Board of Directors

The Institute has a 28-member board of directors that represents a broad range of experience and expertise across the political, business and academic spectrum.

The original board members became concerned in the late 1990s about the loss of direction in international economic policies, seeing a strong need for governments to clarify issues and build domestic consensus before trying to embark on the further liberalization of trade and investment.

Set out below are the members of the Institute�s board:

Chairman: Hon. HARALD MALMGREN: President, Malmgren Group, international financial consultants, Frederickburg, VA; former Deputy U.S. Trade Representatives

Deputy Chairman: Mr DOUGLAS R. OBERHELMAN: Group President, Caterpillar Inc., Peoria, IL, and a director, Ameren Corporation, South Side Bank and the National Association of Manufacturers

Vice Chairman: Mr RICHARD O. CUNNINGHAM: Senior International Trade Partner, Steptoe & Johnson LLP, attorneys-at-law, Washington, DC; former Chairman, Standing Committee on Customs Law, American Bar Association

Chief Executive: Mr HUGH CORBET: President, Cordell Hull Institute; previously Director of the Trade Policy Program, Sigur Center for Asian Studies, George Washington University; former Director, Trade Policy Research Centre, London

Other Members

�         Hon. NORMAN R. AUGUSTINE: Chairman, Executive Committee, Lockheed Martin Corp-oration, Bethesda, MD, having earlier been the Chairman and Chief Executive

�         Dr JAGDISH BHAGWATI: University Professor of Economics, Columbia University, and Andr� Meyer Senior Fellow, Council on Foreign Relations, New York, NY; former Economic Adviser, Director-General of the GATT, Geneva

�         Dr HERMINIO BLANCO: Chairman, Consultoria Soluciones Estrategicas, international economic consultants, Mexico City; former Mexican Secretary of Commerce and Industry

�         Mr ROBERT C. CASSIDY, Jr: Partner, Wilmer Cutler Pickering Hale & Dorr, attorneys-at-law, Washington, DC; former General Counsel, Office of the U.S. Trade Representative

�         Mr BARRY DESKER: Director, Institute of Defence and Strategic Studies, Nanyang Technological University, Singapore; former Chief Executive, Trade Development Board, and former Ambassador to Indonesia

�         Hon. LAWRENCE EAGLEBURGER: Senior Foreign Policy Adviser, Baker Donelson Bearman & Caldwell LLP, attorneys-at-law, Washington, DC; former U.S. Secretary of State, earlier U.S. Ambassador to Yugoslavia

�         Hon. THOMAS L. FARMER: Senior Counsel, International Markets, American Bankers Association, Washington, DC; former General Counsel, U.S. Agency for International Development

�         Ms AUDRAE ERICKSON: President, Corn Refiners Association, Washington, DC; previously Senior Director for Congressional Relations, American Farm Bureau Federation

�         Hon. THOMAS S. FOLEY: partner, Akin Gump Strauss Hauer & Feld, attorneys-at-law, Washington, DC; former Speaker, U.S. House of Representatives; later U.S. Ambassador to Japan

�         Mr JAMES FRIERSON: member, World Trade Council of Tennessee, Chattanooga, TN; former Chief of Staff, Office of the U.S. Trade Representative

�         Mr GARY N. HORLICK: Partner, Wilmer Cutler Pickering Hale & Dorr, attorneys-at-law, and Adjunct Professor of Law, Georgetown University, Washington, DC; and member, WTO  Group of Experts on Subsidies, Geneva

�         Dr KIHWAN KIM: Senior Adviser, Goldman Sachs (Asia), Seoul; former Ambassador-at-Large for Economic Affairs, Government of Korea; earlier President, Korea Development Institute

�         Mr HIDEHIRO KONNO: Chairman, Nippon Insurance and Investment Co. Ltd, previously Vice Minister for International Affairs, Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry, Government of Japan  

�         Mr WILLIAM C. LANE: Washington Director, Governmental Affairs, Caterpillar, Inc., Peoria, IL

�         Ms SUSAN G. LEE: Partner, Arnold & Porter LLP, attorneys-at-law, Washington, DC; former Chief of Staff, U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission

�         Rt. Hon. Lord PARKINSON: director of private companies, London; former Secretary of State for Trade and Industry, for Energy and then for Transport, British Government; twice Chairman of the British Conservative Party

�         Mr MASAHISA NAITOH: Executive Chairman, Japan Institute of Energy Economics, Tokyo, previously Vice Chairman, Itochu Corporation; earlier a senior official, Ministry of International Trade and Industry, Government of Japan 

�         Lt. Gen. BRENT SCOWCROFT, USAF (ret): President, Scowcroft Group, international consultants, Washington, DC; former Assistant to the President of the United States for National Security

�         Dr LORENZ SCHOMERUS: Vice Chairman, Supervisory Board, Allbecon AG, Dusseldorf;. former State Secretary, German Ministry of Economics and Technolgy

�         Dr ANDREW STOECKEL: Executive Director, Centre for International Economics, Canberra; previously Director, Australian Bureau of Agricultural Economics

�         Dr JOSEPH E. STIGLITZ: Professor of Economics, Columbia University, New York; previously Senior Vice President and Chief Economist, World Bank, Washington, DC; awarded the Nobel Prize in Economics, 2001

�         Hon. ROBERT S. STRAUSS: Senior Partner, Akin Gump Strauss Hauer & Feld LLP, attorneys-at-law, Washington, DC; former U.S. Trade Representative and Ambassador to Russia

�         Mr JOHN M. WEEKES: Senior Policy Adviser,  Sidley Austin Brown & Wood LLP, attorneys-at-law, Geneva; former Canadian Ambassador to the World Trade Organization and onetime Chairman of the WTO General Council

Chairman Emeritus: Hon. CLAYTON YEUTTER: Chairman, OppenheimerFunds Inc., New York, and Of Counsel, Hogan & Hartson LLP, attorneys-at-law, Washington, DC; former U.S. Trade Representative and U.S. Secretary of Agriculture

Role of the Institute

Who was Cordell Hull?

Who's Behind the Institute? Board of Directors Building on a Track Record

The WTO System

Neglect of a Recognized Problem

It has been three decades since the government of the United States conducted a systematic review of the multilateral trading system. In 1969-71, the Joint Economic Committee of the U.S. Congress held a series of public hearings, conducted by the Subcommittee on Foreign Economic Policy. At the same time, the Presidential Commission on International Trade and Investment Policy, chaired by Albert Williams of IBM, conducted an exhaustive enquiry that resulted in a major report on U.S. International Economic Policy in an Interdependent World (1971). The two enquiries stimulated a public debate in which think-tanks and other groups also made significant contributions.

The core difficulty facing governments in the early 1970s was that international decision making was not keeping up with international economic integration, the Williams Report said. But little was done to promote a greater public understanding of the issues posed by a rapidly integrating world economy. Hence the confused nature of the debate in recent years over “globalization” - today’s catchword for international economic integration.

Comments on "the Seattle Fiasco"

MacNeilly's comment in the Chicago Tribune, 3 December 1999, on the anti-globalization protesters at the WTO ministerial conference in Seattle.

The Seattle meeting failed to launch a new round of multilateral trade negotiations because in the preparatory discussions in Geneva the WTO members’ delegations could not get close to agreement on a negotiating agenda (eventually reached at the WTO Ministerial Conference in November 2002).

"Few can realize how much damage was done in Seattle to the public perception of the WTO in this country and to the view of the United States that is being formed in other countries"

— WILLIAM E. BROCK, former
U.S. Senator (R-Tennessee) and later U.S. Trade Representative.

"We need to look at the WTO agenda and clarify what the WTO is about. It is necessary to go back to basics because there is a growing suspicion out there about what the WTO system is trying to do"

— NANCY KASSEBAUM BAKER,
then Chairman of the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation; former U.S. Senator (R-Kansas).

"All sorts of arguments about the WTO have been circulating. It’s an infringement of sovereignty, beholden to corporate capitalism, against civil society, not environmentally friendly. It is insensitive to the world’s poor, anti-human rights, the driving force behind cultural homogenization. For years too much has been taken for granted. Now there is a huge education job to be done"

— RICHARD RIVERS, former
General Counsel, Office of the U.S. Trade Representative; earlier Chief Trade Counsel, U.S. Senate Finance Committee.

"Rapid changes are affecting the way people live. Some people are getting rich and others are getting nervous. The WTO is a convenient scapegoat for society's ills — faceless, nameless bureaucrats, meeting in secret"

— JEFFREY A. LANG, former
Deputy U.S. Trade Representative
and earlier Chief Trade Counsel, U.S. Senate Finance Committee.

"Public education must come first, before any PR effort to reach the man in the street. Right now there is no vehicle for spreading information about the benefits of trade liberalization, about how it is achieved, what it entails, its implications"

— ROBERT HORMATS, Vice
Chairman, Goldman Sachs International Inc.; former U.S. Assistant Secretary of State for Economic Affairs.

"We are dealing with multiple audiences here. Trade liberalization is no longer the business of technical experts alone. It goes far beyond economics. It has become a broader political issue. It's also a security issue. We are not going to get over the 'perception problem' unless we make the connection to the security aspect of foreign policy"

— LEE H. HAMILTON, Director
of the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars; former Chairman, Committee on International Relations, U.S. House of Representatives (D-Indiana).

"Every time there is a big trade issue before Congress, the business community appoints a cheerleader, who organizes a support effort. But afterwards the group disappears and so next time the business community is again caught unaware and unready. Some continuity is needed"

— WILLIAM FRENZEL, Guest
Scholar at the Brookings Institution; former U.S.Congressman (R-Minnesota).

Two and a half years after the Seattle fiasco, on 5 June 2002, the U.S. Secretary of Commerce, Donald Evans, announced a nationwide campaign to educate Americans on the value of trade.