Trading Blows

Party Competition and U.S. Trade Policy in a Globalizing Era

James Shoch

• Publisher: The University of North Carolina Press
• Year: 2003
• Print ISBN:
  9780807849750
  9780807826461
• eBook ISBN:
  9780807875315
• Topic: Politics & International Relations
• Subtopic: Economic History
• Index: Politics & International Relations

For the past two decades, trade policy has been high on the American political agenda, thanks to the growing integration of the United States into the global economy and the wealth of debate this development has sparked. Although scholars have explored many aspects of U.S. trade policy, there has been little study of the role played by party politics. With Trading Blows, James Shoch fills that gap.

Shoch offers detailed case studies of almost all of the major trade issues of the Reagan, Bush, and Clinton eras, including administrative and legislative efforts to curb auto, steel, and other imports and to open up markets in Japan and elsewhere, as well as free-trade initiatives such as the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT) treaty that concluded the Uruguay Round of international trade talks, the extension of presidential fast-track trade negotiating authority, and the approval of permanent normal trade relations with China. In so doing, he explains the complex patterns of party competition over U.S. trade policy since 1980 and demonstrates the significant impact that party politics has had on the nation’s recent trade policy decisions.

Table of contents

• Cover Page
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Dedication
• Contents
• Preface
• Introduction
• 1 Parties and Trade Policy: A Theoretical Framework
• 2 Trade Policy and Party Politics from the Civil War to 1980
• 3 The First Reagan Administration: Democratic Pressure and White House Retreat
• 4 Partisanship Heats Up: The Trade Policy Explosion of 1985–1986
• 5 The One-hundredth Congress: Trade Legislation and Presidential Politics
• 6 The Bush Years: Opening Japan, Negotiating NAFTA
• 7 Clinton’s First Two Years in Office: Trade Activism on All Fronts
• 8 Trade Liberalization Grinds to a Halt, 1995–1998
• 9 Trade Liberalization Set Back Again, Then Renewed?: The Battle in Seattle and PNTR with China
• Conclusion
• APPENDIX
• Notes
• Index