The Comparative Advantage Trap And The Choice Of Strategy Of Our Foreign Trade

From 18 to 19 century, the classic economists, Adam Smith and David Ricardo, founded the Theory of Comparative Advantage, after perfected by Eil Filip Hechscher and Beltil Gotthard Ohlin, spread by Vassily WLeontief, it formed the mainstream of the international trade theory and became the academic basis of the foreign trade around the world, especially the developing countries. However, with the advance of the intellective economy and economy globalization, international trade has been changed distinctly and the Theory of Comparative Advantage shows critical defect. The developing countries guided by the Theory of Comparative Advantage have been fallen into "the trap of the comparative advantage". As for our country, how can we clap "the trap of the comparative advantage". How can we develop our foreign trade better, promote the industrial structure and develop our economy in the round? All of these become the question our people focus on. These are also the original intention of the author. After comparing the two theory and analyzing comprehensively the economy trade, the author makes a conclusion: We must keep up developing the comparative advantage vigorously and realize the stratified transformation from the comparative advantage to competitive advantage step by step.Part I: The part is mainly about the main aim, method and structure of my dissertation.Part II: Adam Smith theorized in 1776 that national real income could be maximized if a country specialized in its export sector and imported only these goods that others could make for less. We called it "the theory of absolute advantage ",which was challenged in 1817 by David Ricardo and his theory of comparative advantage, in which revealed the base and the source of mutuallybeneficial trade. The most important refinement of the Ricardian model was developedby Eli. Hechscher and Bertil.Ohlin, who created "Factor Endowments" theory. Comparative Theory and Factor Theory had been the foundation of international trade theory into 1980s. The first significant challenge to the traditional theory was "Leontief Paradox".And then ,after the World War 11 , many new situations appeared in world market,which the traditional theory could not give satisfied explanation, including Tech-products trade; intra-industry trade; trade between similar countries; scale economy; imperfect competitive market. So, by the end of 1980s, relatively few scholars accepted the theory of factor proportions andcomparative advantage as an adequate explanation of the observed patterns of trade. To provide a new explanation ,two very different types of research were undertaken. One developed on the bases of traditional theory, including Theory of Preference Similarity, The Technologic Gap Theory, Product Cycle Theory, and New Trade Theory. Despite a growing number of empirical studies, their native limitation plague the field.Part III: The part is mainly about Porter'stheory. This dissertation holds the idea that the theory of nations competitive advantages considered to be a new framework of international trade theory. In contrast to the trade theorist research, Michael Porter chose an inductive approach and build a complex framework for analyzing the competitiveness of nations. Porter focused on the issue of why some nations' firms succeed in international competition. We called his theory as"the theory of nation 's competitive advantage". Porter's theory was designed to answer three questions: first, why does a nation succeed internationally in a particular industry? Second, what is the influence of the nation on competitive in specific industries and industrial segment ?Part IV: The author analyses the formation of "the comparative advantage's trap" and the inadaptability comparative advantage's strategy in our future economy. On one had, the products with comparative advantage may lack the competitive advantage and can not be the real export products. On the other hand, the complete competition and the theoretical premise of the complete competition and non-scale economy will...