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Because the gains from international cooperation typically rise with the number of countries involved, the ideal international agreement is often multilateral. In practice, however, the modal agreement is not multilateral but regional or bilateral. The prevalence of "minilateralism" begs the question: Do minilateral agreements help or hinder multilateral cooperation? I investigate this question by examining the impact of regional free trade agreements (FTAs) on multilateral trade liberalization in 30 countries from 1988 to 1998. I find that FTAs have important but contradictory conditional effects: they promote multilateral liberalization when members' intra- and extra-FTA comparative advantages are similar but impede such liberalization when these comparative advantages are different. FTAs can thus, depending on the circumstances, either help or hinder broader trade liberalization. My findings have important implications, not only for the relationship between FTAs and multilateralism, but also for the political consequences of customs unions and nontrade minilateral agreements
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