Skip to main content Accessibility help
×
Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-rcrh6 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-04T20:03:25.745Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

11 - Regional trade arrangements in North America: CUSTA and NAFTA

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  04 May 2010

Jaime De Melo
Affiliation:
Université de Genève
Arvind Panagariya
Affiliation:
The World Bank
Get access

Summary

Introduction

Since the mid-1980s, both the profile of and the depth of the debate over regional trade arrangements in North America have grown, first with the 1988 Canada–US Free-Trade Agreement (CUSTA), and subsequently with negotiations in the early 1990s between Mexico, Canada and the United States aimed at achieving a three-country North American Free-Trade Agreement (NAFTA). Recently, debate has intensified even further following a wave of proposed Latin and Central American trade arrangements whose objective, in part, is eventually to facilitate an even wider Western Hemispheric Trade Arrangement (WHFTA). These developments are, however, only part of a global trend towards more extensive regional arrangements in the trading system in the 1990s. In Europe it is manifest in the ‘Europe 1992’ programme, the EC–EFTA pact and other developments; and in Asia it strengthened ASEAN arrangements (AFTA), Australia–New Zealand agreements, and new Japanese regional arrangements.

As elsewhere, the new regional arrangements in North America are driven by a number of factors. A key one is the search for safe-haven trade agreements by smaller countries who now, more than ever before, wish to secure access to the markets of large neighbouring trading partners because of the fear of higher trade barriers in the future. Another is both the frustration felt by larger countries with progress toward new multilateral liberalisation, and their belief that threatening to negotiate, or actually negotiating, regional arrangements on their part may force other reluctant larger powers to make concessions multilaterally.

Type
Chapter
Information
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 1993

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Save book to Kindle

To save this book to your Kindle, first ensure no-reply@cambridge.org is added to your Approved Personal Document E-mail List under your Personal Document Settings on the Manage Your Content and Devices page of your Amazon account. Then enter the ‘name’ part of your Kindle email address below. Find out more about saving to your Kindle.

Note you can select to save to either the @free.kindle.com or @kindle.com variations. ‘@free.kindle.com’ emails are free but can only be saved to your device when it is connected to wi-fi. ‘@kindle.com’ emails can be delivered even when you are not connected to wi-fi, but note that service fees apply.

Find out more about the Kindle Personal Document Service.

Available formats
×

Save book to Dropbox

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Dropbox.

Available formats
×

Save book to Google Drive

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.

Available formats
×