MANAGING THE NOODLE BOWL: THE FRAGILITY OF EAST ASIAN REGIONALISM

Richard Baldwin

The Singapore Economic Review (SER), 2008, vol. 53, issue 03, 449-478

Abstract: The paper argues that East Asian regionalism is fragile, since (i) each nation's industrial competitiveness depends on the smooth functioning of "Factory Asia" — in particular, on intra-regional trade; (ii) the unilateral tariff-cutting that created "Factory Asia" is not subject to WTO discipline (bindings); (iii) there is no "top-level management" to substitute for WTO discipline, i.e., to ensure that bilateral trade tensions — tensions that are inevitable in East Asia — do not spillover into region-wide problems due to lack of cooperation and communication. This paper argues that the window of opportunity for East Asian "vision" was missed; what East Asia needs now is "management", not vision. East Asia should launch a "New East Asian Regional Management Effort", with a reinforced ASEAN + 3 being the most likely candidate for the job. The first priority should be to bind the region's unilateral tariff cuts in the WTO.

Keywords: Regionalism; noodle bowl; East Asia (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2008
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (68)

Downloads: (external link)
http://www.worldscientific.com/doi/abs/10.1142/S0217590808003063
Access to full text is restricted to subscribers

Related works:
Working Paper: Managing the Noodle Bowl: The Fragility of East Asian Regionalism (2007)
Working Paper: Managing the Noodle Bowl: The Fragility of East Asian Regionalism (2006)
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:wsi:serxxx:v:53:y:2008:i:03:n:s0217590808003063

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from

DOI: 10.1142/S0217590808003063

Access Statistics for this article

The Singapore Economic Review (SER) is currently edited by Euston Quah

More articles in The Singapore Economic Review (SER) from World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Tai Tone Lim ().