Does Regionalism Affect Trade Liberalization toward NonMembers?
利用1990-2001年十个拉美国家的行业数据，发现区域内的优惠关税削减会带动对非成员国的外部关税降低，但关税同盟中无此效应，表明区域主义未必阻碍全球贸易自由化。
This paper examines the effect of \n regionalism on unilateral trade liberalization using \n industry-level data on applied most-favored nation tariffs \n and bilateral preferences for ten Latin American countries \n from 1990 to 2001. The findings show that preferential \n tariff reduction in a given sector leads to a reduction in \n the external (most-favored nation) tariff in that sector. \n External liberalization is greater if preferences are \n granted to important suppliers. However, these \n "complementarity effects" of preferential \n liberalization on external liberalization do not arise in \n customs unions. Overall, the results suggest that concerns \n about a negative effect of preferential liberalization on \n external trade liberalization are unfounded.