Description

“Mega-FTAs” dominated the global trade agenda in the first half of the second decade of the 21st Century. Even before the election of Donald Trump to the US Presidency, it seemed that the era of Mega-FTAs would be short-lived—with both the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) and the Trans-Atlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP) encountering significant opposition. The Chinese and ASEAN-backed alternative to the TPP, the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP), is the last of the Mega-FTAs standing. Until the demise of the TPP was confirmed, RCEP had received relatively little attention in the press or in the academic world. This presentation will focus on the factors shaping RCEP. In particular, through a comparison with the other Mega-FTAs, it examines how the structure of regional economic interdependence determines the content of mega trade agreements.

John Ravenhill is Director of the Balsillie School of International Affairs and Professor of Political Science at the University of Waterloo. He was previously Head of the School of Politics and International Relations, Research School of Social Sciences at the Australian National University. He is an editor of the Review of International Political Economy.