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European Protectionism in Theory and Practice

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  13 June 2011

Miles Kahler
Affiliation:
Yale University
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Extract

In the 1970s, discussion of the international economy frequently turned to the emergence of a “new protectionism” among the industrial countries after the accomplishments of trade liberalization in the 1960s. International organizations such as the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT) and the International Monetary Fund (I.M.F.) documented an increase in trade barriers erected against imports of manufactures. The protectionism was “new” in two respects: (1) it was directed against dynamic exporters of manufactured goods (especially Japan and the newly industrializing countries) that had recently become important elements in world trade; (2) the means of protection were nontariff barriers —quotas, voluntary export restraints, and a host of governmental impediments to competitive trading practices.1

Type
Research Article
Copyright
Copyright © Trustees of Princeton University 1985

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References

1 An early description of the new protectionism of the 1970s is given in The Rise in Protectionism (International Monetary Fund, Trade and Payments Division, Pamphlet Number 24, 1978).Google Scholar Also see Curzon, Gerald, “Neo-protectionism, the MFA and the European Community,” The World Economy 4 (September 1981), 251–62.CrossRefGoogle Scholar A recent, and less alarmist, view of the new protectionism is by Hughes, Helen and Waelbroeck, Jean, “Foreign Trade and Structural Adjustment—Is there a Threat of New Protectionism?” in Braun, Hans-Gert and others, eds., The European Economy in the 1980s (Aldershot, England: Gower Publishing Company, 1983), 129.Google Scholar

2 The Cambridge Economic Policy Group, though headed by the chairman of the Applied Economics Department, Wynne Godley, is not coincident with the Department. The proposals of the C.E.P.G. have been published in Economic Policy Review and in articles in the Cambridge Journal of Economics.

3 The outlines of the debate and the C.E.P.G.'s response are given in chap. 4, “Academic Criticisms of the CEPG Analysis,” Economic Policy Review [hereafter referred to as EPR] 8 (April 1982), 3542.Google Scholar

4 So far from assuming full employment, New Cambridge see employment and domestic activity as being determined by the interrelationship between net export demand and domestic fiscal and monetary policy; indeed, with regard to income, output and employment determination the New Cambridge position is firmly in the Keynesian tradition (ibid., 40).

5 Blackaby, Frank in Blackaby, , ed., Deindustrialization (London: Heinemann Educational Books, 1979), 268.Google Scholar

6 Singh, Ajit, “U.K. Industry and the World Economy: A Case of Deindustrialization?” Cambridge Journal of Economics 1 (June 1977), 128; emphasis in original.Google Scholar

7 For different presentations of the evidence on deindustrialization, see ibid., 123–27; C.J.F. Brown and Sheriff, Tom, “Deindustrialization: A Background Paper,” in Blackaby (fn. 5), 233–62; most recently, EPR 8 (April 1982), 2021.Google Scholar

8 Different statements of the C.E.P.G.'s strategy are given in EPR 3 (March 1977)Google Scholar, chaps. 1 and 2; EPR 4 (March 1978)Google Scholar, chaps. 2 and 3; EPR 5 (April 1979)Google Scholar, chap. 3; EPR 8 (April 1982)Google Scholar, chaps. 1 and 2; Cripps, Francis and Godley, Wynne, “Control of Imports as a Means to Full Employment and the Expansion of World Trade: The UK's Case,” Cambridge Journal of Economics 2 (June 1978), 327–34.Google Scholar

9 Begg, Iain and Rhodes, John, “Will British Industry Recover?” EPR 8 (April 1982), 23.Google Scholar

10 A good exposition of the relative merits of devaluation for correcting balance-of-payments disequilibria is given by Scott, Maurice Fg.Corden, W. Max, and Little, Ian M.D. in The Case against General Import Restrictions (London: Trade Policy Research Centre, 1980)Google Scholar, chap. 2. A somewhat different argument, in favor of export promotion rather than import substitution, is made by Thirlwall, A. P., “A Trade Strategy for the United Kingdom,” Journal of Common Market Studies 22 (September 1983), 115.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

11 EPR 8 (April 1982), 36.Google Scholar Also Cripps and Godley (fn. 8), 331.

12 The conventional statement of the effects of protection on X-efficiency is given in Corden, W. Max, Trade Policy and Economic Welfare (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1974), 224–13.Google Scholar

13 Cripps and Godley (fn. 8), 330. The argument against controls on the grounds of encouraging inefficiency is made by Cable, Vincent in Import Controls: The Case Against (London: Fabian Research Series 335, October 1977), 910.Google Scholar

14 The familiar case on retaliation is made in Scott and others (fn. 10), 43–45, and Cable (fn. 13), 10–12; for the C.E.P.G.'s response, see Cripps and Godley (fn. 8), 333–34. For a recent assessment of the probable economic outcome if a British government adopted a protectionist strategy and was faced with retaliation, see Coutts, KenCripps, Francis, and Ward, Terry, “Britain in the 1980s,” EPR 8 (April 1982), 1617.Google Scholar

15 On the last two points, see Singh (fn. 6), 122–23; Sheriff, Tom, A Deindustrialized Britain? (London: Fabian Research Series 341, March 1979), 1315.Google Scholar

16 For the conservative reading of the sources of government policy, see Scott (fn. 10), 75–79; the Brookings view is contained in Caves, Richard and Krause, Lawrence, eds., Britain's Economic Performance (Washington: Brookings Institution, 1980).Google Scholar The most interesting criticism from the “micro” view is Kilpatrick, Andrew and Lawson, Tony, “On the Nature of Industrial Decline in the UK,” Cambridge journal of Economics 4 (March 1980), 85102.Google Scholar

17 Cripps, Francis, “Government Planning as a Means to Economic Recovery in the UK,” Cambridge Journal of Economics 5 (March 1981), 95106.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

18 Ibid., 100.

19 Cripps, Francis and Ward, Terry, “Government Policies, European Recession and Problems of Recovery,” Cambridge Journal of Economics 7 (March 1983), 96.Google Scholar

20 Jeanneney, Jean-Marcel, Pour un nouveau protectionnisme [For a new protectionism] (Paris: Seuil, 1978).Google Scholar

21 Ibid., 66–67.

22 Ibid., 82.

23 Grjébine refers to the work of economic historian Paul Bairoch, who has argued that the trade liberalization of the mid-nineteenth century did not benefit European economies other than Britain's—resulting in slower expansion of trade, slower growth, and no acceleration in innovation. Bairoch traces these effects to the impact of freer trade in agricultural products on the continental European economies. See Bairoch, , “Free Trade and European Economic Development in the 19th Century,” European Economic Review 3 (1972), 242–45CrossRefGoogle Scholar, and Commerce extérieur et développement économique de I'Europe au XIXe siècle [Foreign trade and the economic development of Europe in the 19th century] (Paris: Mouton and Ecole des Hautes Etudes en Sciences Sociales, 1976).Google Scholar

24 Grjébine, André, La nouvelle économie Internationale [The new international economy] 2d. ed. (Paris: Presses universitaires de France, 1982), 134.Google Scholar

25 Ibid., 188–89, 212–16. It is worth noting that Grjébine was a rapporteur for the French government working group (headed by Berthelot, Yves and Tardy, Gerard) that produced the first assessment of the NICs and their impact on France. His appendix to that report diverged from its generally optimistic conclusions. (Commissariat general du plan, Le déft économique du tiers monde: Annexes [The economic challenge of the Third World] (Paris: Documentation française, 1978), 211–30.Google Scholar

26 Ibid., 166–67; see also Grjébine, “Reconquête du marché intérieur et coopération avec le Tiers Monde: Les conditions de la convergence” [Recapture of the domestic market and cooperation with the Third World: Conditions of convergence] (mimeo, n.d.), 1–2, 5.

27 Grjébine (fn. 24), 226–37; (fn. 26), 6–9.

28 Ibid., 7. Unless otherwise noted, all translations are by the present author.

28 Ibid., 9–12; Grjébine (fn. 24), 240–41.

30 André Grjébine and Yves Peccia Galletto, “Les priorités d'une nouvelle politique industrielle” [The priorities of a new industrial policy] (Paris, mimeo, n.d.), and Grjébine, “La France face à la contrainte extérieure” [France confronts its external constraint] (unpub.).

31 Mandrin, Jacques [Didier Motchane, Pierre Guidoni, Georges Sarre], Le Socialisme et la France [Socialism and France] (Paris: Le Sycomore, 1983), 154–59.Google Scholar

32 Ibid., 158–59.

33 Juquin, , Produire français; le grand déft [Production in France: the great challenge] (Paris: Messidor/Éditions sociales, 1983), 125.Google Scholar

34 Hager, , “Making the Best of Protectionism” (mimeo, n.d.), 3. Hager's arguments, which have become more unreservedly protectionist, may be found in the following: “The Strains on the International System,” in Saunders, Christopher, ed., The Political Economy of New and Old Industrial Countries (London: Butterworth's, 1981)Google Scholar; “Industrial Policy, Trade Policy, and European Social Democracy,” in Pinder, John, ed., National Industrial Strategies and the World Economy (Totowa, NJ: Allanheld, Osmun, 1982), 265–88Google Scholar; “Protectionism and Autonomy: How to Preserve Free Trade in Europe,” International Affairs 58 (Summer 1982), 413–28CrossRefGoogle Scholar; “Protectionism in the 80s: Managed Coexistence of Different Industrial Cultures” and Introduction to Volume II in European Research Associates, EEC Protectionism: Present Practice and Future Trends (Brussels: European Research Associates, 1982)Google Scholar; “Little Europe, Wider Europe and Western Economic Cooperation,” Journal of Common Market Studies 21 (September/December 1982), 171–97CrossRefGoogle Scholar; “EEC - Supermercantilism: The Road to Stagnation” (unpub., May 1984). A parallel criticism of a liberal trade regime is given by Dauderstädt, Michael in “Societal Consequences and Conditions of a Free Trade Regime,” paper presented to the conference on “Perspectives on a Realistic International Trade Order” (Stockholm, March 1984).Google Scholar Empirical research in support of a pessimistic position on the consequences of liberalized North-South trade appears in Fröbel, Fölker and others, The New International Division of Labor (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1980).Google Scholar

35 Hager (fn. 34), Introduction to Volume II, EEC Protectionism, p. 6; “Protectionism and Autonomy,” p. 417.

36 Hager (fn. 34), EEC Protectionism, II, p. 10; “The Strains on the International System,” pp. 287–89; “Protectionism and Autonomy,” p. 425.

37 Hager (fn. 34), “The Strains on the International System,” pp. 292–93; “Making the Best of Protectionism,” p. 9.

38 Hager (fn. 34), “Protectionism and Autonomy,” p. 420.

39 Hager (fn. 34), “Industrial and Trade Policy” pp. 248–49; “Protectionism and Autonomy,” pp. 419–20.

40 Dauderstädt (fn. 34), 18.

41 Hager (fn. 34), EEC Protectionism, I, pp. 37–39.

42 Hager (fn. 34), “Little Europe, Wider Europe,” p. 187.

43 Hager (fn. 34), EEC Protectionism, I, pp. 45–46.

44 Ibid., 47–48; “Making the Best of Protectionism,” p. 9; “Protectionism and Autonomy,” p. 426.

45 Hager (fn. 34), “Little Europe, Wider Europe,” pp. 184–90; “Protectionism and Autonomy,” pp. 426–27.

46 Some of Hager's mainstream critics argue that such translation is impossible, see Hindley, Brian, “Protectionism and Autonomy: a Comment on Hager,” International Affairs 59 (Winter 1982/1983), 7786.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

47 On distributional consequences of trade, see Corden (fn. 12), chap. 5.

48 Even Dauderstädt admits that “considerations of international competitiveness played a minor role in the U.S/U.K. attack on the welfare state. However, in the Federal Republic of Germany such considerations have been more influential, particularly 1980/81 when the balance of payments went into the red.” Dauderstadt (fn. 34), 15.

49 Mainstream economists admit this possibility: see Bergsten, C. Fred and Cline, William, “Trade Policy in the 1980s: An Overview,” in Cline, William, ed., Trade Policy in the 1980s (Washington: Institute for International Economics, 1983), 63.Google Scholar

50 The shock of the Great Depression first led Keynes from orthodox support of freetrade characteristic of the Liberal Party to a call for protection in the face of a seemingly immovable gold standard. It was in this period (1933) that he made his famous plea, “But let goods be home-spun whenever it is reasonably and conveniently possible; and, above all, let finance be primarily national.” For his move toward protectionism and his subsequent return to liberalized trade, see dHarrod, Roy F., The Life of John Maynard Keynes (London: Macmillan, 1951), 424–31, 446, 608–10.Google Scholar

51 The importance of ideology as a restraint on protectionism in the postwar period is noted by Bergsten and Cline (fn. 49), 96.

52 For an account of the importance of ideological change in the acceptance of flexible exchange rates, see Odell, John S., U.S. International Monetary Policy (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1982), 308–11, 362–67.Google Scholar

53 Kuttner, , The Economic Illusion: False Choices between Prosperity and Social Justice (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1984).Google Scholar

54 Phillips, , Staying on Top (New York: Random House, 1984), 54.Google Scholar

55 Kuttner (fn. 53), 124–25.

56 Phillips (fn. 54), 12–13.

57 Ibid., 140.

58 For an analysis for the state of protectionist practice in the European economies, see European Research Associates, EEC Protectionism (fn. 34), II, chap. 17.

59 Recent T.U.C. statements include “Programme for Recovery: TUC Economic Review 1982,” chap. 9; TUC—Labour Party Liaison Committee, “Economic Planning and Industrial Democracy: The Framework for Full Employment,” p. 18.

60 The shift in political rhetoric has been ably documented by de Bandt, Jacques, “Division internationale du travail, reconquête du marché intérieur et developpement autocentré: Quelle conciliation?” [International division of labor, recapture of the domestic market and self-reliant development: What reconciliation?], Revue d'économie industrielle, No. 19 (Ier trimistre 1982), 90104.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

61 A summary of Mitterrand's early policy is given by Mosley, Mark, “French Foreign Economic Policy under Mitterrand,” The Fletcher Forum (Summer 1982), 417–34.Google Scholar Also see Lauber, Volkmar, The Political Economy of France (New York: Praeger, 1983), 172–73.Google Scholar

62 Hazera, Jean-Claude, “M. Mitterrand et ses courants” [M. Mitterrand and his factions], Le nouvel économiste, No. 392 (June 13, 1983), 33.Google Scholar

63 Izraelewicz, Erik and Mital, Christine, “Le complot protectionnistc” [The protectionist plot], L'Expansion, No. 218 (June 17–30, 1983), 85.Google Scholar Hazera and this article provide interesting accounts of the debate within the Socialist Party; see also remarks by Jean-Pierre Cot, interviewed by Ross, George, in Newsletter of the Conference Group on French Politics and Society, May 1983, p. 7.Google Scholar

64 The importance of the external constraint is discussed by Béaud, Michel, Le mirage de la croissance: la politique économique de la gauche [The mirage of growth: The political economy of the left], I (Paris: Éditions Syros, 1983), 130–40Google Scholar. On the recent composition of the French deficit, see Bouteiler, Marc, “Le commerce extérieur de la France en 1982: autopsie d'un déficit” [The foreign trade of France in 1982: Autopsy of a deficit], Chroniques d'actualité de la S.E.D.E.I.S. 27 (March 15, 1983), 136–40Google Scholar; Moatti, Gerard, “Notre déficit change de nature” [Our deficit changes its character], “L'Expansion, Nos. 220–220/bis (July 12-September 8, 1983), 79.Google Scholar

65 Stewart, , The Age of Interdependence (Cambridge: The MIT Press, 1984), 8586.Google Scholar

66 Lipson, Charles, “The Transformation of Trade: The Sources and Effects of Regime Change,” International Organization 36 (Spring 1982), 451–52.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

67 Estimates of the proportion of trade in manufactures that is managed by governments in some way range from 23.5% to nearly 30%; if intrafirm trade is added, the proportion climbs to 35–40%. (“How Managed Is ‘Managed Trade’?” The Economist, December 25, 1982, 93.)