What does Regional Economic Integration Deliver?

Abstract

I examine whether recent regional integrations are deeper than older ones using data on the contents of trade agreements. I show that although recent regional integrations are deeper than older ones, the coverage of policy areas is mainly restricted to the provisions that fall under the current mandate of the WTO discipline. I also show that the depth and breadth of RTAs are heterogeneous according to types of RTAs, country pairs, and particular signatory countries, though the differences tend to be narrowing. Then, reviewing the findings of recent studies, I argue that deep integration delivers many gains to trade in goods, production networks, and research and development. However, further studies are required to fully understand the gains and losses of deep integration.