63篇第37篇

(This passage was excerpted from materialwritten in 1990.)

As the economic role ofmultinational, global corporations expands,the international economic environment will be shaped increasingly not bygovernments or international institutions, but by the interaction betweengovernments and global corporations, especially in the United States, Europe,and Japan. A significant factor in this shifting worldeconomy is the trend toward regional trading blocs of nations, which hasa potentially large effect on the evolution of the world trading system. Twoexamples of this trend are the United States-Canada Free Trade Agreement (FTA)and Europe 1992, the move by the European Community (EC) to dismantleimpediments to the free flow of goods, services, capital, and labor amongmember states by the end of 1992. However, although numerous politicaland economic factors were operative in launching the move to integrate the EC’smarkets, concern about protectionism within the EC does not appear to have beena major consideration. This is in sharp contrast to the FTA; the overwhelmingreason for that bilateral initiative was fear of increasing United Statesprotectionism. Nonetheless, although markedly different in origin and nature,both regional developments are highly significant in that they will fosterintegration in the two largest and richest markets of the world, as well asprovoke questions about the future direction of the world trading system.

6.    Theauthor discusses the FTA and Europe 1992 most likely in order to

(A)point out the similarities between two seemingly disparate trading alliances

(B) illustrate how different economicmotivations produce different types of trading blocs

(C) provide contrasting examples of a trend that is influencing theworld economy

(D) identify the most importantcharacteristics of successful economic integration