The crisis and protectionism: Steps world leaders should take

VoxEU.org has just published another Ebook in our 'What leaders should do in the Crisis' series; this one focuses on trade. Unless world leaders strengthen trade cooperation, new tariffs and competitive devaluations could trigger a protectionist spiral of WTO-consistent trade barriers. To rule this out, world leaders should: 1) Reduce protectionist pressures by fighting the recession with macroeconomic polices; 2) Translate APEC and G20 leaders’ words into deeds by agreeing a framework for concluding the Doha Round; and 3) Establish a real-time WTO/IMF surveillance mechanism to track new protection.

VoxEU.org is a policy portal set up by the Centre for Economic Policy Research in conjunction with a consortium of national sites, including the Italian site LaVoce, the French site Telos and the Spanish site Sociedad Abierta. Vox aims to promote research-based policy analysis and commentary by leading scholars. The intended audience is economists in governments, international organisations, academia and the private sector as well as journalists specializing in economics, finance and business.