Free Trade and Social Welfare in Europe by Lucia Coppolaro Lorenzo Mechi

Author:Lucia Coppolaro, Lorenzo Mechi [Lucia Coppolaro, Lorenzo Mechi]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781032175140
Google: vE6RzgEACAAJ
Publisher: Taylor & Francis Limited
Published: 2021-09-30T01:37:58+00:00

Self-regulation disputed: from cartels to intergovernmental commodity agreements

During the early 1930s, two main critics of these visions emerged in the ICC regarding its activity involving cartels. The international crisis led to the role of cartels in helping in the reduction in tariffs being questioned. According to Bussière, despite the great expectations that emerged after the conference of 1927, the LoN achieved only minimal reductions in trade barriers before the crisis stopped the trade liberalisation agenda.37 The Great Depression played an important role in delaying this project, and international organisations were not able to fully develop their free-trade policies in a period of rising economic nationalism.38 The CEII debated about the failure of policies that were meant to eliminate trade barriers; cartels were again considered as a more effective tool than political negotiations were to achieve this aim. Rather than reconsider the desirability of cartels, efforts were made to modify the modus operandi of the study group, to make it more effective in promoting free-trade goals. The action of the CEII as a consultative body was considered as no longer sufficient, and both the LoN and the ICC were considered ineffective in proposing policies to national governments.39

The CEII tried to play a more decisive role, once again calling on cartels to promote international trade interconnections. Unlike in the 1920s, several members of the ICC and the CEII aimed to transform their study group into a consultative board to directly assist in the formation of new cartels rather than to simply study them. The direct connection between the presidents of the most-influential cartels in the economic panorama and the CEII resulted in important intelligence being supplied and diffused to non-cartelised industries. This view was expressed during the council of October 1931 of the ICC, which discussed the proposal to recast the study group into a consultative board for the establishment and administration of cartels. René Duchemin, vice president of the ICC and president of the French Employers’ Association, endorsed the CEII proposal, claiming

La Chambre de Commerce Internationale exprime l’opinion que les ententes industrielles internationales, bien conçues et soucieuses des intérêts des consommateurs des différents pays, peuvent avoir des résultats hautement bienfaisants et que leur extension pourrait contribuer sensiblement à une amélioration de l’organisation de la production. Il faut reconnaître en outre que les cartels internationaux sont un résultat naturel de l’interdépendance croissance de l’économie mondiale.40

After this resolution, Lammers, as the chief expert in the ICC on cartel matters, undertook the creation of the bureau sought by Duchemin. He suddenly gained the cooperation of Marlio and Meyer. The formation of a specialist expert group within the ICC would have been a way to use cartels for political purposes. Experts were convinced, for example, that cartels could fight inflation by stabilising commodity prices and that they could hold off the adoption of trade barriers and bilateral agreements. These resolutions were presented to the ICC Congress of 1935 and 1937, publicly supported both during a meeting dedicated to the cartel question and during another that focused on the économie dirigée.

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