The New Global Trading Order: The Evolving State and the Future of Trade

The international institutions that have governed global trade since the end of World War II have lost their effectiveness, and global trade governance is fractured. The need for new institutions is obvious, and yet, few proposals seem to be on offer. The key to understanding the global trading order lies in uncovering the relationship between trade and the State, and how the inner constitution of Statecraft drives the architecture of the global order and requires structural changes as the State traverses successive cycles. The current trade order, focused on the liberalization of trade in goods and services and the management of related issues, is predicated on policies and practices that were the product of a global trading order of the 20th-century modern nation-states. Today, a new form of the State - the post-modern State - is evolving. In this book, the authors propose a new trade norm - the enablement of global economic opportunity - and a new institution - the Trade Council - to overhaul the global trading order.

Table of Contents:
1. Introduction; 2. The evolving state; 3. The changing nature of welfare; 4. Disaster and redemption: 1930s and Bretton Woods; 5. The transformation of the Bretton Woods world and the rise of a new economic order; 6. The end of Bretton Woods and the beginning of a new global trading order; 7. The enablement of global economic opportunity; 8. Trade and security; Conclusion.

Review :
'In this important new book, Patterson and Afilalo address the largely neglected question of how the transformation of the constitutional and international order currently underway will affect the global trade regime. Their striking analysis is as formidable and serious as the question itself.' Philip Bobbitt, author of The Shield of Achilles: War, Peace, and the Course of History 'In this timely book, Patterson and Afilalo remind us that international trade is not just crucial to prosperity, but to world peace as well. Their analysis of the trade regime's current crisis, and their concrete recommendations for fixing it, should be required reading for all those with a stake in maintaining the global economy.' Ethan B. Kapstein, Paul Dubrule Professor of Sustainable Development, INSEAD 'The New Global Trading Order makes a significant and highly original contribution to the thinking about the international trade order. Well-written and well-argued, this book will be of great interest to those concerned with international trade law, international economics, history, and the issues of globalization. This book should be widely read.' Jeffrey L. Dunoff, Temple University Beasley School of Law 'In this engaging new book, the authors show how the post-war Bretton Woods system for regulating the global economic order was predicated on a conception of the State that no longer holds. They develop a provocative and original thesis for radical institutional redesign of the existing trade regime to promote the enablement of global economic opportunity and growth for citizens of developed and developing countries alike.' Michael Trebilcock, University of Toronto 'The New Global Trading Order is a thought-provoking work, which made an early contribution to an emerging body of literature seeking to shed a humanist view on the world trading system.' Sonia E. Rolland, Jurisprudence