Matt Sanford
Abstract: Trade has the potential to spur economic growth. However, government policies deny entrepreneurs access to international markets for fear of allowing competition against domestic industries. States use institutions to build trust with other states and facilitate trade liberalization, the removal of trade barriers. The World Trade Organization (WTO) is one of those institutions. This paper analyzes the paths to membership in the WTO of three states in the former Yugoslavia. These states pursued WTO accession when it became clear that they could each take advantage of the benefits of trade. Slovenia quickly adopted liberal trade policies and acceded to the WTO because of the structure of its economy and how dependent on trade it was for economic growth. Croatia was the next to pursue WTO membership because, while it recognized the benefits of trade, Croatia’s accession timeline was pushed back due to the state’s need to prioritize other economic reforms before trade liberalization. Finally, Bosnia and Herzegovina has recently accelerated its WTO accession process because it suffered the most from the effects of conflict and it did not necessarily need to pursue WTO membership in order to solidify its most important trade relationships.
