ll aspects of trade relations with the rest of the world. (Devuyst 1995) In practice though this was done through the establishment of a common commercial policy based upon three principles. A common external tarrif, common trade agreements with third countries and the uniform application of trade instruments across member states, made up these three principles. Due to two central rationales the founding member states began to delegate trade on a collective level. Firstly, the history of trade policy in advanced industrial democracies, like the United States, showed that such delegation helped insulate the policy-making process from domestic pressures, which in turn promoted a more liberal international trade order. The second rationale was, a single voice in trade policy was expected to facilitate the conclusion of trade agreements with third count
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