1150 Seventeenth Street, N.W., Washington, D.C. 20036
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Six months into taking office, President Barack Obama has launched sweeping initiatives to stimulate the economy, reform health care, and curb global warming. On one subject--international trade policy--however, the administration has been largely silent, as AEI's Philip I. Levy and Claude Barfield discuss in the recently published International Economic Outlook,
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"In Search of an Obama Trade Policy."
Other than delivering stirring calls to avoid protectionism, the president and his new team of trade officials have given few clues regarding their intentions for the future of the World Trade Organization's Doha Round, the pending ratification of free trade agreements with Panama, Colombia, and Korea, or the charting of a new path for U.S. trade policy (a promise Obama trumpeted during the presidential campaign). At this event, a group of trade policy experts will assess the challenges facing the administration on trade policy and the Obama administration's options in this area going forward.
| 9:45 a.m. | Registration | |
| 10:00 | Panelists: | Philip I. Levy, AEI |
| Edward Gresser, The New Democratic Leadership Council | ||
| John Murphy, U.S. Chamber of Commerce | ||
| Bruce Stokes, National Journal | ||
| Moderator: | Claude Barfield, AEI | |
| 11:45 | Adjournment | |
Claude Barfield is a resident scholar at AEI. He is the author or editor of a number of books on trade and science policy, including Free Trade, Sovereignty, Democracy: The Future of the World Trade Organization (AEI Press, 2001). In 1999, he coauthored Tiger by the Tail: China and the World Trade Organization (AEI Press) with Mark Groombridge. Mr. Barfield is working with Andrei Zlate on the forthcoming AEI Press book The Eagle and the Dragon: The United States, China, and the Rise of Asian Regionalism. Before coming to AEI, he served in the Gerald R. Ford administration on the staff of the Senate Governmental Affairs Committee and as a co–staff director of the President’s Commission for a National Agenda for the Eighties.
Edward Gresser is a senior fellow and the director of the Project on Trade and Global Markets at the Democratic Leadership Council. His first book, Freedom from Want: American Liberalism and the Global Economy (Soft Skull Press), was published in November 2007. From 2001 to 2008, Mr. Gresser worked at the Progressive Policy Institute, where his research included topics such as economic relations between the West and the Muslim world, East Asian integration and American trade relations with China, and the U.S. tariff system. Mr. Gresser also created the widely praised “Trade Fact of the Week” electronic information service. His research has been cited by leaders of the World Trade Organization, the World Bank, the International Monetary Fund, and other institutions and covered by major publications and news outlets including the Washington Post, the New York Times, the Los Angeles Times, the Financial Times, the Far Eastern Economic Review, and others. From 1998 to 2001, Mr. Gresser served as policy adviser to U.S. Trade Representative Charlene Barshefsky. In this position, he was the representative’s principal policy adviser, speechwriter, and research aide. Mr. Gresser also served as a legislative assistant and policy director for Senator Max Baucus (D-Mont.) from 1993 to 1998.
Philip I. Levy studies international trade and development at AEI. Before joining AEI, he handled international economic issues as a member of the secretary of state’s policy planning staff (2005-2006), was senior economist for trade on the President’s Council of Economic Advisers (2003-2005), and was a faculty member in Yale University’s department of economics (1994-2003). An economist by training, he has experience in many international trade and development policy issues, including free trade agreements, trade with China, antidumping policy, welfare effects of globalization, U.S. foreign assistance policy, and economic development policy.
John Murphy is vice president of international affairs at the U.S. Chamber of Commerce. Since joining the Chamber in 1999, Mr. Murphy directed its successful campaigns to win congressional passage of trade agreements with Peru (2007), Central America and the Dominican Republic (2005), and Chile (2003). He plays a key role in the Chamber’s work relating to such business priorities as protection of intellectual property, global regulatory cooperation, trade facilitation, and the World Trade Organization’s Doha Development Agenda negotiations. From 2001 to 2008, Mr. Murphy served as the Chamber’s vice president for Western Hemisphere affairs and as executive vice president of the Association of American Chambers of Commerce in Latin America. Previously, Mr. Murphy oversaw Latin America-related programs at the International Republican Institute, a nonprofit organization dedicated to the promotion of democracy around the globe. From 1994 to 1996, he served as assistant director of communications at the Center for International Private Enterprise, and in 1992 and 1993, he was the first Western lecturer in economics at the National University of Economics in Czechoslovakia.
Bruce Stokes is the international economics columnist for the National Journal. He has received numerous awards for his writing, including the John Hancock Award for excellence in business and economics reporting. Mr. Stokes is the coauthor, with Andrew Kohut, of America against the World (Times Books, 2007). A former senior fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations, Mr. Stokes is currently a transatlantic fellow at the German Marshall Fund and a consultant to the Pew Research Center. In 2004, he was chosen by International Economy magazine as one of the most influential China watchers in the American press.
