search query: @indexterm FREE TRADE / total: 286
reference: 70 / 286
Author: | Cowling, K. Sugden, R. |
Title: | Strategic trade policy reconsidered: National rivalry vs free trade vs international cooperation |
Journal: | Kyklos
1998 : VOL. 51:3. p. 339-357 |
Index terms: | TRADE POLICY FREE TRADE ECONOMIC THEORY INTERNATIONAL TRADE MULTINATIONAL COMPANIES |
Language: | eng |
Abstract: | In the early 80s economic theorists discovered strategic trade policy and thereby appeared to legitimise state support for domestic oligopolists threatened by international rivals. However, these selfsame theorists had been long disposed free trade and thus found their new position uncomfortable. They soon began to back away and the argument has since gone full circle; the return of free trade as the favoured policy has been the outcome of theoretical, empirical and political analysis. We share the concerns of earlier literature but dispute the conclusion favouring free trade. We see the 'free' trade as freedom at a cost; it refers to the freedom of strategic decision- makers in transnational corporations to further their own objectives despite teh resistance of others. |
SCIMA