THE STERLING AREA REVISITED: THE POLITICAL ECONOMY OF INTERNATIONAL ECONOMIC DISINTEGRATION

英国脱欧进程和唐纳德•特朗普（Donald Trump）当选美国总统，引发了有关未来全球金融和贸易关系的紧迫问题。哪些政治和经济机制支持国际经济秩序，以及这些秩序的空心化？当国际体制崩溃时，谁是赢家，谁又是输家？人们通常把当前对全球化的普遍抵制与上世纪30年代的国际政治和经济相提并论。然而，1945年英国经济帝国主义遗留下来的、被遗忘已久的历史遗迹——英镑区（Sterling Area）的解体，在世界面临美国经济衰退和欧盟经济体制磨损的前景之际，可能更具启发性。斯特林地区是一群与英国有着深厚历史、政治和经济联系的国家，在二战后仍然是“世界上最大的多边贸易体系”（Shannon 1949）。但即使在那时，这一体系也在缓慢衰落，并在20世纪70年代彻底解体。这项研究首次对经济集团在英国和其他成员国的解体进行了定量调查。这段历史可以帮助我们认识和更好地理解国际经济解体和重新调整的动态。在战后初期，斯特林地区的参与者就他们的相对负担以及持续成员资格的好处进行了激烈的辩论（例如1952年的柯南；1954年的戴）。但后来的观察家关注的是该体系对英国国内经济和国际货币秩序的影响（如Cohen 1971， Schenk 2010）。迫使欧盟成员国离开该体系的日益沉重的负担被忽视了。此外，从来没有系统地研究歧视性的国际贸易政策和经济模式在这个过渡时期是如何演变的。我们需要理解各国的选择是如何影响国际货币和贸易结果的，这样才能帮助我们驾驭当今解体和重组的动态。选择是有的。虽然具体情况有所不同，但大多数国家在制定贸易和汇率政策方面享有一定的自主权。此外，大多数行业可以决定是适应不断变化的全球经济环境，还是捍卫自己的英镑地区市场。关键的政治和经济选择是通过一套松散耦合的具体相互作用的制度来构建的，包括英镑区、美元区、欧洲支付联盟、双边协议网络，以及关税及贸易总协定（GATT）和布雷顿森林机构下的多边安排。在这个反映了今天的支离破碎的世界经济中，各国评估了在英镑区歧视的好处和自由化的好处之间的权衡，包括与美国和欧洲建立更紧密的经济联系。利用新的数据和混合方法技术，我们可以评估各州在这种情况下做出选择的原因，并考虑对经济表现和结果的影响。斯特林区域的分解已经被研究过了（例如Schenk 1994； Strange 1971）。但我们的重新评估认真考虑了过去被忽视的变量，例如构成国家行为的国际政治和制度因素、体系内的市场表现以及与世界经济其他部分的联系。我们还将处理一系列独特而全面的影响，考虑到该体系对成员国退出决策、英国贸易表现以及政策制定者所追求的适应性策略的影响。更全面的研究对那些努力应对当今国际格局调整的人是有用的。通过关注正确的数据，我们希望表明，二战后的世界经济可以揭示美元贬值、英国脱欧、全球贸易保护主义抬头等问题。

The Brexit process and election of Donald Trump call forth pressing questions about the future global financial and trade relationships. What political and economic mechanisms support international economic orders, and the hollowing out of such orders? Who wins and who loses when international regimes breakdown?Historical parallels are commonly drawn between the current popular backlash against globalisation and the international politics and economics of the 1930s. However, the disintegration of the Sterling Area after 1945, a long-forgotten historical remnant of British economic imperialism, may be more instructive as the world faces the prospect of American economic decline and a fraying EU economic regime.The Sterling Area, a group of countries bound to Britain through the deep historical, political and economic ties, remained after WWII, "the largest multilateral trading system in the world" (Shannon 1949). But the system was slowly declining even then and definitively came apart in the 1970s. This study is the first to quantitatively survey the dissolution of the economic bloc as it played out in Britain and across member countries. This history can help us to recognize and better understand the dynamics of international economic disintegration and realignment.In the early post-war period, Sterling Area participants vigorously debated their relative burdens as well as the benefits of ongoing membership (e.g. Conan 1952; Day 1954). But later observers focused on the system's effects on the British domestic economy and on the international monetary order at large (e.g. Cohen 1971, Schenk 2010). The mounting burdens on the bloc's individual participants that drove them to leave the system have been neglected. Moreover, there has never been a systematic study of how discriminatory international trade policies and economic patterns evolved in this transitional era. We need to understand how the choices of states affected international monetary and trading outcomes, if they are to help us navigate today's dynamics of dissolution and realignment.And choices there were. While particulars differed, most countries enjoyed some autonomy in making trade and exchange-rate policies. Further, most industries could decide between adapting to the shifting global economic environment or else defending their Sterling Area markets. The key political and economic choices were structured through a loosely coupled set of specific interacting regimes, including the Sterling Area, US-dollar area, European Payments Union, a network of bilateral agreements, and multilateral arrangements under the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT) and Bretton Woods institutions.In this fragmented world economy that mirrors today's, countries evaluated trade-offs between the benefits of the Sterling Area discrimination and those of liberalisation, including closer economic ties with America and Europe. With new data and mixed method techniques, we can evaluate why states made the choices they did in this context and consider the implications for economic performance and outcomes.The breakdown of the Sterling Area has been studied before (e.g. Schenk 1994; Strange 1971). But our re-evaluation takes seriously variables that have been ignored in the past, such as the international political and institutional factors that structured state behaviour, market performance within the system and connections with other parts of the world economy. We will also tackle a uniquely comprehensive range of influences, considering the impact of the system on member exit decisions, British trade performance, and the adaptive strategies pursued by policymakers.More complete research is useful to those grappling with today's international realignments. By focusing on the right data, we hope to show that the post-WWII world economy can shed light on issues such as the decline of the US dollar, Brexit, and mounting protectionism in global trade.