This volume is a careful selection of the leading legal and economic papers analysing international discrimination in government purchasing. It also includes the WTO agreement that seeks to curb such discrimination. Studies of individual country experiences are also featured, adding a practical dimension to what often appears to be a narrow technical debate. This authoritative and wide-ranging volume will provide trade negotiators, other government officials including purchasing officers, and scholars with a thorough grounding so as to effectively assess proposals for further international rules on government procurement practices, be they in bilateral, regional, or multilateral arenas.

Regulations and enforcement decisions that at first appear to have only a domestic impact can have substantial spillover effects on other nations' economies. Experience has shown time and again that there is no reason to expect that these effects are confined to jurisdictions at the same level of development. Governments on both sides of the Atlantic recognize this, yet their responses in many policy areas are not aligned - sometimes deliberately so. This creates a complex regulatory landscape that appears to be the product of both cooperation and competition, and which can only be fully understood by looking through a number of disciplinary lenses.Drawing on some of the best legal, economic and political science expertise from both sides of the Atlantic, as well as on the knowledge of officials and private practitioners with experience in both industrialized and developing countries, this timely book assesses the systemic, global implications of transatlantic regulatory cooperation and competition. Insights from thematic papers are integrated with those from sector-specific analyses, and a rich set of implications for policymakers, business and civil society is offered.

Although the dispute over China's exchange rate regime intensified in the run up to the Seoul G20 Summit, pressures for across-the-board protectionist measures have been contained, for now. The latest data on protectionism, summarised in this Report, show that the countries with large current account surpluses have not been targeted unduly in recent months. In addition to presenting statistics on the resort to protectionism by each G20 member, this Report highlights three other systemic developments: - An acceleration since the summer in tariff-cutting on machinery, parts, and components by numerous developing countries. - Even though the G20 countries have avoided a trade war to date, they continue to impose protectionist measures at 2009's heightened rates. - G20 countries account for 101 of the 141 protectionist measures that have harmed the commercial interests of the most vulnerable nations, namely, the Least Developed Countries. Most of that harm is done by the developing country members of the G20. This Report, the eighth produced by the Global Trade Alert team, will be of interest to analysts, government and international officials, and scholars in the run up to the Seoul G20 summit and beyond.

The Seventh Report of Global Trade Alert, drawing upon over 1200 investigations of state measures, reveals that while 2010 has seen a substantial recovery in world trade, governments have continued to discriminate against foreign commercial interests. Moreover, recovery does not seem to have affected the rate at which governments resort to protectionist measures. One reaction to this finding is to argue that the discrimination cannot be that significant if world trade is recovering so quickly. This Report shows that such a reaction overlooks the fact that many of the largest trading nations have implemented export promotion schemes over the past 12-18 months and that the rebound in world trade has been underwritten by subsidies, cheap access to credit, and tax rebates and exemptions for exporters. These findings highlight that contemporary discrimination against foreign commercial interests need not be commerce-reducing, like the across-the-board tariff increases of the 1930s. The composition of contemporary protectionism is very different from its counterpart in the Great Depression. This Report also has a regional focus on developments in Latin America. Governments in this region have differed markedly in their resort to protectionism and several country studies shed light on the factors responsible. Detailed reports of each nation's resort to protectionism and the harm done by the protectionism of others will further facilitate comparisons within the region.

In July 2010, the US Treasury finally released its delayed currency report, which said that China's currency is undervalued, but stopped short of claiming that China is manipulating its exchange rate. This book was first published in ebook form on VoxEU to coincide with the original April 2010 deadline for the Treasury report. At that time commentators such as Paul Krugman, as well as members of Congress, were arguing the case for getting toughA" with China over its exchange rate manipulation. The release of the Treasury report in July appeared to bring a measure of calm to the debate, but this was shortlived and the controversy has erupted again this month. The 28 short essays in this book provide the best available economic, legal, political, and geopolitical thinking on the causes and likely consequences of the dispute.

The world has now faced the most severe global economic crisis since the Great Depression of the 1930s. Governments have responded to the crisis with many initiatives, often with implications for the openness of their national economies to global markets. While the primary objectives have been to support demand and thus economic activity and employment, recognition of cross-border spillovers has led to calls for international cooperation and to refrain from beggar-thy-neighbour measures. Arguably these calls have been heard. Efforts have been made to coordinate policy responses, through the G20 and other fora. As recovery becomes an ever greater prospect in late 2009, the question arises as to whether current, primarily non-binding inter-governmental cooperation will be sustained. Protectionist pressures may increase as trade recovers, imports into markets expand, and job growth still lags. Also, many governments are left with little margin for manoeuvre in fiscal and monetary policy, and in the event of an economic relapse, trade and industrial policies threaten to become the default stop-gap. The purpose of this book is to examine the ways in which the existing manifestations of openness, including binding international accords, have constrained or enhanced the options available to national policymakers during the crisis and influenced the degree, and potentially even the effectiveness, of cross-border cooperation. By examining state responses during the crisis in a number of distinct policy domains, the different chapters reveal potential complementarities and tensions as governments seek to tackle sharp national recessions while being mindful of the growing role that the international dimension has played in influencing national economies in an era of globalization.