Trade and Aid

‘Trade not aid’, the slogan associated in particular with UNCTAD, is an attractive nostrum. Open up the economies of advanced countries to the free trade with all-comers which their governments preach, runs the underlying rationale, and Third World countries will be able to expand their exports to a point which makes the aid given by those same governments unnecessary. Development can then proceed on a basis of mutual self-respect, rather than on a basis which inflicts economic and technological dependence on Third World countries.