From Trade Liberalization to Economic Integration: The Clash between Private and Public Goods

Marina Whitman
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Marina Whitman: University of Michigan

No 539, Working Papers from Research Seminar in International Economics, University of Michigan

Abstract: As tariffs and quotas have fallen substantially during successive rounds of multilateral trade negotiations, attention has increasingly focused on harmonizing a variety of "domestic" policies that limit or distort international trade and investment, such as intellectual property protection, environmental rules, labor standards, and competition (antitrust) policies. An increase in such "deep integration" or "system convergence" would indeed maximize global welfare as regards transactions in private goods, but it also undermines the ability of sovereign states to respond to their own voters' preferences as regards such public goods as inflation and unemployment rates, national defense, income distribution, environmental quality, and worker protection. The resulting tensions have made the negotiation of multilateral trade agreements and regional integration arrangements more complex and difficult and the resistance to them more pronounced.

Pages: 18 pages
Date: 2003
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:mie:wpaper:539

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