Dispute Resolution: A Case Study of World Trade Organization

2003 ◽  
Vol 7 (2) ◽  
pp. 77-110
Author(s):  
Velma I. Grover
Author(s):  
Sivan Shlomo Agon

Recent years have confronted the World Trade Organization (WTO) Dispute Settlement System (DSS) with an intense wave of complex linkage disputes. US-Clove Cigarettes, which stands at the centre of this chapter, serves as the second case study in the investigation into the DSS’s goal-attainment endeavours in this category of WTO disputes. The chapter begins with a review of several jurisprudential milestones leading from the early US-Shrimp, examined in Chapter 5, to the more recent US-Clove Cigarettes, examined here, with a view to portraying the legitimation continuum of which the latter dispute forms a part. The chapter then discusses the intricate legitimacy setting in which US-Clove Cigarettes unfolded and, through a close goal-oriented analysis, shows how the intensified legitimacy concerns aroused shaped the goals pursued by the DSS and the judicial choices made towards their achievement. The chapter concludes by linking the goal-attainment efforts identified to the broader DSS goal-based effectiveness framework advanced in the book.


Author(s):  
Jennifer Sterling-Folker

This chapter examines the neoliberalist argument that international institutions promote international cooperation. While neoliberalism acknowledges that cooperation can be difficult to achieve in anarchic conditions, it insists that institutions allow states to overcome a variety of collective action impediments. The central concern of neoliberal analysis is how institutions do so, and how they might be redesigned to more efficiently obtain cooperative outcomes. This chapter considers three questions that are relevant for understanding neoliberal contributions: How did neoliberalism emerge? What are the barriers to international cooperation? How does neoliberalism study international institutions. The chapter uses the World Trade Organization as a case study to illustrate the importance of institutional design for international free trade cooperation. Along the way, various concepts such as interdependence, hegemonic stability, hegemon, bargaining, defection, compliance, autonomy, and principal–agent theory are discussed, along with the game known as Prisoner's Dilemma.


2002 ◽  
Vol 1 (2) ◽  
pp. 123-134 ◽  
Author(s):  
KYM ANDERSON

The dispute resolution procedures of the World Trade Organization allow sanctions to be imposed when a country is unwilling to bring a WTO-inconsistent trade measure into conformity. Apart from the fact that the procedure for triggering the retaliation process has ambiguities that need to be removed, the retaliation itself has some undesirable economic features. This paper looks at why compensation is not preferred to retaliation and then examines five economic features of the temporary trade retaliation that WTO may permit under certain conditions. Both efficiency and equity concerns are raised. The paper concludes with some suggestions for reforming this part of WTO dispute resolution during the review of the Dispute Settlement Understanding that is due to be completed by May 2003.


2001 ◽  
Vol 34 (6) ◽  
pp. 622-650 ◽  
Author(s):  
R. DANIEL KELEMEN

This article analyzes the politics of supranational dispute resolution, focusing on trade-environment disputes in the context of the European Union (EU) and General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade/World Trade Organization (GATT/WTO). The author analyzes how the interaction of political and legal pressures has influenced decision making by the European Court of Justice (ECJ) and by GATT/WTO panels in trade-environment disputes.


Author(s):  
Jennifer Sterling-Folker

This chapter examines the neoliberalist argument that international institutions promote international cooperation. While neoliberalism acknowledges that cooperation can be difficult to achieve in anarchic conditions, it insists that institutions allow states to overcome a variety of collective action impediments. The central concern of neoliberal analysis is how institutions do so, and how they might be redesigned to more efficiently obtain cooperative outcomes. This chapter considers three questions that are relevant for understanding neoliberal contributions: How did neoliberalism emerge? What are the barriers to international cooperation? How does neoliberalism study international institutions? The chapter uses the World Trade Organization as a case study to illustrate the importance of institutional design for international free trade cooperation. Along the way, various concepts such as interdependence, hegemonic stability, hegemon, bargaining, defection, compliance, autonomy, and principal–agent theory are discussed, along with the game known as Prisoner’s Dilemma.


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