With this Handbook, Miroslav Jovanovic has provided readers with both an excellent stand-alone original reference book as well as the first volume in a comprehensive three-volume set. This introduction into a rich and expanding academic and practical world of international economic integration also provides a theoretical and analytical framework to the reader, presenting select analytical studies and encouraging further research. International Handbook on the Economics of Integration, Volume I covers two broad themes: general integration issues and regional integration groups. The first part discusses topics that range from an overview of the regional integration deals registered with the World Trade Organization, to multilateralism and regionalism, hub-and-spoke integration networks, limits to integration, rules of origin, and globalization. The second part of the Handbook is devoted to an outline of the principal integration arrangements in Europe, the Mediterranean, North and Latin America, East Asia and sub-Saharan Africa, as well as economic integration efforts throughout the Arab world. Contributors to this major reference work include eminent authors, some of whom contributed to the creation of economic integration theory from the outset. The authors not only survey the literature, but also present their own arguments and new ideas in order to offer a new perspective, as well as discussing the issues they believe are essential in the field. Each of the insightful chapters is approachable not only to graduate students, scholars, researchers and policymakers, but also to advanced undergraduate students.
