This paper examines the evolving dynamics between economic globalization and Asian regional interdependence, and asks whether and how the global financial crisis impacted Asian regionalism. The analysis suggests that the global crisis did trigger advances in regional policy cooperation from 2007...

This paper argues that the collective action in Asia by its regional organizations has historically suffered from a "capability-legitimacy gap": a disjuncture between the capability (in terms of material resources) of major Asian powers to lead regional cooperation on the one hand and their...

We examine the global ownership structure of firms in the context of the investment regime. Investment agreements extend valuable privileges to firms invested abroad. But, these privileges only apply to firms whose assets are owned in a country that has signed an agreement with their host...

This paper gives an overview of the role of the IMF in the European debt crisis. It describes the rescue packages and the involvement of the IMF. The main part discusses the pros and cons of the participation of the IMF in elaborating and monitoring the economic adjustment programs for the...

What is the strategic role of membership in an intergovernmental group with unanimity requirements if the group negotiates with an external player in a setting with incomplete information? Being in such a group has a strategic effect compared to negotiating as a stand-alone player and reduces...

We examine how donor government ideology influences the composition of foreign aid flows. We use data for 23 OECD countries over the period 1960-2009 and distinguish between multilateral and bilateral aid, grants and loans, recipient characteristics such as income and political institutions,...

We analyze the influence of IMF and World Bank programs on political regime transitions. We develop an extended version of Acemoglu and Robinson's [American Economic Review 91, 2001] model of political transitions to show how the anticipation of new loans from international financial...

Most existing commitments are confined to guaranteeing the levels of access that existed in the mid-1990s, when the Agreement entered into force, in a limited number of sectors. The only significant exceptions are the accession schedules of recent WTO Members and the negotiating results in two...

The General Agreement on Trade in Services (GATS) is broader in policy coverage than conventional trade agreements for goods and, at the same time, offers governments more flexibility, in various dimensions, to tailor their obligations to sector- or country-specific needs. An overview of...

The creation of the General Agreement on Trade in Services (GATS), in the Uruguay Round, and its entry into force in 1995 marked a new stage in the history of the multilateral system. It was motivated essentially by the rapid expansion of international services trade within an increasingly open...