Free Trade, Free World: The Advent of GATT (The Luther Hartwell Hodges Series on Business, Society, and the State)

Zeiler traces the debate between proponents of free trade and advocates of protectionism, showing how and why a compromise ultimately triumphed. Placing a liberal trade policy in the service of diplomacy as a means of confronting communism, American officials forged a consensus among politicians of all stripes for freer—if not free—trade that persists to this day. Constructed from inherently contradictory impulses, the system of international trade that evolved under GATT was flexible enough to promote American economic and political interests both at home and abroad, says Zeiler, and it is just such flexibility that has allowed GATT to endure.