Nafta: The Trump card of the United States? (original) (raw)
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NAFTA: Old and new lessons from theory and practice with economic integration
The North American Journal of Economics and Finance, 1996
The approval of Nafta in 1992-1993 brought Mexico into the U.S.-Canada Free Trade Agreement and motivated a number of studies in an effort to assess the empirical content of international trade theory. In this paper we review the experiences from customs unions formed before and after World War II. A review of the European Union follows, including a discussion of the Treaty of Rome, of the Single European Act, and of recent experiences toward monetary union. In each case, we try to relate the experiences gained to NAFTA. Although NAflA is not an advanced form of economic integration, the lessons of history provide useful insights for NAFTA.
Is NAFTA economic integration?
Economic and Financial Policy Review, 1994
Is NAFTA Economic Integration? ome analysts consider the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) part of a larger economic integration process that goes beyond narrowly defined trade policy (Pastor 1992, Weintraub 1993b). Because of U.S. initiatives, issues with only tenuous direct connections to trade have come under negotiation. A harmonization of national policies that appears tantamount to a broad movement toward integration seems to be under way. But is it? NAFTA clearly makes trade freer on a broad front among the signatories and will result in the efficiency enhancements typical of trade openings. However, in many cases, what may at first look like integration appears on further scrutiny simply to be a continuation of a Hegelian dialectic over trade policy. 1 To show why a Hegelian dialectic appropriately characterizes what took place with NAFTA and the parallel agreements and why economic integration seems a less appropriate characterization, we begin by considering the antecedents of the NAFTA negotiations. The events that precipitated NAFTA began, at the very latest, in the 1970s.
From NAFTA to a North American Community? Conference on A Free Trade Area of the Americas
The establishment of NAFTA brought about almost immediately a debate on the future of the trade agreement and particularly on its possible evolution towards a This presentation seeks to add to the discussion by positing that the assessment of the possibility of a North American community rests on the answers to two basic questions. The first question that we must try to answer concerns the nature of the NAFTA model. What are the main characteristics of this model and, in particular, how does it compare to the European Union model and to what was envisioned by the classical theories of regional integration? The second question concerns the capacity of the NAFTA model to support a larger North American community. Is the current NAFTA model a suitable foundation for a deepening of the integration process?. The Nature of the NAFTA Model Starting with the first question, it seems very clear that the model chosen to sustain the NAFTA experience is quite original with regards to other integration schemes and very different from what was projected in early thinking concerning regional integration.
International Journal, 2005
While the North American free trade agreement (NAFTA) was a major event in Mexico, it was of only sectoral interest in the US and of interest pri marily to the free trade community in Canada. The major event in Canada was, of course, the Canada-United States free trade agreement (FTA) five years earlier. The combined effects of the Canada-US FTA and several rounds of GATT trade liberalization had created a situation in which the impacts of NAFTA were expected to be rather small: tariff barriers had already been lowered (average Mexican tariffs were 13 percent and US and Canadian tariffs were about six percent); many of Mexico's quantitative restrictions had been removed; and trade diversion from other developing countries was thought to limit the impacts of low wage imports into Canada and the US from Mexico. The final estimates of the probable effects of the more significant FTA (1989) were an increase in Canadian gross domestic product in the range of only two-three percent, and one-tenth of that for the US. Nonetheless, there was considerable opposition to NAFTA in each of the three countries. Furthermore, being a trade liberalization initiative, NAFTA was treated by many as just another aspect of globalization and was subjected to the same criticism that all such initiatives receive. It is only the opposition that is related specifically to intra-North American consequences
NAFTA: Outcomes, Challenges and Prospects
2009
This paper provides and overview of NAFTA institutions and decision processes. This is followed by a review NAFTA effects on trade, investment and domestic policy formulation. Ongoing challenges are then examined before a closing discussion of discussion of NAFTA’s future prospects.
International Journal, 1995
Under review here is a single-author work and four collections comprising no less than 48 contributions by some 61 authors, not counting commentators and panel discussants. This richness is but a small indication of the unflagging interest the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) has spawned among academics, researchers, and analysts. If nothing else, NAFTA has certainly proven that interactive and integrative forces do carry with them interesting spill-over effects on the research agendas of universities and foundations, thereby con