Esoteric simplified

One of the most difficult tasks faced by academic economists specialising in international trade is chosing a core text for students from the increasingly large number of theoretical texts on trade. Mia Mikic's recently published text must be a strong contender for first place. This is a rigorous, comprehensive and extremely thorough text, which provides students with all they need to know about the very latest developments in trade theory. The graphical analysis and algebra are well within the competence of a third-year economics undergraduate and the text is written in a clear and concise style.

I found the book to be most useful in setting out in intelligible form some of the more complex, esoteric developments in the subject that have occurred in the past 20 years. For example, the book contains the clearest exposition of the most recent models of trade under imperfect competition that I have yet come across. There is a brief, but succinct chapter on the political economy of trade policy, in which the author provides a useful synopsis of contemporary developments in the theory of commercial policy. There is also a helpful glossary of terms.

I would have liked a more extensive discussion of the growing literature analysing the effects of regionalism than is to be found in the final chapter of the book. However, this does not detract from the fact that this is an extremely good text on trade and one that will, surely, be used extensively on third-year undergraduate and postgraduate courses throughout the UK and beyond.

Nigel Grimwade is principal lecturer in economics, South Bank University.