World Trade Policies

The Changing Panorama, 1920–1953: A Series of Contemporary Periodic Surveys

Henry Chalmers

• Publisher: University of California Press
• Year: 2023
• Print ISBN: 9780520349346
• eBook ISBN: 9780520349353
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Economics
• Subtopic: International Business
• Index: Economics

World Trade Policies: The Changing Panorama, 1920–1953 by Henry Chalmers offers a rare, year-by-year record of how governments reshaped trade policy across three turbulent decades, from the fragile post–World War I recovery through depression, global war, and the unsettled aftermath of Korea. Originally appearing as contemporaneous surveys for the U.S. Department of Commerce, these reports combine painstaking detail with the clarity of a seasoned observer who distilled mountains of technical regulations into patterns of global significance. Chalmers traces the tightening and loosening of tariffs, quotas, and exchange controls, showing how national expedients gradually replaced the nineteenth-century liberal trading order.

The volume’s chronological structure captures both the disintegration of world trade and tentative moves toward reconstruction. Early optimism about restoring prewar stability gave way to the tariff wars and bilateralism of the 1930s, the emergency regimes of wartime economies, and postwar experiments with Bretton Woods institutions, reciprocal trade agreements, and GATT. Along the way, Chalmers’ foresight stands out—identifying exchange controls as central to trade regulation as early as 1931, or reframing the postwar “dollar shortage” as consequence rather than cause. *World Trade Policies* thus provides not a retrospective synthesis but the documentary voice of an analyst writing in real time. For historians of international economics, policymakers, and students of trade, it remains a foundational guide to the interplay of protectionism, nationalism, and the search for multilateral order in the modern global economy.

This title is part of UC Press's Voices Revived program, which commemorates University of California Press’s mission to seek out and cultivate the brightest minds and give them voice, reach, and impact. Drawing on a backlist dating to 1893, Voices Revived makes high-quality, peer-reviewed scholarship accessible once again using print-on-demand technology. This title was originally published in 1953.

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title
• Copyright
• CONTENTS
• 1920-1923 EXTREME POSTWAR TRADE RESTRICTIONS MODERATED AS DISORGANIZATION DIMINISHES
• 1924-1926 TRADE POLICIES MOVE TOWARD LESS RESTRICTIVE AND MORE STABLE BASIS
• 1927 MODERATING TENDENCIES EVOLVE INTO PROGRAMS THROUGH TREATIES AND CONFERENCES
• 1928 DISTINCT PROGRESS TOWARD TARIFF STABILITY AND MODERATION OF TRADE RESTRICTIONS
• 1929 RELATIVE LULL FOLLOWS TRADE POLICY READJUSTMENTS OF FIRST POSTWAR DECADE
• 1930 GENERAL ECONOMIC DEPRESSION BECOMES DOMINANT INFLUENCE ON COMMERCIAL POLICY MEASURES
• 1931 MARKET SHRINKAGES AND FINANCIAL CRISES PROMPT DRASTIC TRADE CONTROL MEASURES
• 1932 ECONOMIC DIFFICULTIES UNDER DEEPENING DEPRESSION SHAPE COURSE OF TRADE POLICIES
• 1933 FAILURE OF HOPES FOR COLLECTIVE ACTION PROMPTS MORE DRASTIC NATIONAL MEASURES
• 1934 GREAT ACTIVITY IN TRADE CONTROLS NETS LITTLE EASEMENT IN OVER-ALL RESTRICTIONS
• 1935 DOMESTIC ECONOMIC RECOVERY BRINGS SOME RELAXATION OF FOREIGN TRADE BARRIERS
• 1936 TRADE RECOVERY FAVORED BY IMPROVING CONDITIONS HELD BACK BY UNCERTAINTIES
• 1937 EASEMENT OF DEPRESSION TENSIONS ENCOURAGES RELAXATION OF EMERGENCY MEASURES
• 1938 INCIPIENT TRADE LIBERALIZING MOVES CHECKED BY RECESSION AND POLITICAL TENSIONS
• 1939 OUTBREAK OF WAR BRINGS WIDE RESORT TO PRECAUTIONARY CONTROLS AND DEALS
• 1940 SPREAD OF THE WAR CAUSES SHARP SHIFTS IN WORLD TRADE AND CONTROLS
• 1941 YEAR OF COMMERCIAL DETERIORATION IS CLIMAXED BY PEARL HARBOR AND WORLD-WIDE WAR
• 1942 AS WAR BECOMES GLOBAL NORMAL TRADE RELATIONS ECLIPSED BY EMERGENCY ARRANGEMENTS
• 1943 TRADE CONDITIONS WORSEN IN AXIS REGIONS WHILE IMPROVING AMONG ALLIES
• 1944 PROSPECT OF WAR'S END BRINGS PLANS FOR MORE NORMAL TRADING CONDITIONS
• 1945 WAR’S END BRINGS ONLY LIMITED PROGRESS TOWARD DEMOBILIZATION OF CONTROLS
• 1946 ACUTE NEEDS OF RECENTLY WAR-INVOLVED AREAS ARE THE DOMINANT TRADE FORCES
• 1947 INCREASED IMPORTATIONS BEYOND EARNINGS BRING RENEWED TIGHTENING OF CONTROLS
• 1948 SUBSTANTIAL IMPROVEMENT FAILS TO MATERIALIZE AND THE MARSHALL PLAN IS LAUNCHED
• 1949 FIRST BROAD EFFORTS TO “LOOSEN UP THE LOG JAM” OF TRADE AND CURRENCIES
• 1950 TRADE APPROACHES NORMALIZATION UNTIL KOREA BRINGS SCRAMBLE FOR SUPPLIES
• 1951 SUBSIDENCE OF POST-KOREAN TRADE BOOM BRINGS PRICE DROPS AND RENEWED IMPORT CURBS
• 1952-1953 LOOKING AHEAD IN WORLD TRADE POLICIES104