16 - Regulating trade, investment and money

Summary

A fragmenting arena

Analysis of regulation in trade, investment and money must take account of the specific characteristics of each field. The following discussion will be macroeconomic, leaving aside the legal dimension pertaining to economic actors’ individual behaviours and transactions. The field of the investigation is complex, whether approached from a normative angle (how are trade, investment and finance regulated?) or an organic angle (who regulates trade, investment and finance?). The complexity increases when both endogenous and exogenous perspectives are taken into account. From the endogenous perspective, the traditional fragmentation allowing for the cohabitation of the distinct fields of trade, investment and monetary regulation is called into question by their increasing interdependence. From the exogenous perspective, complexity arises from the progressive penetration of international economic regulation into other fields of regulation, such as the environment, health and human rights. Tensions are often created by the way an economic approach is imposed on fields alien to economics. The various interconnections and more or less confrontational frictions thus reveal a distinct need for linkage.

Though this need – and the search for consistency – has been intellectually identified for a long time, its expression in the practice of law and politics is relatively recent and, overall, little has been achieved in terms of concrete results. Two remarks can, however, be made at this point.