We develop a political economy model to study the decision of representative democracies to join a preferential trading agreement, distinguishing between free trade areas and customs unions. Our theoretical analysis shows that bilateral trade imbalances and income inequality are important factors determining the formation of preferential trading agreements, whereas the patterns of geographic specialisation explain whether a customs union or a free trade area will emerge. Our empirical analysis—using a comprehensive panel dataset spanning 187 countries over the period 1960–2015—provides strong support for these predictions.

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优惠贸易协定的政治经济学：实证研究

我们开发了一个政治经济学模型来研究代议制民主国家加入优惠贸易协定的决定，区分自由贸易区和关税同盟。我们的理论分析表明，双边贸易失衡和收入不平等是决定优惠贸易协定形成的重要因素，而地理专业化模式则解释了是否会出现关税同盟或自由贸易区。我们的实证分析——使用 1960 年至 2015 年期间跨越 187 个国家的综合面板数据集——为这些预测提供了强有力的支持。