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This paper investigates the internationalization of consulting providers that supply to multilateral institutions such as the World Bank, United Nations and Asian Development Bank. Previous research has identified that such clients do play a notable role in the internationalization of some consulting firms, but little empirical research has been undertaken. In this paper, a “network” approach to internationalization is taken, with the findings from an interview study suggesting that while consulting providers “follow” multilateral institutions to new markets, this is only one of several “relationship strategies” that firms use in combination to enter and develop foreign markets.

This study investigates the effect of multilateral trade liberalization on services export diversification with a view to complementing the recently published work on the effect of multilateral trade liberalization on export product diversification.

The empirical exercise been performed using a panel dataset of 133 countries over the period 1995–2014.

The findings show that multilateral trade liberalization is associated with greater services export diversification in both developed and developing countries alike. This is particularly the case in countries with a high reliance on manufactured goods exports or those that enjoy greater export product diversification. Interestingly, multilateral trade liberalization enhances services export diversification in countries that experience higher foreign direct investment inflows.

These findings highlight the importance of multilateral trade liberalization for services export diversification. The study has considered explicitly supply-side factors that could affect services export diversification. This is because the indicator of multilateral trade liberalization is highly correlated with some demand-side factors, such as the world demand for services exports. Therefore, another avenue for future research could involve looking at the demand side factors that could influence services export diversification, and whether the degree of multilateral trade liberalization matters for the influence of these demand factors on services export diversification.

The current study through its positive effect on both export product diversification and services export diversification, greater cooperation among World Trade Organization (WTO) Members on trade matters could help revive economic growth, particularly in the current COVID-19 pandemic that has significantly plummeted it.

To the best of our knowledge, this is first study that has investigated this issue.

The purpose of this study is to examine empirically whether the impact of multilateral trade liberalization on export performance and export performance convergence in developing countries depends on the amount of Aid for Trade (AfT) flows that accrue to these countries. Export performance is measured by export of goods and services to gross domestic product ratio, whereas export performance convergence refers to the process whereby a developing country’s export performance catches up with the world’s average export performance.

The analysis has used an unbalanced panel data set covering a sample of 97 developing countries, over the period 2002 to 2015. The two-step system generalized methods of moments has been used to address the question empirically.

Empirical results show that multilateral trade liberalization generates higher export performance and convergence in export performance in developing countries only when it is accompanied by higher AfT flows to developing countries, with a view of helping these countries enhance their trade capacity and reap the opportunities offered by multilateral trade liberalization in the international trade market.

These findings indicate that greater access to the international trade market is not sufficient to promote developing countries’ export performance and convergence in export performance. Such a promotion could materialize if multilateral trade liberalization is accompanied by higher AfT flows (to enhance these countries’ capacity to trade). The findings therefore indicate that the current context of escalation of trade tensions would likely result in lower degree of multilateral trade liberalization, and eventually lower AfT flows to recipient-countries, and ultimately hamper developing countries’ export performance and convergence in export performance.

The findings therefore indicate that the current context of escalation of trade tensions would likely result in lower degree of multilateral trade liberalization, and eventually lower AfT flows to recipient-countries, and ultimately hamper developing countries’ export performance and convergence in export performance. An avenue for future research could be to perform the same analysis when data would be available over a longer time period. Future studies on the matter could also investigate whether the findings obtained apply to components of export performance, including for example manufactured exports and non-manufactured exports.

Many papers related to the AfT effectiveness have looked at the effect of AfT inflows on recipient-countries’ export performance. However, little attention has been paid to the effect of multilateral trade liberalization on developing countries’ export performance and export performance convergence and particularly to whether this effect would depend on the amounts of AfT that would accrue to developing countries to help them develop their trade capacity. To the best of our knowledge, no previous paper has addressed this issue.

This paper aims to discuss the recent emergence of multilateral forums for African development. By focusing on the Tokyo International Conference on African Development (TICAD) led by the Japanese Government, the paper considers key issues and challenges that this new type of multilateral forum may face.

The paper reviews the existing literature in an interdisciplinary manner. To illustrate the multiplicity of issues and highlight diverse viewpoints, the study also provides an overview of a panel discussion at the fifth TICAD meeting as an exemplar by using a coding method.

The study suggests that a multilateral forum based on policy dialogue between a single donor and multiple recipients is likely to not only pose extremely complex tasks for the donor nation but also potentially constrain aid effectiveness in African countries unless the recipients’ ownership of their development is properly identified through sensible leadership.

Although “one donor–multiple African countries” forums are on the rise across the world, this paper calls for careful examination of the effectiveness of new type of multilateral forums for Africa. Through the evaluation of the contribution of TICAD, which is the pioneer for this kind of forum, this paper sets out essential elements to be considered by researchers and policymakers for the development of Africa.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the impact of multilateral trade policy (MTP) liberalization on developing countries’ economic exposure to shocks.

The analysis is conducted on a panel data set comprising 120 countries over the period 1996–2013 and uses the within fixed effects estimator.

The empirical results suggest that over the entire sample as well as sub-samples of least developed countries (LDCs) and non-LDCs, multilateral trade liberalization have a negative and significant impact on economic exposure to shocks. Interestingly, LDCs appear to experience the highest magnitude of the reducing impact of multilateral trade liberalization on countries’ economic exposure to shocks.

These findings suggest that a greater cooperation among countries in the world, including among WTO members to further liberalize trade would surely contribute to reducing developing countries’ economic exposure to shocks.

The current study shows that the current backlash against trade and the consequent strong appeal for domestic trade protectionist measures would likely to undermine the likelihood of further multilateral trade liberalization. One implication of this could be a rise in countries’ economic exposure to shocks.

To the best of the author’s knowledge, this is first the study on this matter.

The purpose of this study is to determine the impact of disaggregate official development aid (ODA) on economic growth, and ascertain whether bilateral and multilateral aid played complementary role with private sector, government sector and external sector in driving growth of sub-Saharan African economies.

The role of bilateral and multilateral aid in economic growth of sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) is investigated in this study. The vector error correction model (VECM) and generalized method of moments (GMM) techniques are employed in estimating the short-run and long-run impacts, over the period 1980–2020.

The estimation results reveal that the effect of bilateral aid is positive, and more significant than multilateral aid. Their effect on economic growth is, however, less significant than the effects of domestic private investment and government spending. Nonetheless, aid complemented private and government sectors in facilitating growth. External trade is the only exogenous variable in estimation that is insignificant. The results further reveal that economic growth is unable to significantly respond to its own lag. Generally, the estimation results conform to theoretical expectations.

One major implication of the findings is that SSA countries have benefited substantially from development aid. It is, therefore, important for these countries to develop stronger institutions that would attract more inflows of development aid.

The study was motivated by the fact that less attention has been given to the role of disaggregate ODA in economic growth of African countries. Previous research works have tended to focus more on aggregate ODA. Furthermore, adequate research has yet to be done on how ODA complements the private sector, government sector and external sector in facilitating growth of African countries. These issues are investigated in the study.

The purpose of this paper is to provide a theoretical framework for the legal classification of trading venues in financial markets. Currently, there is no clear definition of when a trading platform should be classified as multilateral or bilateral. This paper builds a theoretical framework that will allow regulators to define the border (with its regulatory implications) between multilateral and bilateral trading venues.

The approach used for this paper focuses on looking at the different trading models available in financial markets and analyzing their key features in order to bring up recurrent aspects that have helped to build the theoretical framework.

Multilateral trading facilities would not only be systems bringing together multiple interests from third parties, but those systems bringing together multiple interests with “no discretion” (ex ante rules) vis‐à‐vis membership, admission of products to trading, and matching of interests. All trading venues that do not meet these three key requirements will be falling under the bilateral trading classification, which implies the application of fiduciary duties, such as conflicts of interest rules and best execution. The paper then advances a proposal to solve the legal classification issue in the revision of the Markets in Financial Instruments Directive in Europe (MiFID). In effect, despite the claim that the Organised Trading Facility (EU) and the Swap Execution Facility (USA) would be equivalent categories, EU and US regulators, respectively, have taken divergent paths on how these venues will ultimately look.

The value of the paper is in its ability to provide a theoretical framework to something that has not been assessed in these terms previously. Today, only the SEC is trying, for the first time, to have a definition of when a RFQ model can be defined “multilateral”. This topic has been rarely discussed before in financial regulation, while it is extensively discussed in market microstructure (but on the market structure implications, rather than its regulatory and policy implications).

This study aims to investigate the environmental effects of climate financial fragmentation in the form of emerging multilateral institutions.

Among the countries that have economic relations with China, those involved in climate finance cooperation are taken as the experimental group, and those not involved in other areas are taken as a control group. Using system generalized method of moments regression, the difference-in-differences method is used to test the environmental effects of climate finance cooperation of emerging multilateral institutions. In this way, this study explores the financial and trade mechanisms of cooperation among emerging multilateral institutions.

The results of this empirical study show that the cooperation of emerging multilateral institutions has a positive impact on the environment. Research results further reveal the financial and trade mechanisms of climate finance cooperation projects. When the invested countries are more likely to obtain international capital, environmental effects will be greater. However, trade intimacy could inhibit the improved environmental effects.

This research is one of the few studies to test the environmental effects of climate financial fragmentation empirically. This study provides a better understanding of the multilateral cooperation of emerging economic entities and China’s climate finance policy, thus providing evidence for the collaborative governance of global climate finance.

The purpose of this study is to explore the relationship between interorganizational information system (IOIS) adoption in supplier coordination and operations performance improvements.

The paper focuses on the association between dyadic and multilateral IOISs and improvements in performance priorities associated with stable and dynamic supply networks, using data on 201 manufacturers in 13 countries from the international manufacturing strategy survey (IMSS) database. Regression models were used to test relationships between IOIS adoption and operations performance improvements.

Analysis indicates that dyadic IOISs appear to be more associated with the performance priorities of stable supply chains (cost, delivery, and quality), while multilateral IOISs appear to be more associated with the performance priorities of dynamic supply chains (flexibility and quality).

Survey data were collected in the years 2000 and 2001. Some of the conclusions might be reassessed in light of recent developments in information technology. Data were limited to medium/large manufacturers of fabricated metal products, machinery, and equipment.

Findings suggest that the choice of IOISs must follow the company's product portfolio and supply chain configuration. Dynamic networks with innovative products may benefit from multilateral IOISs; stable networks with functional products may benefit from dyadic IOISs.

This appears to be the first study to provide empirical evidence to performance effects of IOISs in light of existing supply chain frameworks.

In this work, the author explores the specific structural conditions that render multilateral arms control agreements problematic by situating their dynamic in a three-person Prisoner’s Dilemma game. The addition of even a third state to an arms race compounds many times over the structural difficulties that face two racing states. Nevertheless, even in multilateral arms races, conditions exist that make it rational for all participating states to pause. The most salient of these conditions is the existence of a coalition that is collectively rational for a subset of the racing states. It was suggested that if such a coalition exists naturally, or if one forms as a result of a exogenous shock to the system, then it is possible for it to offer incentives to all states not in the coalition to join it and, at the same time, increase the payoffs to the original members of the coalition. Thus, if such a coalition exists, then the possibility also exists that all the participating states could be induced to stop arming. Nonetheless, the major lesson that should be drawn from this chapter is the realisation that the conditions under which multilateral arms races might rationally be terminated are generally quite restrictive.