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Over the past decade, most OECD countries have begun to reform fundamentally their agricultural policies. Some dispute has emerged over the extent to which policy-making at the international level has triggered and shaped these reforms. These disputes raise important theoretical questions about how we theorize and test for the degree of interdependence between international, European Union (EU), and domestic policy change. The concept of autonomous, linked games is offered as a possible theoretical route to follow, a route that also permits more systematic consideration of two possible roles of international organizations in policy-making: international mediators and entrepreneurial leaders. Drawing on these concepts, reform of the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) is shown to be significantly shaped by proposals and outcomes in the international negotiations on agriculture during the GATT Uruguay Round, with the European Commission (EC) playing an entrepreneurial leader role.

The study of international trade in agricultural products has developed rapidly over the past fifty years. In the 1960s the disarray in world agriculture caused by domestic price support policies became the focus of analytical studies. There followed attempts to measure the distortions caused by policies also in developing countries and to model their impact on world agricultural markets. Tools were advanced to explain the trends and variations in world prices and the implications of market imperfections. Challenges for the future include analyzing trade based on consumer preferences for certain production methods and understanding the impact of climate change mitigation and adaptation on trade.