The free trade–fair trade fault-lines in historical context
Journal: Edward Elgar Publishing eBooks
Year: 2021

Chapter 1 provides an historical context for contemporary controversies over the boundaries between free-trade and fair trade, sketching the evolution of trading patterns over the course of human history and the dramatic expansion in international trade over the past two centuries or so, precipitated initially by the Industrial Revolution and the invention of the steam engine which greatly reduced transportation costs, and much more recently by the communications revolution that has dramatically