Working Paper 22-19: The World Bank, the IMF, and the GATT/WTO: Which institution most supported trade reform in developing economies?

20.500.12592/cssf3n

Working Paper 22-19: The World Bank, the IMF, and the GATT/WTO: Which institution most supported trade reform in developing economies?

30 Nov 2022

Working Paper 22-19: The World Bank, the IMF, and the GATT/WTO: Which institution most supported trade reform in developing economies? WORKING PAPER 22-19 The World Bank, the IMF, and the GATT/WTO Which Institution Most Supported Trade Reform in Developing Economies? Douglas A. [...] The World Bank, the International Monetary Fund (IMF), and the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT)—then the World Trade Organization (WTO) after 1995—supported and encouraged the reform efforts. [...] The World Bank was “to promote the long-range balanced growth of international trade and the maintenance of equilibrium in balances of payments by encouraging international investment for the development of the productive resources of members” (Articles of Agreement I:3). [...] THE GENERAL AGREEMENT ON TARIFFS AND TRADE/WORLD TRADE ORGANIZATION (GATT/WTO) Over the postwar period, the GATT helped facilitate the reduction of trade barriers in the United States, Western Europe, and Japan (Bown and Irwin 2017). [...] Even strong reform advocates (e.g., Krueger and Rajapartirana 1999, Nogués 1998, and Edwards 1997) concluded that Bank lending did not produce much change in the trade policies of loan recipients.12 Why was the track record so mixed? The Bank identified the lack of country “ownership” of the reforms—i.e., the reluctance of policymakers to undertake reforms—as the key problem.

Authors

Douglas Irwin

Pages
16
Published in
United States of America