_Most trade-policy decisions that governments face today arise in the context of a variety of international commitments that must be considered; hence, the study of commercial policy in international trade has in effect become the study of trade agreements, in which the GATT/WTO plays a central role. (p. 224)_ Re the liberalization experiences we have studied, this statement is both descriptively incorrect and analytically misleading. With Mexico’s NAFTA bargaining being the exception, Latin American trade policy reform has been in large part unilateral. Liberalization was not fashioned through the process of reciprocal bargaining; indeed the bound rates these countries attached to the Uruguay Round agreements were ceiling bindings, two to four times higher than the MFN rates then applied. (Mexico‘s WTObound rates average more than four times the average for their applied MFN rates.<sup>29</sup> ) In this context it is important to bring forward a finding from the Peru study: FTA negotiations give small-country reformers more influence in the domestic politics of trade than do WTO negotiations. FTA negotiations have brought forward in the public mind that Peruvian leaders have been shapers of the accords. They also allowed them greater influence over the pace of liberalization than WTO negotiations would allow. Large countries such as the United States, India and Brazil can use leadership in WTO negotiations as part of the management of their domestic politics of trade policy, but their doing so takes away the same opportunity for smaller countries.

The application by Latin American governments of GATT/WTO rules on antidumping and other trade remedies has likewise been unilateral. These governments were not bargaining with other countries over the content of these rules, nor were they bargaining to accept these rules in exchange for reciprocal “concessions” from other countries. When these reforms were put in place all of the countries except Mexico were already GATT contracting parties and hence had already accepted the international law obligations implicit in those rules. They were using the rules – as they existed – to restructure domestic policy-making institutions in such a way as to remove a burdensome accumulation of institutions and regulations and to ensure that the philosophies and interests that supported the ongoing reforms would have a voice in the management of pressures for protection that might arise in the future.

Use of formal trade remedies should be approached as part of the broader question of how governments manage domestic pressures for protection. A critical part of how Peru has sustained its reforms is how leaders there have insisted that all pressures for protection be channeled through INDECOPI. Leaders we interviewed indicated that there have been pressures for off-the-books actions and that saying “No. Go to INDECOPI,” has been an exercise in political courage by high officials.<sup>30</sup> As to the meaning in this context of “commitment,” part of a property rights interpretation of trade remedies is that they express the rights of domestic industries to protection from foreign competition. In a rule-of-law situation – which implies a positive

> 29 WTO data at http://stat.wto.org/TariffProfile/WSDBTariffPFView.aspx?Language=E&Country=MX. Accessed 23 August 2013.

> 30 Harberger 1993 brings forward the importance of political courage in sustaining economic reforms.

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