Indeed, the association between higher growth rates and an export-promotion strategy had already been established before the present project began, although additional evidence has since confirmed the results.… It seemed neither necessary nor desirable to cover that ground again.

That a liberal is preferable to a restrictive trade regime is now generally accepted, and a substantial body of empirical research carried out over the last 20 years supports this conclusion.

The question of the wisdom of an outward-oriented (export-promoting) strategy may be considered to have been settled.

[O]ne must resist succumbing to the oversimplifications and generalizations that have too frequently plagued the debates in the sphere of trade strategy … what seems to emerge from this survey is a need for a fresh review of fairly major proportions … of experience and knowledge of the interaction between trade and other policies and their joint effects upon industrialization and development. Such a review would be particularly valuable if it avoided prejudgements about the relative efficacy of specific trade and other policies in general; and instead explored the specific circumstances in which particular policies, instruments, and policy mixes were less or more effective.

The mainstream view is that … policy should be directed toward eliminating barriers to trade. […]