Americans have witnessed inconsistent and seemingly dramatic turnabouts inlegislators attitudes toward trade with strong bipartisan support for freetrade and th... » 

Americans have witnessed inconsistent and seemingly dramatic turnabouts inlegislators attitudes toward trade with strong bipartisan support for freetrade and the Uruguay Round in one instant and heated debate over participationin the World Tarde Organization the next. Martha L. Gibson systematicallytraces the competing forces that interject conflict into an overall consensuson the value of a liberalized trade policy.Cutting through the tangled web of congressional politics Gibson shows why itis impossible to understand trade legislation without first understanding howelectoral politics and the institutional rules of Congress distort legislatorsinterests incentives and policy goals. Gibsons book clearly show that tradelegislation is not made in a vacuum but is just one in a series of simultaneousgames with competing goals in which legislators engage to satisfy theconflicting demands of constituents. «