Liberalisation of Trade and reduction of protectionism

Essay from the year 2004 in the subject Economics - Macro-economics, general, grade: 72%, University of Bradford (-), course: Macro Economics, language: English, abstract: International trade has increased from $2 trillion in 1985 to over $ 6.4 trillion in 2002.1 This impressive growth is primarily the consequence of various political and technological developments of the past 15 years. The political raise of Russia and Asia, particularly China, has extended the worldwide markets. At the same time, technological changes like the Internet have decreased information asymmetry and lowered costs for logistic services, which facilitated the development of international trade. Moreover, organisations like the World Trade Organisation (WTO) have helped to liberalize and deregulate worldwide markets. Today, all aspects of a nation's economy are closely correlated to the economies of its trading partners. The world has become a 'village' and market players are able to interact and transact around the world within 'real time' (Carbaugh 2002). [...]