Describes the rules governing regional trade agreements, providing new insights into the interplay between regional and multilateral trade rules.

International trade and the rapidly proliferating network of trade agreements have aroused passions for decades. While some blame trade agreements for exporting jobs, sowing poverty, furthering illegal migration, and robbing national sovereignty, others praise them as lynchpins of growth, pillars of peace, guarantors of security, and engines of globalization. Still others view them as useful instruments for fostering global trade and investment. This book examines whether trade agreements merit the blame levelled against them or the hopes pinned on them. It employs extensive new historical...