The United Nations Conference on Trade and Development was established by the UN General Assembly in 1964 and headquartered in Geneva, to give developing countries a stronger organized voice in the postwar trading system than the GATT's tariff-negotiation framework offered them. Its first Secretary-General, Raul Prebisch, built the institution around a structuralist critique of the classical case for comparative-advantage-based free trade, arguing that specialization in commodity exports left developing economies permanently disadvantaged against manufacturing exporters, a critique the institution still carries into its present work on trade and development policy.
Facts
Founding Year Headquarters Cross-Tradition Connections
Critiqued Here
Comparative Advantage, Concepts Why this is disputed. UNCTAD was built around founding Secretary-General Raul Prebisch's structuralist critique of the classical case for comparative-advantage-based free trade, arguing it left commodity-exporting economies permanently disadvantaged against manufacturing exporters.
Associated With
Prebisch was UNCTAD's first Secretary-General from 1964 and shaped its trade-and-development agenda along structuralist lines.
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