Abstract
THE PREVIOUS chapter discussed the establishment and philosophy of the international economic order. In this chapter, the main events affecting the GATT since the early 1970s are reviewed, setting the scene for the analysis in the following three chapters.
Since the early 1970s the governments of the major trading countries have repeatedly reasserted their commitment to the principles and rules of the GATT system of international trade. But they have felt obliged to make concessions here and there, allowing exceptions to the rule, hoping thereby to maintain the integrity of the rules as a whole. Merely verbal reaffirmations of GATT principles and rules are therefore no longer enough. Governments should begin repudiating the precedents that have permitted deviations from GATT principles and rules’
— Lord McFadzean of Kelvinside et al., Global Strategy for Growth: a Report on North-South Issues (1981)
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Notes and References
Joint declarations by the United States and the European Community and by the United States and Japan were lodged with the GATT Secretariat on 9 and 10 February 1972 and other signatory countries to the GATT subsequently associated themselves with the tripartite initiative.
The negotiations were held up until the Congress of the United States afforded the Administration a negotiating authority, which it did in the Trade Act of 1974, and until the Council of Ministers of the European Community agreed negotiating directives for the Commission, which it did in February 1975.
On the limitations of the GATT Code on Subsidies and Countervailing Duties, see Victoria Curzon Price, Industrial Policies in the European Community (London: Macmillan, for the Trade Policy Research Centre, 1981), ch. 1 on ‘What the Tokyo Round Failed to Settle’.
For a lucid account, see Kent Jones, ‘Forgetfulness of Things Past: Europe and the Steel Cartel’, The World Economy, May 1979, pp. 139–54.
Also see René Joliet, ‘Cartelisation, Dirigism and Crisis in the European Community’, The World Economy, January 1981, pp. 403–45.
‘Fifteenth Meeting of the Consultative Group of Eighteen’, GATT Press Release, No. 1291, 26 June 1981.
Address by Arthur Dunkel to the Ostasiatisches Liebesmahl, Hamburg, 5 March 1982. See GATT Press Release, No. 1312, 5 March 1982.
See, for example, ‘Fifteenth Meeting of the Consultative Group of Eighteen’, op. cit.
Ministerial Declaration’, GATT Press Release, No. 1328, reproduced in the Journal of World Trade Law, Geneva, January–February 1983, para. 7(i).
The extent to which the price mechanism has been impaired was stressed in International Trade 1982–83 (Geneva: GATT Secretariat, 1983) ch. 1.
This point has been emphasized in Brian Scott et al., Has the Cavalry Arrived? a Report on Trade Liberalisation and Economic Recovery, Special Report No. 6 (London: Trade Policy Research Centre, 1984) pp. 12–14.
On these issues, see Gary Banks and Tumlir, Economic Policy and the Adjustment Problem, Thames Essay No. 45 (Aldershot, New York and Sydney: Gower, for the Trade Policy Research Centre, 1986).
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© 1987 United Nations
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Viravan, A. et al. (1987). Crisis in the GATT System of International Trade. In: Trade Routes to Sustained Economic Growth. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-349-18860-4_3
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-349-18860-4_3
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