Book Review: Nato in the 1960's
| Date | 01 December 1960 |
| DOI | 10.1177/002070206001500419 |
| Author | Richard A. Preston |
| Published date | 01 December 1960 |
| Subject Matter | Book Review |
BOOK REVIEWS
367
being
possible of
achievement.
Today, political
appeal
lies
in
the
posi-
tive
act
of
creating
international
or
supranational
Institutions and
this
can
only
be done by
similar
nations,
hence
the
necessity
for
only
re-
gional, not
universal,
free
trade.
In
any
case,
write
the
authors,
"inte-
gration
is
more
of
a
political
than
an
economic
desideratum".
The
economic
analysis
discusses
tariff,
exchange
rate
and
fiscal
policies
correctly and
concisely.
It
acknowledgedly
owes
much,
one
might almost
write
all,
to
Professor
J.
E.
Meade,
including,
unfortu-
nately,
his
tedious
taxonomic
method
of
exposition. Though
the
analysis
contains
nothing
novel
for
the specialist
in
the
theory
of
international
trade,
it
provides
an
excellent
instructive
and comprehensible
summary
for others, though
it
may
give
them
an
unfortunate
impression
of
the
elegance
of
expression
of
economists.
The
authors demonstrate
that
the
higher
are
the
original
rates
of
duty
of
countries
forming
a
customs union,
the
greater
is
the
likelihood
of
a
rise
in
economic
welfare.
Trade
is
more
likely
to
be
created,
which
is
to
say
that
goods
previously
produced
at
home
are
now
imported,
and
trade
is
less likely
to
be
diverted,
which
is
to
say
that
goods
previously
imported
from
low
cost
third
countries
are
now
imported
from
higher
cost
partner
countries
because
of
tariff
preference.
The
authors
are
not
worried about
transitional
difficulties
in
the
establishment
of
new
trade patterns,
reasonably
pointing to
recent
experience when
yet
more
radical
economic
transformations
have
been achieved
with
little
pain.
The
book
follows
Meade
in
his
regrettably
rather
isolated advocacy
of
flexible
rates
of
exchange
to permit the
easiest
adjustment
in
the
balance
of
payments
of
member countries,
especially
during
the early
days
of
union
when
important
structural
changes
in
their
economies
take
place.
A
European
Monetary
Fund
could
act
as
a
stabilization
fund
to
avoid
the
possible
misuse
of
stabilizing
operations
by
national
funds
for
competitive purposes.
The
section
discussing
fiscal
policies
considers
the
effect
of
different
methods
of
taxation
on
the
pattern
of
trade
and
concludes
that
tax
harmonization
is
not
a
prerequisite
of
customs
unions.
The
authors
do
not
venture to
estimate
the
extent
to
which
a
Euro-
pean customs union
might,
in
fact,
affect
the
course
of
trade
in
parti-
cular
commodities
and the
costs
and
prices
of
different
industries.
Such
estimates
involve
statistical
and
theoretical
problems
of
great
difficulty,
but
that
is
what
we
really want
to
know.
University
of
Toronto
H.
C.
EAsTmAN
NATO
IN
THE
1960'S.
Studies
in
International
Security:
I.
By
Alastair
Buchan.
1960.
(London: Weidenfeld
&
Nicolson.
xii,
131pp.
12/6d.)
This
book
is
the
first
major
production
of
the
new
Institute
for
Strategic
Studies
and
(since
the Institute's
periodical,
Survival,
is a
collection
of
reprints
of
significant
articles)
its
first
piece
of
original
writing.
The
reason
for
the
foundation
of
the
Institute
was
that
a
need
was
felt
for the
stimulation
in
Britain
of
discussion
on
problems
of
national
and
international
security
by
well-informed
individuals
even
though
they
might not
be
in
possession
of
the
classified
information
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