This capacity-building project, managed jointly by the IAI and the World Bank Institute (Washington) aimed to analyze the negotiating issues at the core of the future multilateral talks of the World Trade Organisation and enhancement of the capacities of the Mediterranean area countries to participate actively in them.

This study - in cooperation with the HWWA-Institute fur Wirtschaftsforschung, Hamburg - was centred on the internationalisation processes under way in the audio-video sector and relative national policies and evaluated the implications for global governance in terms of sectoral development and relations among major countries.

This programme, launched with the support of the German Marshall Fund, aimed at analysing the state and prospects of the transatlantic relations within the WTO negotiations, by fostering qualified initiatives on the most suitable strategies to adopt for a joint-leadership role of United States and European Union, within the ongoing multilateral trade negotiations. In such a perspective, the international conference organized on March 14th, 2006 centred on United States and European negotiation strategies for finding out common and diverging points at an international trade level.

A network of institutes studying the scenarios for reform of global economic governance system - of which IAI was a member together with Chatham House, the Centre for International Governance Innovation (CIGI) and the Oxford Institute for Economic Policy - analyzed options for reform of rules and institutions underlying the dynamics of the global economy. Particular attention was paid to the reform processes of multilateral economic and  financial institutions (World Bank, International Monetary Fund, World Trade Organization).

In a study project on the Italian foreign policy in a global multipolar system, financed by the Fondazione Monte dei Paschi di Siena and guided dall'Arel, the IAI was in charge of coordinating a working group including scholars, analysts and representatives from institutions and firms. Carrying on an analysis already undertaken in the framework of a previous IAI-AREL joint initiative, the working group focused on some key issues such as the reform of the main international institutions (IMF, WB, WTO) and the perspectives of cooperation between the most relevant global economic areas.

The aim of the project was to analyse, in the light of the current recovery stage, after the deep recession of the 2008-2009, the future possible positions for Italy in Europe and in the global economic system in a mid-long term perspective, also in order to suggest adequate options for the Italian foreign economic policy. The research general hypothesis is that Italy and Europe would profit from a multilateral management of the international system based on cooperative agreements and shared rules among principal poles.

The aim of the project is to investigate the elements and the impact of the cooperation between the major international players in the use of coercive diplomacy focusing on the instrument of restrictive measures. The role of sanctions remains crucial in the response of international and regional organizations to crises and conflicts, as demonstrated recently in Iran, Libya and Syria.