| Research Abstract |
The Okinawa prefectural authorities announced the future plan of the whole area free trade zone, which provoked pros and cons among common people as well as economic specialists. For their hot arguments, the results, however, fell far short of expected appraisal. The main reason is, I think, that their discussions remained superficial and sentimental, not theoretical. Among opponents prevailed a naive and hysterical argument : "If foreign firms come in freely, immediately go down home ones." The disputes came to an end without any significant results. In this study I want, therefore, to examine closely how the postwar framework of international economy has been established and where the world economy is hereafter going, while tracing the old and new controversies : free trade versus protection. Here I will confine myself to the first half of the 20th century, in which the postwar tendency of international economy was made up. The postwar international economy started under the Bretton
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Woods system, namely the International Monetary Fund (IMF) organization, to put it more concretely, the fixed exchange rate system pegged to gold/dollar. Its leading founders were the English J.M.keynes and the American H.F.White, both of whom realized that regionalism and retaliatory tariff had led to the first world war. In other words, they confirmed that multilateral payments system and stabilization of foreign exchange rate are necessary and essential. On the other hand, their arguments were quite different on the international means of payment. As international currency, Keynes proposed bancor that was purely managed, non-convertible, while White unitas that was convertible, pegged to gold. Their currencies reflected respectively the postwar positions of their own countries. The U.K.needed expansionary relaxing policy with some inflation to promote its economic restoration after war : the U.S.wanted contractionary restraining policy with some deflation to keep dollar convertible into gold and dominant over the world economy. This report as "part one" intends to scrutinize the international trade theory of the 20 century's greatest economist J.M.Keynes, and to make a comparative examination on keynes and White plans for the International Monetary Fund so as to make clear the prospects of international economy on which the future of Okinawa free trade zone depends. Less
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