We study the sustainability of international trading rules in a multipolar world. A rules-based equilibrium is shaped by three forces. A static temptation to exploit market power undermines cooperation, while two dynamic forces support it: the efficiency gains from rules and the cost of...

We use global tariffs to reveal the weights that nations implicitly place on the welfare of their trading partners relative to their own. Our estimated welfare weights suggest that formal and informal rules of the world trading system make countries internalize the impact of their policies onto...

Die EU-Handelspolitik bewegt sich im Spannungsfeld der strategischen Ziele Wohlstand, Wettbewerbsfähigkeit, Entwicklungsförderung, Nachhaltigkeit und Bildung politischer Allianzen. Vor dem Hintergrund ihrer sinkenden Handelsbedeutung für viele Partner und steigender geopolitischer Spannungen...

Europa: • Deutschland muss sich wieder als wichtiger Teil und als eine der Führungsnationen der EU verstehen. Die neue Bundesregierung sollte in außenwirtschaftlichen Fragen konsequent europäisch denken und handeln. • Nur ein starker EU-Binnenmarkt schafft Augenhöhe mit den USA und...

Europe: • Germany must once again see itself as an important part of and a leading nation within the EU. The new German government should consistently think and act in a European way on foreign trade issues. • Only a strong EU single market can compete on equal terms with the USA and China....

This empirical qualitative research explores the texts of 14 free trade agreements (FTAs) concluded by Arab Gulf countries individually or as block. The objective is to evaluate if these documents are gender-responsive using an internationally recognised framework that qualitatively measures if...

This study examines the impact of the South Asian Free Trade Agreement (SAFTA) on participation in global value chains (GVCs) among South Asian economies, specifically Bangladesh, India, and Pakistan. This research offers new empirical insights into the relatively underexplored relationship...

Campos et al. (2021) (Economics Letters) show that including domestic trade flows in the gravity model is important for estimating the effect of trade agreements (TAs), regardless of how these flows are measured. Without domestic trade flows, TA effects are small, negative, and statistically...

This paper examines the evolution of global merchandise trade, between 2010 and 2022, assessing the share of imports subject to regional trade agreements (RTAs). A key question for us is whether the share of merchandise trade subject to preferences has kept pace with the proliferation in RTAs....

The Most-Favoured-Nation (MFN) principle has historically been instrumental in promoting stability and equitable trade conditions. In recent decades there has been a rise in bilateral and regional trade agreements, which deviate from the MFN principle in providing more favourable tariff...

Members of the World Trade Organization are increasingly disregarding its rules, raising concerns about the future of the multilateral trading system. To analyze the sustainability of the rules-based trade regime, we develop a dynamic framework of stochastic asynchronous games where the leading...

The trade strategy of the European Union has experienced substantial transformations in the initial two decades of the millennium, focusing on Asia, the strategy emphasises competitive bilateralism, shared values, and alignment with European trade standards. The EU's trade strategy has been...

Do countries gain more by liberalizing trade together than alone? To answer this question, we study the 2015 Phase II expansion of the Information Technology Agreement (ITA), which eliminated tariffs on products covering over 12% of world trade. Market access rose by 4-6%. Nearly half of this...

Access to critical raw materials (CRMs) is increasingly being shaped by geopolitical dynamics, fuelling a global competition for supply security. This paper applies the gravity model of trade to examine how OECD countries leverage Aid for Trade (AfT), Bilateral Investment Treaties (BITs), and...

After some 20 years, the negotiations on the EU Mercosur Association Agreement (EUMAA) were concluded in June 2019. Due to strong opposition by EU Member States as well as from trade unions and civil society organizations, in particular with respect to the lack of enforceable environmental...