European Community Trade Policies Vis-À-Vis Korea and Taiwan in the Eighties: A Comparative Perspective

This article will review the trade policies of the European Community towards Korea and Taiwan over the past ten years. This time period has been chosen for two reasons. In the first place, ten years ago, on November 28, 1979, the Tokyo Round of multilateral trade negotiations was concluded. At that time, the Tokyo Round was the most comprehensive GATT negotiating round ever, both in terms of trade value affected and in terms of its coverage of topics. An interesting question, therefore, is to what extent the 1979 commitments to trade liberalization were actually kept. Secondly, during the last decade countries such as Korea and Taiwan have become extremely competitive and have started to become a threat to European manufacturers. In addition, the EC has run a persistent trade deficit with these countries in recent years. It is only against such a background that one can expect trade policy responses.