The Rules of the Game in the Global Economy

Analyzing the evolution of international policy regimes affecting the development and management of international business, this text attempts to explain the nature of international regime. The idea is to show how the interlinked processes of global economic integration and multinational enterprise expansion make the development of regimes both inevitable and desirable. Lee Preston examines several major types of regime currently in place, including those that have emerged from global or regional institutions such as the United Nations (UN) and the European Community (EC), those dealing with functional areas such as international trade and payments, sea and air transportation, telecommunications, and environmental issues. The text concludes with an assessment of the critical similarities and differences among existing regimes, the most likely direction and scope of future regime development, and the important implications of regime evolution for international management.The following revisions are contained in this edition: updated data and tables to include more recent developments and examples, wherever possible and appropriate; specific attention is given to the evolution of new institutional arrangements, such as the European Union, NAFTA, and WTO; an increased emphasis on the importance to business and economic activity of environmental regimes as reflected in the issues raised at the 1992 Earth Summit in Rio de Janeiro and related developments; the reorganization of some sections of the text, and the introduction of a separate chapter on telecommunications and services.