Sino-Indian Liberalization: The Role of Trade and Foreign Investment

Two major factors account for a country’s growing integration with the global economy: trade and foreign investment; expansion of exports, and foreign direct investment (FDI). Growth of exports became a dominant source of industrial growth during the 1980s in most developing countries (see Helleiner, 1995). Most of these countries including China and India, have replaced the old import-substitution policy by an export promotion strategy. Both domestic and international factors played an important role in the shift of national policies to repay debts. The process of globalization already underway necessitated export orientation for improving technology, management practices, marketing and international competitiveness. This paper aims at exploring the contributions of exports and FDI to growth and economic liberalization in China and lndia. The first section briefly reviews similarities and differences in the two economies. The second section deals with growth, composition and direction of foreign trade. The third section examines the role of FDI, and its sources and composition by sector, industry, and by overseas ethnic Chinese and Indians. Trade and FDI linkages are examined in the fourth section which also contains a brief case study of Guangdong (China).     

The Future of International Investment Regulation: Towards a World Investment Organisation?

With growth in foreign investment and in the number of companies investing in foreign countries, the application of general principles of public international law has not been deemed adequate to regulate foreign investment and there is, as yet, no comprehensive international treaty on the regulation of foreign investment. Consequently, states have resorted to bilateral investment treaties (BITs), regional trade and international investment agreements (IIAs) and free trade agreements to supplement and complement the regime of protection for foreign investors. In the absence of an international investment court, states hosting foreign investment or investor states have opted for investor-state dispute settlement mechanism (ISDS). This mechanism has brought about its own challenges to the international law of foreign investment due to inconsistency in the application and interpretation of the key principles of international investment law by such arbitration tribunals, and further, there is no appellate mechanism to bring about some cohesion and consistency in jurisprudence. Therefore, there are various proposals mooted by scholars to address these challenges and they range from tweaks to BITs and IIAs, the creation of an appellate mechanism and the negotiation of a multilateral treaty to proposals for reform of ISDS only. After assessing the merits and demerits of such proposals, this study goes further, arguing for the creation of a World Investment Organisation with a standing mechanism for settlement of investment disputes in order to ensure legal certainty, predictability and the promotion of the flow of foreign investment in a sustainable and responsible manner.

     

对外开放三十年来我国外经贸法治建设基本经验和展望

1978年以来,我国利用对外贸易成就巨大,其经验主要有:良好的投资环境是有效利用外资的关键;健全的法治建设是引进外资得以成功的有效保障。经验告诉我们,在制定利用外资的法律和政策时,要把外国经验和本国的实际相结合,在立法、执法和司法过程中既要注意保护外资的合法利益,又要有助于本国经济的发展,即,要正确把握充分利用外资与注意国家经济安全的"度"。     

An Econometric Analysis of the Role of Knowledge in Economic Performance

We conduct a regression analysis of the effects of knowledge on aggregate economic performance using data from the United Nations Development Program (UNDP) and the World Bank for four groups of countries during 1995–2001. Our results indicate that knowledge is a key driver of economic growth for each group of countries. More importantly, we find that variation in economic performance among these groups may be related to the timing of investment in education, R&D, and information technology, as well as economic policies that affect trade and foreign direct investment.     

“超国民待遇合理合法论”评析——外商投资领域国民待遇制度的理性思辨

入世后 ,经过修订后的中国外资立法与WTO规则已基本接轨 ,惟有“超国民待遇”的问题尚未触及 ,学界对国民待遇的理解出现了歧义 ,一些学者主张“超国民待遇”与国民待遇兼容 ,与WTO规则并行不悖。对“超国民待遇合法合理论”应提出质疑 ,提出“超国民待遇”于法无据 ,于理相悖 ,因此 ,应重塑我国的外资优惠政策的思路 ,以便在新形势下深化外资优惠政策新的形式和内涵 ,逐步消除“超国民待遇”现象     

International integration and the determinants of regional development in China

Concerns about the duration of China??s growth and hence the question of a permanent significant contribution of China to world economic growth relate, amongst other things, to the problem of reducing regional disparity in China. While China??s high average growth is driven by a small number of rapidly developing provinces, the majority of provinces have experienced a more moderate development. To obtain broad continuos growth it is important to identify the determinants of provincial growth. Therefore, we introduce a stylized model of regional development which is characterized by two pillars: (1) International integration indicated by FDI and/or trade lead to imitation of international technologies, technology spill overs and temporary dynamic scale economies, and (2) domestic factors indicated by human and real capital available through interregional factor mobility. Using panel data analysis and GMM estimates our empirical analysis supports the predictions from our theoretical model of regional development. Positive and significant coefficients for FDI and trade support the importance of international integration and technology imitation. A negative and significant lagged GDP per capita indicates a catching up, non steady state process across China??s provinces. Highly significant human and real capital identifies the importance of these domestic growth restricting factors. However, other potentially important factors like labor or government expenditures are (surprisingly) insignificant or even negative. Extending the model using an unbalanced panel leads to a positive effect of the quality of governance and institutions on development.     

非洲国家税法对外资的影响分析

在经济全球化的背景下,非洲国家大都渴望吸引更多的外来投资以发展本国经济.税收作为国家宏观调控的重要手段,税法作为宏观调控法的重要组成部分,在吸引外来投资的过程中作用十分关键,所以非洲国家都非常重视税法的作用.他们积极地进行税收立法,明确税法以吸引投资为主要目的;采用税收优惠政策以吸引投资;采取税收措施以引导投资方向;消除关税壁垒以减少吸引外资的障碍.在中国企业逐渐将目光投向非洲大陆的时候,这些都值得我们关注和探讨.     

谈新贸易保护主义下的国家安全审查制度——从华为、中兴收购受阻谈起

传统“国家安全”内涵延伸到经济领域导致贸易保护盛行,投资壁垒越来越多,尤以中兴、华为进入美国遭到的以国家安全审查为内容的新贸易保护阻挠为最.本文透视美国安全审查制度,分析了中国企业海外投资遭受歧视待遇的原因,以期为我国对外资的管制和促进海外投资的保护提供借鉴.     

美国行政协定的合宪性分析

对三种具体行政协定的合宪性讨论随着美国总统和国会之间就对外贸易政策制定权中主导权的争夺而开始兴起。大多数学者和美国法院都承认行政协定的合宪性。确认美国行政协定的合宪性,有利于理清行政协定和美国对外贸易政策的关系,有利于利用行政协定更好地实施美国对外贸易政策,促进其不断发展。     

我国对外贸易壁垒调查制度:成就、不足及完善

原外经贸部颁布的《对外贸易壁垒调查暂行规则》是我国外贸政策与立法范式转化的重要标志 ,对于我国真正享受多边贸易规则赋予的权益 ,积极维护对外贸易参与人利益都具有深远意义 ,但《暂行规则》在贸易壁垒的认定、申请人结构安排及程序运作等方面仍须进一步完善     

Bad but Stable

Russia's fiscal system was destabilized in 2015 because of the fall in national oil revenues. The budget crisis resulted in a sustained fall in personal income, which in turn led to a fall in consumption. This in turn resulted in a decline in trade and investment. These trends were present in the majority of Russia's regions. Russia's industrial slump, on the other hand, was relatively small and did not last long, in large part due to continued investment and growth in the defense industry. The sustained industrial production, combined with the buffer of a substantial pool of foreign migrant labor, allowed for stable employment figures. Overall, the Russian economy was better able to adapt to the deterioration in conditions than most expected.     

Adapting to the foreign technological challenge

United States technology is increasingly viewed as providing the backbone and where-withal to arrest the nation's economic slide and to restore the accustomed U.S. leadership position in international trade. This view stems from demonstrated U.S. preeminence in technology, the importance of technology in economic growth, and the ascendance of technology in foreign affairs and international trade today. But, undue preoccupation with the domestic technology base represents at best a suboptimum strategy in the face of a continuing decline in the national investment in R&D. In view of the incipient shifting of the world technological balance overseas, comparable attention needs to be focused on foreign technological developments, and their potential for import and adaptation to help fuel technological innovation at home. A more balanced mix of foreign and domestic technological ingredients in the U.S. socioeconomic cauldron promises to be more attuned to the reality of scarce domestic resources and the changing world environment.     

The moderating effect of institutions in foreign direct investment led growth hypothesis in Nigeria

Economic Change and Restructuring - This paper investigates the moderating role institutional quality plays in foreign direct investment led growth hypothesis in Nigeria from 1984 to 2018 using...     

实力变迁、法律传统与美欧印中贸易政策的演进

国际经济格局的深刻变化引发了美欧印中等主要贸易体贸易政策的变化.这种变化主要体现为其外贸法、外资法和出口管制法的修改,而国际习惯法和国际经济条约对这种修改的约束有限.美欧印中的代表性国际经济法理论分别为"制度管理说"、"规范承诺说"、"贸易民主论"和"责任共担论",这些理论反映了各贸易体的国际经济法传统和理念.以这些理...     

The Politics of the Difficult: Congress,Public Opinion,and Early Cold War Aid and Trade Policies

Many foreign policies central to American cold war efforts were politically difficult. Understanding the politics behind these policies is important for understanding the capacity of democracies to implement difficult but strategically important policies. I argue that we must recognize the important role of public opinion. When the public is unified, popular preferences permeate and dominate the entire political system. For the case of the early cold war, I present quantitative evidence that public attitudes about national security influenced Senate voting on security aid and trade issues. My tests employ previously unused opinion data and take advantage of methodological advances in the analysis of panel data.     

The dynamic interactions among foreign direct investment, economic growth, exports and unemployment: evidence from Taiwan

The vector autoregression (VAR) method of variance decomposition and impulse response function analysis was applied to analyze dynamic relationships among foreign direct investment (FDI), economic growth, unemployment, and trade in Taiwan. The analysis results show that both economic growth and exports have positive impacts on FDI inflow; however, export expansion has a negative impact on FDI outflow. FDI inflow also has an obvious positive impact on exports and economic performance. The evidence also shows that there is no relationship between FDI inflow and unemployment. In addition, we found that a positive relationship exists between economic growth and exports while a negative relationship exists between unemployment and economic growth.     

Chronicles of an information company

The birth and growth of a US West Coast information company is chronicled from its beginning as a part-time partnership to its status five years later as a small but profitable corporation providing information services to Government agencies as well as graduate students. Documentation Associates provides a search and retrieval service that includes brokering on-line data-base searches, and the investment required to set up and maintain this kind of operation is described. Some information-broker policies are discussed, e.g. service types, pricing methods, and the reasons for the wide disparity in data-base search prices are examined. The policies of Documentation Associates in the operation of its broker service are presented.     

论“与投资有关的贸易措施”

贸易与投资有着密切的关系。影响市场准入或出口竞争的贸易措施，对投资的数量、部门构成、地理分布会产生重要影响，甚至对投资流向造成扭曲。因此，从投资的角度看，对“与投资有关的贸易措施”，特别是对发达国家采取的保护主义的措施，应予调整或限制。我国也必须制定和完善有关立法，使有关的贸易措施既有利于发展对外贸易，也有利于利用外资。     

Outward FDI from Central and Eastern European Countries

In Central and Eastern Europe, outward foreign direct investment (FDI) has not yet become as a prominent factor in the region’s reintegration into the world economy as trade liberalisation used to be in the early 1990s or inward foreign direct investment is currently. In the terminology of the investment–development path, with the notable exception of the Russian Federation, the region is in stage 2, whereby inward flows are still growing faster than outward flows. This article argues that a combination of the latecomer status of the region’s transnational corporations and the transition shock can explain most of that laggard situation. It hypothesises that the enlargement of the European Union (EU) would give a major push to the outward foreign direct investment flows of Central and Eastern Europe (CEE), on condition that adequate government policies to promote those investments are put in place. The impact on the investment–development path, however, is uncertain, because accession to the EU is often accompanied by a surge in foreign direct investment inflows, too. Finally, the article also looks at the options available to deal with the specific problems of the Russian Federation in relation to capital flight, including ways of regularisation and potential return to the home economy.     

完善法律 促进城乡协调发展

改革开放以来,我国城乡差距总体上呈现逐步扩大的趋势。从法律的层面来看,国家对城镇和农村在资金投入、教育权利、劳动就业权利、社会保障权利的不平等待遇,是城乡差距产生的一个主要原因。随着以征地活动为主的城市化进程发展,法律的不完善导致城市化进程中农民利益进一步受损,加剧了城乡差别。统筹城乡发展要借鉴国际经验,通过积极的立法形式向农村倾斜,扶植农村经济的发展;通过完善土地征用的有关法律、加强农村社会保障的立法,构建农村社会保障制度维护农民的权利;以完善违宪审查制度为切入点,全面清理对农民不平等的政策法规,使农民和城镇居民一样享受到宪法规定的同等待遇。