. It is the forum in which many features of the globalisation process are considered, and it currently faces an unprecedented set of challenges. The increasing importance of countries in Asia, Latin America and Africa in international trade relations, the revealed preference towards regionalism, intensification of trade conflicts, the role of business groups and NGOs in trade policy formation and negotiations, and pressures for more leadership in an institution threatened by paralysis are examples of issues that are discussed in some detail; all are critical for the operation of the system and for international business in the coming decade. This edition also includes numerous real-world examples to illustrate how the WTO impinges on business, workers and households, written from the perspective of managers and business associations.

An insider's view of the institutional history of the WTO allows the authors to use a variety of conceptual tools to analyse the working of the WTO in a non-technical manner. Suggestions for Further Reading at the end of each chapter and an extensive bibliography make the volume suitable both for introductory and postgraduate courses on international economics and business, international relations, and international economic law.

Bernard Hoekman manages the World Bank's international trade department. Prior positions at the World Bank include Research Manager of the trade and international integration program in the Development Research Group, leading the trade capacity building program of the World Bank Institute and working as a trade economist in the Middle East/North Africa and Europe and Central Asia departments. He has published widely on the functioning of the multilateral trading system, trade in services, preferential trade agreements and trade and investment policy. Between 1988 and 1993 he worked as a research economist in the GATT Secretariat in Geneva. He is a graduate of the Erasmus University Rotterdam, holds a Ph.D. in economics from the University of Michigan and is a Research Fellow of the London-based Centre for Economic Policy Research.

Dr. Michel Kostecki is Professor and Deputy Dean of the Faculty of Economics of the University of Neuchâtel, Switzerland. He has been founding director of The Enterprise Institute at the same university and directed the joint doctoral program in Administrative Sciences of the French-speaking Swiss universities. He completed his PhD at the Graduate Institute of International Studies in Geneva and worked at the Institute of Operations Research and Applied Mathematics at the University of Zurich. During the Uruguay Round Professor Kostecki was Counsellor in the GATT (now WTO) secretariat. He was Professor of Business Economics at the Université de Montréal (HEC) in Canada and Investment Manager at a financial company of one of the leading German banks. He has published extensively on international trade and business, acted as consultant to organisations such as ASEAN, ICTSD, ITC, OECD, UNCTAD, World Bank, WTO, various ministries and multinational companies.