ABSTRACT
The recent Great Recession has triggered substantial government intervention-notall of it macroeconomic.This article presents evidence that the sectoral incidenceand forms of government intervention appear to have changed from pre-crisisregularities.Once the commercial significance of a sector is taken into account,pre-crisis measures of trade policy intervention poorly predict the crisis-era sectoralincidence of discriminatory state measures imposed by Asian governments.Qualitative evidence focusing on three key countries in Asia-China,Japan,andSouth Korea-is also marshaled to sustain the contention that Asian governmentshave used the recent economic crisis to reinvigorate industrial policies,targetingapparent growth poles and apparently environmentally friendly technologies andsectors.Implications for the expansion of WTO rules and their effectiveness arediscussed.
Key Words:financial crisis,WTO,trade rules,industrial policy,protectionism.