IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/taf/rripxx/v29y2022i5p1420-1447.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Utilization of GSP schemes as a political and economic determinant of the utilization of North-South FTAs

Author

Listed:
  • Antonio Postigo

Abstract

Many works have examined the variables driving the formation of North-South free trade agreements (FTAs) between developed and developing countries. This study analyzes the determinants shaping their utilization in the contexts of their political economy and of Generalized System of Preferences (GSP) schemes that are unilaterally granted by developed economies to developing countries’ exports. Most of the goods liberalized through GSP are liberalized from early on in North-South FTAs; however, since FTA concessions are legally binding, goods that are excluded or only partially liberalized in GSP will be also excluded or protected in FTAs. As GSP schemes are subject to unilateral restriction/elimination by the developed country, exporters using GSP tariffs will lobby for the non-removable liberalization of their exports through an FTA and subsequently will have a high FTA utilization. These scenarios result in North-South FTAs being used to a great extent to export goods covered by and exported through GSP, thus consolidating pre-FTA trade patterns. These arguments were tested by analyzing disaggregated and rarely accessed data on Thailand’s and Malaysia’s exports through the Japanese GSP and their bilateral FTAs with Japan, as well as interviews with key actors involved in the policymaking of these FTAs. Most sectors in Thailand and Malaysia that benefited from GSP lobbied for FTA liberalization with Japan. Goods previously exported through GSP account for most of FTA utilization and the previous use of GSP preferences has a higher predictive value of subsequent FTA utilization than FTA tariff savings.

Suggested Citation

  • Antonio Postigo, 2022. "Utilization of GSP schemes as a political and economic determinant of the utilization of North-South FTAs," Review of International Political Economy, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 29(5), pages 1420-1447, September.
    • Handle: RePEc:taf:rripxx:v:29:y:2022:i:5:p:1420-1447
    DOI: 10.1080/09692290.2021.1892796
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://hdl.handle.net/10.1080/09692290.2021.1892796
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1080/09692290.2021.1892796?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to look for a different version below or search for a different version of it.

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Manger,Mark S., 2009. "Investing in Protection," Cambridge Books, Cambridge University Press, number 9780521765046.
    2. Cornelia Woll, 2008. "Firm Interests: How Governments Shape Business Lobbying on Global Trade," Post-Print hal-02183956, HAL.
    3. Manger,Mark S., 2009. "Investing in Protection," Cambridge Books, Cambridge University Press, number 9780521748704.
    4. Antonio Postigo, 2016. "Institutional spillovers from the negotiation and formulation of East Asian free trade agreements," Review of International Political Economy, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 23(3), pages 379-417, May.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Solís Mireya, 2013. "Business advocacy in Asian PTAs: a model of selective corporate lobbying with evidence from Japan," Business and Politics, De Gruyter, vol. 15(1), pages 87-116, March.
    2. Knobel, Alexander & Chokaev, Bekhan, 2014. "Possible Economic Outcomes of a Trade Agreement with the European Union," EconStor Preprints 121853, ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics.
    3. John Ravenhill, 2012. "The Numbers Game in Asia-Pacific Cooperation," Chapters, in: Christopher M. Dent & Jörn Dosch (ed.), The Asia-Pacific, Regionalism and the Global System, chapter 5, Edward Elgar Publishing.
    4. Soo Yeon Kim & Gabriele Spilker, 2019. "Global value chains and the political economy of WTO disputes," The Review of International Organizations, Springer, vol. 14(2), pages 239-260, June.
    5. Aydin B. Yildirim & J. Tyson Chatagnier & Arlo Poletti & Dirk De Bièvre, 2018. "The internationalization of production and the politics of compliance in WTO disputes," The Review of International Organizations, Springer, vol. 13(1), pages 49-75, March.
    6. Mireya Sol�s & Saori N. Katada, 2015. "Unlikely Pivotal States in Competitive Free Trade Agreement Diffusion: The Effect of Japan's Trans-Pacific Partnership Participation on Asia-Pacific Regional Integration," New Political Economy, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 20(2), pages 155-177, April.
    7. Soo Yeon Kim, 2021. "Investment commitments in PTAs and MNCS in partner countries," Economics and Politics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 33(3), pages 415-442, November.
    8. Iain Osgood & Yilang Feng, 2018. "Intellectual property provisions and support for US trade agreements," The Review of International Organizations, Springer, vol. 13(3), pages 421-455, September.
    9. Damian Raess & Andreas Dür & Dora Sari, 2018. "Protecting labor rights in preferential trade agreements: The role of trade unions, left governments, and skilled labor," The Review of International Organizations, Springer, vol. 13(2), pages 143-162, June.
    10. Hiroshi Mukunoki, 2017. "The welfare effect of a free trade agreement in the presence of foreign direct investment and rules of origin," Review of International Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 25(4), pages 733-759, September.
    11. Jieun Lee & Iain Osgood, 2018. "Exports, Jobs, Growth! Congressional Hearings on US Trade Agreements," Working Papers 667, Research Seminar in International Economics, University of Michigan.
    12. Ferdi De Ville & Gabriel Siles-Brügge, 2019. "The Impact of Brexit on EU Trade Policy," Politics and Governance, Cogitatio Press, vol. 7(3), pages 7-18.
    13. Ryan M. Weldzius, 2021. "The end of currency manipulation? Global production networks and exchange rate outcomes," Economics and Politics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 33(3), pages 514-532, November.
    14. Scott Cook, 2010. "Mark S. Manger. 2009. Investing in Protection: The Politics of Preferential Trade Agreements between North and South (New York: Cambridge University Press)," The Review of International Organizations, Springer, vol. 5(4), pages 501-504, December.
    15. Baccini, Leonardo & Urpelainen, Johannes, 2014. "International institutions and domestic politics: can preferential trading agreements help leaders promote economic reform?," LSE Research Online Documents on Economics 55608, London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library.
    16. Ka Zeng & Karen Sebold & Yue Lu, 2020. "Global value chains and corporate lobbying for trade liberalization," The Review of International Organizations, Springer, vol. 15(2), pages 409-443, April.
    17. Johannes Urpelainen, 2011. "Early birds: Special interests and the strategic logic of international cooperation," The Review of International Organizations, Springer, vol. 6(2), pages 113-140, July.
    18. Baccini, Leonardo & Dür, Andreas & Elsig, Manfred & Milewicz, Karolina, 2011. "The design of preferential trade agreements: A new dataset in the Making," WTO Staff Working Papers ERSD-2011-10, World Trade Organization (WTO), Economic Research and Statistics Division.
    19. Ida Bastiaens & Evgeny Postnikov, 2020. "Social standards in trade agreements and free trade preferences: An empirical investigation," The Review of International Organizations, Springer, vol. 15(4), pages 793-816, October.
    20. Jieun Lee & Iain Osgood, 2019. "Exports, jobs, growth! Congressional hearings on US trade agreements," Economics and Politics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 31(1), pages 1-26, March.

    More about this item

    JEL classification:

    • L81 - Industrial Organization - - Industry Studies: Services - - - Retail and Wholesale Trade; e-Commerce

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:taf:rripxx:v:29:y:2022:i:5:p:1420-1447. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Chris Longhurst (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.tandfonline.com/rrip20 .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.