Off-shoring, Insecurity and the Protectionist Threat

The financial crash of 2008 threatens economic insecurity in industrialized countries to an extent not experienced since the Great Depression. But as discussed in the World Economic and Social Survey 2008 (WESS), concerns about the security of employment, fairness of pay and effectiveness of social protection have been mounting for years and perhaps decades prior to this crisis. But this explanation, because it abstracts trade from its wider macroeconomic setting, runs the risk of encouraging misguided protectionist responses, especially in developed countries. Globalization is neither an automatic nor a predetermined process, the choice of policies, including macroeconomic and financial policies, to manage it matters. This Policy Brief shows how this aspect of economic insecurity can be reduced without sacrificing trade and development.