And Results - Oriented versus Rules - Oriented Trade Policies

In the recent years, there has been an increasing amount of interest in trade policy for so called "results-oriented" trade policies (REO). This term refers to situations in which a country's trade policy focuses on quantitative market outcomes rather than on rules by which international transactions are conducted. Typically, a "results-oriented" trade policy involves a government specifying to another country, export targets or market access requirements on particular industries using the stick of unilateral retaliatory threats. In the last decade, number of such schemes have been initiated by the US Administration to expand american firms' market access to foreign markets. Notorious examples with Japan are the Semi Conductor Trade Agreement (SCTA) in 1986, the "Structural Impediment Initiative" (SII) in 1989, the Market-Opening Sector Specific (MOSS) in construction, cellular phones, telecommunications, supercomputers, the recent auto parts agreement signed after strong showing in June 1995.