IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/bav/wpaper/089_herz.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Multilateralism versus Regionalism!?

Author

Listed:
  • Bernhard Herz
  • Marco Wagner

Abstract

The well-known question whether regional trade agreements (RTAs) and the multilateral trading system (MTS) are "strangers, friends, or foes" (Bhagwati and Panagariya, 1996) has gained new importance with the widespread proliferation of RTAs in recent years. Based on an extensive data set which covers most of world trade over the past 60 years and about 240 regional trade agreements, we analyze the relationship between RTAs and the MTS by combining the gravity model framework with vector auto-regression analysis. Impulse-response-functions robustly suggest that multilateral trade liberalization responds in a signifcantly positive way to regional trade liberalization. We also find robust evidence that RTA liberalization Granger-causes GATT/WTO liberalization. Thus, our results indicate that RTAs do not undermine the MTS but serve as building blocs to multilateral trade liberalization.

Suggested Citation

  • Bernhard Herz & Marco Wagner, 2010. "Multilateralism versus Regionalism!?," Working Papers 089, Bavarian Graduate Program in Economics (BGPE).
    • Handle: RePEc:bav:wpaper:089_herz
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://bgpe.cms.rrze.uni-erlangen.de/files/2023/07/089_Multilateralism-versus-Regionalism.pdf
    File Function: First version, 2010
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Antoni Estevadeordal & Caroline Freund & Emanuel Ornelas, 2008. "Does Regionalism Affect Trade Liberalization Toward Nonmembers?," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 123(4), pages 1531-1575.
    2. Jessica Decker & Jamus Lim, 2009. "Democracy and trade: an empirical study," Economics of Governance, Springer, vol. 10(2), pages 165-186, April.
    3. Nuno Limão, 2018. "Preferential Trade Agreements as Stumbling Blocks for Multilateral Trade Liberalization: Evidence for the United States," World Scientific Book Chapters, in: Policy Externalities and International Trade Agreements, chapter 13, pages 353-371, World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd..
    4. Subramanian, Arvind & Wei, Shang-Jin, 2007. "The WTO promotes trade, strongly but unevenly," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 72(1), pages 151-175, May.
    5. James E. Anderson & Eric van Wincoop, 2003. "Gravity with Gravitas: A Solution to the Border Puzzle," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 93(1), pages 170-192, March.
    6. Bergstrand, Jeffrey H, 1985. "The Gravity Equation in International Trade: Some Microeconomic Foundations and Empirical Evidence," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 67(3), pages 474-481, August.
    7. C. Fred Bergsten, 1997. "Open Regionalism," The World Economy, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 20(5), pages 545-565, August.
    8. J. M. C. Santos Silva & Silvana Tenreyro, 2006. "The Log of Gravity," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 88(4), pages 641-658, November.
    9. Nuno Limão, 2018. "Are Preferential Trade Agreements with Non-trade Objectives a Stumbling Block for Multilateral Liberalization?," World Scientific Book Chapters, in: Policy Externalities and International Trade Agreements, chapter 10, pages 283-317, World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd..
    10. Michael Tomz & Judith L. Goldstein & Douglas Rivers, 2007. "Do We Really Know That the WTO Increases Trade? Comment," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 97(5), pages 2005-2018, December.
    11. Boriss Siliverstovs & Dieter Schumacher, 2009. "Estimating gravity equations: to log or not to log?," Empirical Economics, Springer, vol. 36(3), pages 645-669, June.
    12. Dowlah Caf, 2008. "The Generalized System of Preferences of the United States: Does It Promote Industrialization and Economic Growth in Least Developed Countries?," The Law and Development Review, De Gruyter, vol. 1(1), pages 74-97, December.
    13. Richard Pomfret, 2005. "Regional Trade Agreements," International Trade 0511002, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    14. Paulo Paiva & Ricardo Gazel, 2003. "Mercosur: past, present, and future," Nova Economia, Economics Department, Universidade Federal de Minas Gerais (Brazil), vol. 13(2), pages 115-136, July-Dece.
    15. Arvind Panagariya, 1999. "The Regionalism Debate: An Overview," The World Economy, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 22(4), pages 455-476, June.
    16. Daniel J. Henderson & Daniel L. Millimet, 2008. "Is gravity linear?," Journal of Applied Econometrics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 23(2), pages 137-172.
    17. Jagdish Bhagwati, 1992. "Regionalism versus Multilateralism," The World Economy, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 15(5), pages 535-556, September.
    18. P. Magee, Stephen & Lee, Hak-Loh, 2001. "Endogenous tariff creation and tariff diversion in a customs union," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 45(3), pages 495-518, March.
    19. Lütkepohl,Helmut & Krätzig,Markus (ed.), 2004. "Applied Time Series Econometrics," Cambridge Books, Cambridge University Press, number 9780521839198, September.
    20. Granger, C W J, 1969. "Investigating Causal Relations by Econometric Models and Cross-Spectral Methods," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 37(3), pages 424-438, July.
    21. Lütkepohl,Helmut & Krätzig,Markus (ed.), 2004. "Applied Time Series Econometrics," Cambridge Books, Cambridge University Press, number 9780521547871, September.
    22. repec:bla:worlde:v:22:y:1999:i:4:p:477-512 is not listed on IDEAS
    23. Richard Pomfret, 2007. "Is Regionalism an Increasing Feature of the World Economy?," The World Economy, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 30(6), pages 923-947, June.
    24. Tammy Holmes, 2005. "What Drives Regional Trade Agreements that Work?," IHEID Working Papers 07-2005, Economics Section, The Graduate Institute of International Studies.
    25. Trejos Alberto, 2005. "Bilateral and Regional Free Trade Agreements, and Their Relationship with the WTO and the Doha Development Agenda," Global Economy Journal, De Gruyter, vol. 5(4), pages 1-11, December.
    26. World Bank, 2007. "World Development Indicators 2007," World Bank Publications - Books, The World Bank Group, number 8150.
    27. Arvind Panagariya, 1999. "The Regionalism Debate: An Overview," The World Economy, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 22(4), pages 455-476, June.
    28. Rainer Winkelmann, 2008. "Econometric Analysis of Count Data," Springer Books, Springer, edition 0, number 978-3-540-78389-3, January.
    29. Faezeh Foroutan, 1998. "Does Membership in a Regional Preferential Trade Arrangement Make a Country More or Less Protectionist?," The World Economy, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 21(3), pages 305-335, May.
    30. Joakim Westerlund & Fredrik Wilhelmsson, 2009. "Estimating the gravity model without gravity using panel data," Applied Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 43(6), pages 641-649.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Muhammad Ibrahim Shah, 2021. "Investigating the Role of Regional Economic Integration on Growth: Fresh Insights from South Asia," Global Journal of Emerging Market Economies, Emerging Markets Forum, vol. 13(1), pages 35-57, January.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Herz Bernhard & Wagner Marco, 2011. "Regionalism as a Building Block for Multilateralism," Global Economy Journal, De Gruyter, vol. 11(1), pages 1-25, March.
    2. Bernhard Herz & Marco Wagner, 2011. "The Dark Side of the Generalized System of Preferences," Review of International Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 19(4), pages 763-775, September.
    3. Nuno Limão, 2016. "Preferential Trade Agreements," NBER Working Papers 22138, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    4. Estrella Gómez-Herrera, 2013. "Comparing alternative methods to estimate gravity models of bilateral trade," Empirical Economics, Springer, vol. 44(3), pages 1087-1111, June.
    5. Marco Dueñas & Giorgio Fagiolo, 2013. "Modeling the International-Trade Network: a gravity approach," Journal of Economic Interaction and Coordination, Springer;Society for Economic Science with Heterogeneous Interacting Agents, vol. 8(1), pages 155-178, April.
    6. Emanuel Ornelas, 2016. "Special and Differential Treatment for Developing Countries," CESifo Working Paper Series 5823, CESifo.
    7. Silviano Esteve-Pérez & Salvador Gil-Pareja & Rafael Llorca-Vivero, 2020. "Does the GATT/WTO promote trade? After all, Rose was right," Review of World Economics (Weltwirtschaftliches Archiv), Springer;Institut für Weltwirtschaft (Kiel Institute for the World Economy), vol. 156(2), pages 377-405, May.
    8. Florian Mölders & Ulrich Volz, 2011. "Trade creation and the status of FTAs: empirical evidence from East Asia," Review of World Economics (Weltwirtschaftliches Archiv), Springer;Institut für Weltwirtschaft (Kiel Institute for the World Economy), vol. 147(3), pages 429-456, September.
    9. Ward, Megan & Herr, Hansjörg & Pédussel Wu, Jennifer, 2020. "South Asian Free Trade Area and food trade: Implications for regional food security," IPE Working Papers 148/2020, Berlin School of Economics and Law, Institute for International Political Economy (IPE).
    10. Tamaş Anca, 2020. "Why should the gravity model be taught in business education?," Proceedings of the International Conference on Business Excellence, Sciendo, vol. 14(1), pages 422-433, July.
    11. Moelders, Florian, 2011. "Trade Persistence and the Limits of Trade Agreements," Proceedings of the German Development Economics Conference, Berlin 2011 58, Verein für Socialpolitik, Research Committee Development Economics.
    12. Christodoulopoulou, Styliani, 2010. "THE Effects of Multilateral Trade Liberalization on the Extensive and the Intensive Margins of Trade," MPRA Paper 29169, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    13. Rahul Sen & Sadhana Srivastava & Don J Webber, 2015. "Effects of preferential trade agreements in the presence of zero trade flows: the cases of China and India," Working Papers 20151507, Department of Accounting, Economics and Finance, Bristol Business School, University of the West of England, Bristol.
    14. Gil-Pareja, Salvador & Llorca-Vivero, Rafael & Martínez-Serrano, José Antonio, 2014. "Do nonreciprocal preferential trade agreements increase beneficiaries' exports?," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 107(C), pages 291-304.
    15. Salvador Gil-Pareja & Rafael Llorca-Vivero & José Antonio Martínez-Serrano, 2016. "A Re-Examination of the Effect of GATT/WTO on Trade," Open Economies Review, Springer, vol. 27(3), pages 561-584, July.
    16. Alberto Behar & Laia Cirera-i-Crivillé, 2013. "Does it Matter Who You Sign With? Comparing the Impacts of North–South and South–South Trade Agreements on Bilateral Trade," Review of International Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 21(4), pages 765-782, September.
    17. Tarlok Singh, 2010. "Does International Trade Cause Economic Growth? A Survey," The World Economy, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 33(11), pages 1517-1564, November.
    18. Tristan Kohl, 2014. "Do we really know that trade agreements increase trade?," Review of World Economics (Weltwirtschaftliches Archiv), Springer;Institut für Weltwirtschaft (Kiel Institute for the World Economy), vol. 150(3), pages 443-469, August.
    19. C. Umana Dajud, 2013. "Political Proximity and International Trade," Economics and Politics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 25(3), pages 283-312, November.
    20. Kristian Behrens & Cem Ertur & Wilfried Koch, 2012. "‘Dual’ Gravity: Using Spatial Econometrics To Control For Multilateral Resistance," Journal of Applied Econometrics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 27(5), pages 773-794, August.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Regionalism; multilateralism; trade agreement; gravity model;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • F13 - International Economics - - Trade - - - Trade Policy; International Trade Organizations

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:bav:wpaper:089_herz. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Anton Barabasch (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/vierlde.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.