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This paper examines the current state of the trade policy regime in Vietnam against the backdrop of market-oriented policy reforms undertaken over the past one-and-a-half decades. The core of the paper is an in-depth analysis of the structure of protection, focusing on both incentives for import-competing production and the bias in the incentive structure against export production compared to import-competing production. It is found that, despite notable reform efforts, the structure of protection in Vietnam is still out of line with that of the major trading nations in the region, in terms of the level and the inter-industry dispersion of nominal and effective protection rates. There is a clear anti-export bias in the incentive structure, even though the degree of the bias has considerably declined over the years. There is no evidence to justify the existing protection structure on grounds of infant industry protection or employment generation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The global garment and textile industries face changing international trade regimes, concerns with labour standards, new competitors and forms of competition. These challenges have a differentiated impact on developing-country producers and workers. One potential 'winner' is Vietnam. This paper uses a global value-chain framework to analyse the Vietnamese experience. It maps Vietnam's changing position in the global industry, and probes ties between Vietnamese firms and global buyers. It explores links within the Vietnamese garment and textiles sectors, and considers the impact of global challenges on Vietnamese firms and workers. This helps distinguish who are the potential 'winners' and 'losers'. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paradox of economic sanctions is that though they are used with increasing frequency in the post-cold war world, policy makers and scholars still largely conclude that they do not work to produce political change in targeted countries. This paper uses Steven Brams' revision of standard game theory, the "theory of moves," to derive conditions for successful sanctions, failed sanctions, and stalemated sanctions disputes. Then, applying the theory of moves to the cases of U.S. sanctions against Vietnam and Haiti, it illustrates how Brams' theory can explain the dynamics and outcome of sanctions disputes. The paper shows that even if the recipient state has a dominant strategy of noncompliance with the sanctioning state, sanctions can succeed-even when they are costly to the sanctioning state. Further, it demonstrates that the theory of moves provides a better conceptual account of the dynamics of sanctions disputes over time than traditional game theory. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Vietnam has been successful in attracting substantial foreign direct investment (FDI) inflows. The foreign-invested sector is an important engine of economic growth for Vietnam. The first part of the article profiles Vietnam's experience in attracting FDI since the late 1980s, and identifies the factors that lay behind a subsequent contraction in FDI inflows during the latter half of the 1990s. The second part identifies areas where Vietnam might improve its attractiveness to foreign investors, and thereby better harness overseas capital for sustained economic development and poverty reduction. This necessitates moving away from incremental adjustments to the FDI regime itself, and adopting a more holistic approach to the design and implementation of a conducive host country business environment, which benefits both local and overseas investors alike. Many of the lessons learnt by Vietnam are pertinent to other developing and transitional economies seeking to harness FDI for economic development and poverty reduction. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]