To what extent has globalization limited national policy autonomy and eroded national identity? Conventional dialogue on this question has proven unsatisfying and even extreme, emphasizing either the supposed infallibility of markets or the evil of the World Trade Organization. Patricia Goff's book injects much-needed focus and clarity by examining the evolution of efforts by the Canadian government and the European Union to regulate international trade in the culture industries: film, radio, television, publishing, and sound recording.

The book provides a powerful and needed reminder that the impact of economic liberalization cannot be measured solely in financial terms. Goff argues that, contrary to the expectations of interest-group models of trade policy, the restrictions on market entry and participation known as culture policy are driven by state interest (in Canada and the EU) in maintaining national identity, rather than in protecting declining or uncompetitive producers. Moreover, framing the debate in economic terms (free trade vs. protectionism) marginalizes a valid national goal. Goff argues that the preservation of national voices in culture represents a legitimate social purpose, one that should be recognized among many other such compromises in embedded liberalism.

In the empirical chapters on Canada and the European Union, the evidence offered to support the contention that culture policy is indeed cultural comes mainly in two parts. First, Goff traces the detailed histories of state intervention in support of the culture industries in Canada and France. Second, consistent with her position that rhetoric is important, much of the book is filled with excerpts from government documents and public statements by Canadian, French, and European officials, who repeatedly discuss the importance of protecting cultural interests in international negotiations.

This approach seems ill suited for countering the impression that the national identity considerations related to culture policy are a mere veneer over traditional interest-group-driven protectionism. The observations of long histories of intervention and public comments attributing this intervention to broad social motives are equally consistent with an interest-group model. One can easily find similar statements by U.S. policymakers about farm programs that are rather transparently a sop for agri-business.

What appears to be missing is a detailed consideration of the policy process that leads to the observed culture policy outcomes. While Goff recognizes that “culture industry policy reflects an effort to balance many interests” (p. 47), there is no discussion of how governments arrive at this balance. If culture policy does differ from traditional protectionism, there should be clear differences in the way policy is made in other sectors where it is dominated exclusively by economic concerns. By avoiding clear specification of this policy process, the culture protection argument is essentially offered against a null model, and an opportunity is missed to assess how governments weigh these competing goals (or pressures).

Instead, interest-group arguments are dismissed out of hand. In the case of genetically modified (GM) foods, labeling restrictions that are costly to GM producers are asserted to be of no aid to organic or non-GM producers “since GMO products do not tempt European consumers” (p. 152). This argument is based on survey evidence indicating that between 70% and 80% of EU consumers oppose GM foods; however, this figure still leaves a market segment of more than a hundred million consumers that GM producers could feasibly compete for with local non-GM producers. Similarly, Goff argues that because Canadian broadcast content restrictions are costly for private broadcasters, the policy must be driven by nation building. Yet, interest-group accounts of protectionism highlight precisely this sort of distributional impact of policy between different domestic groups.

The economic costs of culture policy almost certainly extend beyond consumers and those sectors directly involved in production. All of the culture policies mentioned in the book are discussed in the context of international trade negotiations. That the bargaining chip of culture industry liberalization is not being played by Canada or the EU means that potential concessions in other sectors by negotiating partners are being forgone. One would certainly like to see some accounting of how governments weigh these concessions against the desire to maintain national voices in culture production.

The book does offer an insightful examination of the unintended consequences of commitments to international institutions. Goff explains how housing culture policy exemptions within the GATT and WTO trading regimes created rights of retaliation for excluded countries and established market openness as a standard from which culture policy is seen as a deviation. In the area of health care, GATT and WTO rules make it difficult to introduce limited or incremental market-oriented reforms to government-run health systems without risking the creation of grounds for a dispute. The author concludes that current international institutional infrastructure is inappropriate for managing the legitimate desires of states to regulate national culture and identity.

In terms of positive political theory, Limits to Liberalization serves as a warning against adopting crudely materialistic interpretations of culture policy choices. In normative terms, the book forces readers to reconsider the importance of market liberalization for its own sake against broader social goals. Goff rightfully questions an international trading system that appears to have been designed to serve the former and not the latter.