In response to concern about the model of trade and investment liberalization reflected in existing and proposed trade and investment agreements (TIAs), efforts have been made to balance the economic orientation of trade with social considerations. One proposal that has garnered significant attention in this regard is the social clause (SC): a set of labour rights to be attached to the text of TIAs. Although the idea of including labour rights in TIAs seems laudable, significant opposition to the particular SC recommendations developed by Canadian and international labour organizations has emerged. Some critics charge that the addition of a clause to TIAs will not only prove unproductive, but will actually serve to legitimate problematic aspects of these agreements. Others insist that the content of the SC will exacerbate existing inequalities in the international trade order. In this thesis, I reconstruct debate over the SC to determine whether this instrument can effectively contribute to the realization of a more socially responsible trade and investment regime. Using proposals advanced by the Canadian Labour Congress as a key point of reference, I argue that there are resources available to clause proponents to respond to claims that the SC is an inadequate approach to the goal of resisting the current model of liberalization. As such, there is room to resist the conclusion that the SC should be rejected in its entirety. While it may be possible to preserve the SC approach, however, the same cannot be said about the content of current clause proposals. Criticisms of the narrow range of issues covered by existing SC recommendations clearly demonstrate that a rethinking of the content of the clause is not only warranted, but also necessary. Accordingly, I conclude by exploring three considerations that should be factored into the development of what would constitute a more adequate SC: first, existing patterns of inequality in the international trade system; second, the range of issues addressed by the clause; and third, the location of the clause within the context of the international trade regime.

In response to concern about the model of trade and investment liberalization reflected in existing and proposed trade and investment agreements (TIAs), efforts have been made to balance the economic orientation of trade with social considerations. One proposal that has garnered significant attention in this regard is the social clause (SC): a set of labour rights to be attached to the text of TIAs. Although the idea of including labour rights in TIAs seems laudable, significant opposition to the particular SC recommendations developed by Canadian and international labour organizations has emerged. Some critics charge that the addition of a clause to TIAs will not only prove unproductive, but will actually serve to legitimate problematic aspects of these agreements. Others insist that the content of the SC will exacerbate existing inequalities in the international trade order. In this thesis, I reconstruct debate over the SC to determine whether this instrument can effectively contribute to the realization of a more socially responsible trade and investment regime. Using proposals advanced by the Canadian Labour Congress as a key point of reference, I argue that there are resources available to clause proponents to respond to claims that the SC is an inadequate approach to the goal of resisting the current model of liberalization. As such, there is room to resist the conclusion that the SC should be rejected in its entirety. While it may be possible to preserve the SC approach, however, the same cannot be said about the content of current clause proposals. Criticisms of the narrow range of issues covered by existing SC recommendations clearly demonstrate that a rethinking of the content of the clause is not only warranted, but also necessary. Accordingly, I conclude by exploring three considerations that should be factored into the development of what would constitute a more adequate SC: first, existing patterns of inequality in the international trade system; second, the range of issues addressed by the clause; and third, the location of the clause within the context of the international trade regime. / Graduate and Postdoctoral Studies / Graduate

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of California, Irvine, 1997. / Vita.

University of Macau / Faculty of Social Sciences and Humanities / Department of Economics

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Pennsylvania, 1993. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 270-280).

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Stockholm, 1988. / Includes bibliographical references (p. 286-295).

A small open economy model which incorporated. the rational expectations - natural rate hypothesis was constructed. The resulting model indicated that to the extent that foreign monetary policies may affect the relative price of domestic to foreign goods, the domestic unemployment rate was not neutral with respect to foreign monetary policies. Using Canada as the small open economy and the United States as the rest of the world, the weak open economy version of the natural rate hypothesis was empirically tested for both the flexible and the fixed exchange rate periods. The empirical methodology employed was the Granger causality test. The results based on the goodness of fit test indicated that for all the exchange rate regimes, the Canadian unemployment rate was rtot Granger caused by any causal variables considered. However, the results based on a comparison of the postsample forecasting performance were different. For the first flexible exchange rate. period, 1953-1962, we found that the Canadian unemployment rate was Granger caused by the foreign price level. However, this result was consistent with the weak open economy version of the natural rate hypothesis. We also found that the foreign unemployment rate Granger caused theCanadianunemployment rate in the second flexible rate period, 1970-1979. But, this did not damage the natural rate hypothesis since the natural rate hypothesis does not preclude real variables from having a systematic effect on the Canadian unemployment rate. The tests for rationality with the Canadian price level equations for both the flexible and the fixed exchange rate periods were inconclusive. First, we were not able to detect a breakpoint in the foreign and domestic money rules. The alternate tests of rationality which examined whether the relevant variables were included in the Canadian price level equations were also inconclusive because of a high degree of multicollinearity between the variables. / Ph. D.

This aim of this thesis is to analyse the demand for labour from trade with a selection of South Africa’s trading partners. It is expected that labour demand will be greater in trade with developed blocs. Trade between developing blocs, however, is thought to be more skilled labour intensive and such trade should have greater linkages. This ought to feed through into greater labour demand so that South-South trade may be more ‘labour creating’ than expected. As it is more skill intensive, it may also be more dynamic, which has implications for future growth and development. Factor content methodology is used to assess labour demand. Calculations consider linkages to other sectors (which will increase labour demand) and the use of scarce resources (which has an opportunity cost to labour). The findings support the claim that trade with developing blocs is more professional labour intensive. Evidence that it may be more dynamic and have greater linkages to labour is borne out in exports to SADC. Greater labour demand through linkages, however, is not evident in net trade to SADC. Neither are they of significance in trade with any of the other developing blocs so labour effects due to linkages appear to be negligible. The advantages of South-South trade may rather lie in the dynamic benefits that trade in higher technology goods provides. When scarce resources such as capital and professional labour are taken into account, it is found that labour demand is negative in net trade to all blocs. However, even without the problem of scarce resources, most blocs have a negative demand for labour in net trade. The indication is that with the present trade patterns, South Africa cannot expect trade to increase labour demand. Policy which could improve this situation would be to increase labour force skills, improve the flexibility of the labour market and develop sectors which are both more advanced as well as labour intensive. Despite the negative impact of trade on labour in general, it is found that trade does differ by direction and that for each labour type there are certain blocs where labour demand is positive. This is also the case in net trade for particular sectors. Such information could be used as part of a targeted trade policy to assist in the marketing of particular sectors in trade and also for increasing labour demand for certain labour groups.

Thesis (Ph. D. Agriculture (Agricultural Economics)) -- University of limpopo, 2021 / The study analysed the effects of international trade on employment and wages in the fruit industry of South Africa. However, the study prioritised six industries within the fruit industry which are pertinent contributors to economic growth, international trade, employment and source of wages. The six types of fruits considered for this study are apples, apricots, avocadoes, oranges, pears and table grapes. The relationship between international trade and labour market is continuously significant, especially with increasing number of trade agreements amongst countries and regions. The international trade has been identified by many economic authors to be amongst main contributors of employment and wage source in the exporting countries. The overarching theoretical framework guiding research on the impact of international trade on employment and wages is based on Krugman’s theory of imperfect competition. The theory states that international trade on similar products amongst developed and developing countries works in favour of the developed countries based on the following arguments: developing countries export primary commodities; developed countries export beneficiated goods; firms in developed countries are mostly vertically integrated with a higher market share. The overall aim of the study is to analyse the effects of international trade on employment and wages in the South African fruit industry between the period between 1990 and 2018. There are five objectives for the study and they are broken down as follows: outlining the performance of the South African fruit industry in terms on international trade, employment and wages; secondly, to analyse the impact of international trade flow on employment and wages in the selected six South African fruit industries; thirdly, to determine the causality effects amongst employment, wages and exports within the six South African fruit industry; fourthly, to determine the response of employment, exports and imports on changes in wages within the selected six South African fruit industries; and lastly, to determine the effects of European Union’s Trade Development and Cooperation Agreement on wages in the South African fruit industry. vi The study adopted various analytical techniques to address the objectives. Those analytical techniques were used as follows: descriptive statistics, to profile the six prioritised fruit industries; error correction model, to analyse the impact of international trade flow on employment and wages in the selected six South African fruit industries; granger causality test, to determine the causality effects amongst employment, wages and international trade within the six South African fruit industry; two-staged least squares approach, to determine the response of employment, exports and imports on changes in wages within the selected six South African fruit industries and ordinary least squares, to determine the effects of European Union’s Trade Development and Cooperation Agreement on wages in the South African fruit industry. The findings from descriptive analysis show that all six prioritised fruit industries contributes significantly to the international trade, employment and wages in South Africa. The error correction model for all six fruit industries indicates the existence of a long-run relationship amongst total employment, wages and international trade. Therefore, findings for all fruit industries show that exports output lead to an increase in total employment in a long run, while imports output lead to a decrease in total employment in a long run. The granger causality test for all six fruit industries highlight that there is a causality effect between total employment and exports output. However, there is no causality effect between total employment and imports output, even between exports output and imports output. The results from the two-staged least squares indicate that the wages are affected positively by the exports output. However, there are other factors that affect wages positively such as net realisation from exports, local sales, total gross value of production and foreign direct investment. The wages are negatively affected by imports output, average exchange rate and average prices. The ordinary least squares for all estimated fruit industries show that the volumes of exports to the European Union market affect the wages positively, vii while other variables that are positively affected by the exports to EU market include amongst others the production volumes, productivity, total area planted and foreign direct investment. However, the volumes of exports to the European Union market negatively affect the processing volumes of the fruit industries in South Africa, domestic consumption per capita and average prices. Conclusively, it is recommended that fruit producers, with support of government institutions responsible for trade promotions, should strengthen trade cooperation with various trading blogs, more particularly the European Union; United Kingdom; countries in Asia and Middle East; and African states. This exercise will highly enhance the capacity of South African fruit producers to exploit the untapped international trade opportunities from different markets. Furthermore, it is prudent to recommend that the government should continue to regulate the labour market so that employees could benefit from net realisation from international trade. This will probably reduce the instances of unfair labour practices such as lower wages, child labour, abnormal working hours and overall poor working conditions.