Openness as a "catalyst" for growth.

Summary To try to answer the following questions, does openness necessarily lead to growth? Under what conditions? I have structured my work in three parts: The first part begins with a review of studies that seek to describe the links between openness and economic growth. However, exports, or more generally openness, are not enough to cause growth. It is this observation that leads me to say that openness is not an engine of growth, as investment can be, but that it is a catalyst. The second part focuses on the determination of the appropriate study framework to identify the impacts of openness on growth: long-run gains are shown to be a dead end. The medium-term impacts are analyzed in a neo-classical framework and then in an endogenous growth framework. In both cases, the ambiguity of the links between openness and growth is strongly apparent. An empirical application to the case of Mexico shows that these medium-term phenomena, such as the dynamics of market structures, have a strong influence on the vision of the gains from openness. This ambiguity of the gains is also expressed when we look at the external framework in which this openness takes place, that is, the institutional framework of openness. The third section describes the advantages and disadvantages of such institutionalization strategies, as well as the dangers posed by the new trade negotiations: intellectual property, social and environmental clauses.