Research Seminar in International Economics

The Research Seminar in International Economics is a University of Michigan center that is operated jointly by the Gerald R. Ford School of Public Policy and the Department of Economics. It was founded by Professor Robert M. Stern in the Department of Economics in 1963. It has been distributing discussion papers since 1968, and it became affiliated with the Institute of Public Policy Studies, predecesoor of the Ford School, in 1980. The activities of the Research Seminar include a weekly seminar or workshop, an ongoing program of faculty and graduate student research, linkages with developing country institutions, conferences involving academics and policy makers, training of graduate students specializing in international economics and international economic law, and the distribution of a series of RSIE Discussion Papers.

Co-directors of the Research Seminar are Alan V. Deardorff and Linda Tesar, Professors of Economics. Other core faculty include: Dominick Bartelme, Javier Cravino, Kathryn Dominguez, Andrei Levchenko, and Sebastian Sotelo. Several additional faculty members from Economics, Business Administration, and Public Policy also participate actively in the Research Seminar. The Research Seminar is administered by the Ford School of Public Policy and is located within the International Policy Center on the third floor of Weill Hall.

Faculty research currently in progress under the auspices of the Research Seminar includes such topics as: the future of the multilateral trading system; preferential trading arrangements; econometric analysis of trade and trade policies; international taxation, international finance, and international corporate behavior; economic reform and transition; and international political economy.

Research results are reported initially in the form of Discussion Papers. For almost thirty years, these were circulated periodically in hard copy to about 200 specialists in international economics and to government and international agencies and institutions. More recent discussion papers are available for viewing and downloading here on the World Wide Web.

In 1989, a series of Studies in International Economic Policy was established under the auspices of the University of Michigan Press, with Professor Stern as the General Editor of the series. That series was discontinued in 2003, then restarted in 2006 by World Scientific Publishers as World Scientific Studies in International Economics, again with Professor Stern as General Editor. Upon his death in 2015, Keith Maskus of University of Colorado took over as Series Editor.