Fair Trade is a labeling initiative aimed at improving the lives of the poor in developing countries by offering better terms to producers and helping them to organize. In this survey, we provide a critical overview of the economic theory behind Fair Trade, describing the potential benefits and...

In the former age of national capitalism, a measure of "market fairness" was embedded in a normative framework generated by government, labor unions, and perhaps religious authority. In the current age of global capitalism, new actors such as NGOs, industry associations and public-private...

With the expanding globalization of trade, grades and standards (Gamp;S) help to set the rules of the game whose implications for developing countries are becoming increasingly relevant. While they are clearly important to efficient trade, their formation and utilization is also undergoing a...

I provide a theoretically-guided discussion of the dynamics of human behavior, focusing on the importance of culture (socially-learned information) and tradition (transmission of culture across generations). Decision-making that relies on tradition can be an effective strategy and arises in...