Demonstrates how new techniques of economic analysis can be used to study the process of regional integration.

Regional trade agreements have expanded exponentially over the past decade, and have become a significant, if controversial, factor in the expanse of economic globalization. Social Regionalism in the Global Economy attempts to take a fresh, interdisciplinary approach to addressing labour regulation by drawing upon insights from industrial relations, comparative capitalism, and new governance schools of thought. It stands for the proposition that an interdisciplinary study of regional regulation holds the potential to offer a fuller account of social regionalism. Its focus is to consider how institutions and labour market actors reconstruct and renegotiate regulatory space in a changing economic environment characterized by regional impulses. It argues that there is a dynamic interplay between institutions and actors of social regulation. This interplay occurs at many levels. The book therefore maps both how actors shape institutions as well as how institutions shape social actors’ ability to affect regulatory processes. The editors bring together leading international specialists willing to move beyond textual analyses of regional agreements to offer alternative accounts of regional integration. The work emphasizes that institutional context and social actors at multiple governance levels are integral to the progressive construction and regulation of regional space. It further contributes to the literature by combining insights from overlooked regional entities in transition and developing countries with original analyses from the European Union and the NAFTA. These aims will be achieved by combining original research that is empirically grounded with theoretically informed analysis.

This scholarly and interdisciplinary volume sheds much needed light on the realtionship between national policies, regional integration patterns and the wider global setting. It covers regional patterns in Europe, Asia and the Americas. Individual chapters focus on topics ranging from industrial or financial policies to social welfare regimes, as well as broader assessments and comparisons of regional arrangements in a global context. The chapters point to the diversity of regional patterns in the world economy and the continuing importance of national regulatory structures, yet they also point to the common pressures of globalisation felt by all, especially in the domain of capital markets. With broad coverage and clear but sophisticated analysis this new book will be vital reading to all those seeking to clarify their understanding of the contemporary regional/global paradox.

November 1996 Do the forces that regional integration arrangements set up encourage or discourage a trend toward globally freer trade? We don't know yet. The literature on regionalism versus multilateralism is growing as economists and political scientists grapple with the question of whether regional integration arrangements are good or bad for the multilateral system. Are regional integration arrangements building blocks or stumbling blocks, in Jagdish Bhagwati's phrase, or stepping stones toward multilateralism? As economists worry about the ability of the World Trade Organization to maintain the GATT's unsteady yet distinct momentum toward liberalism, and as they contemplate the emergence of world-scale regional integration arrangements (the EU, NAFTA, FTAA, APEC, and, possibly, TAFTA), the question has never been more pressing. Winters switches the focus from the immediate consequences of regionalism for the economic welfare of the integrating partners to the question of whether it sets up forces that encourage or discourage evolution toward globally freer trade. The answer is, We don't know yet. One can build models that suggest either conclusion, but these models are still so abstract that they should be viewed as parables rather than sources of testable predictions. Winters offers conclusions about research strategy as well as about the world we live in. Among the conclusions he reaches: * Since we value multilateralism, we had better work out what it means and, if it means different things to different people, make sure to identify the sense in which we are using the term. * Sector-specific lobbies are a danger if regionalism is permitted because they tend to stop blocs from moving all the way to global free trade. In the presence of lobbies, trade diversion is good politics even if it is bad economics. * Regionalism's direct effect on multilateralism is important, but possibly more so is the indirect effect it has by changing the ways in which groups of countries interact and respond to shocks in the world economy. * Regionalism, by allowing stronger internalization of the gains from trade liberalization, seems likely to facilitate freer trade when it is initially highly restricted. * The possibility of regionalism probably increases the risks of catastrophe in the trading system. The insurance incentives for joining regional arrangements and the existence of shiftable externalities both lead to such a conclusion. So too does the view that regionalism is a means to bring trade partners to the multilateral negotiating table because it is essentially coercive. Using regionalism for this purpose may have been an effective strategy, but it is also risky. This paper - a product of the International Trade Division, International Economics Department - was prepared for a conference on regional integration sponsored by the Centre for Economic Policy Research, La Coru-a, Spain, April 26-27, 1996, and will appear in the conference proceedings.

In theory, regionalism and globalization are intended to be viewed as two separate concepts. However, as long as the approaches complement each other, considering these paradigms in tandem can have significantly positive effects on the overall status of the world economy. Regional Economy Integration and the Global Financial System addresses recent trends in regional integration projects and the strides that such projects are making on the road toward globalization. Focusing on a range of economic projects, emerging supranational units, and possible implications for future trends, this book is an essential reference source for professionals, scholars, and institutions interested in the dynamic effects of regionalism and globalization.

An assessment of the extent to which increased global and regional integration has changed the functioning of the world economy. With contributions from both academics and professionals, it analyses the implications for global trade, relocation of production, structural changes and the international transmission of shocks.

International economic integration is a topic upon which both academics and policy-makers are focusing a great deal of attention. This has perhaps been most marked in western Europe, given the establishing of the inter nal market and the prospects for an economic and monetary union. In parallel with the movement toward widening and deeping of western European economic integration, we find an increased integration of eastern Europe to world trade and finance as well as regional integration in North America and in East Asia. The book on hand provides a collection of recent research by leading scholars and practicians in this field. It is divided into three parts. The first part deals with some theoretical aspects of international integration, the second and the third part attend to implications of concrete forms of international integration inside and outside Europe. Part I starts with a neoclassical analysis of the impacts of factor-market integration by Franz Peter Lang. He investigates the effects on production level, production structure, demand level and structure of external trade of a "small integration area". Lang shows that the specific welfare effects of factor-market integration can only be realized if and only if external trade (between the integration area and the rest of the world) is increased too.