scholarly journals WTO: As an Instrument of Dispute Settlement in the International Trade

2018 ◽  
Vol 7 (2.11) ◽  
pp. 58
Author(s):  
Chitra Bajpai ◽  
Priyanka Malik ◽  
Chitra Krishnan ◽  
Seema Sahai ◽  
Richa Goel ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
International Trade ◽  
World Trade Organization ◽  
World Trade ◽  
Dispute Settlement ◽  
Research Paper ◽  
Trade Disputes ◽  
Common Features ◽  
Trade Dispute ◽  
The Third ◽  
The World

The World Trade Organization is a platform which is primarily responsible for the rules and regulation related to the world trade for the member nations. This research paper is an effort to measure the effectiveness of the WTO as a Dispute Settlement Body (DSB). In relation to that the first objective of the research paper is to understand the nature of the International Trade Dispute among the member nations. The second objective of the research paper is to analyze certain International Trade Disputes which were reported to the WTO. The third objective of the research paper is to find out some common features among the analyzed cases.   

Diplomacy and the Settlement of International Trade Disputes

2020 ◽  
Vol 64 (7-8) ◽  
pp. 1358-1389 ◽  
Author(s):  
Julia Gray ◽  
Philip Potter
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
International Trade ◽  
World Trade Organization ◽  
Dispute Resolution ◽  
World Trade ◽  
Dispute Settlement ◽  
The United States ◽  
Trade Disputes ◽  
The World ◽  
The Impact

How do countries settle disputes in the shadow of the law? Even in the presence of legalized dispute settlement, countries still rely on diplomatic channels to resolve conflicts. But it can be difficult to assess diplomacy’s impact on dispute resolution because those channels tend to be opaque. We present both an original theory of the impact of diplomacy on dispute resolution and a novel measure of diplomacy. If countries with close or, conversely, distant relationships use legal channels for dispute resolution, diplomacy will have little impact on dispute settlement; resorting to legal recourse among friends or adversaries likely means that the dispute is intractable. However, diplomacy can increase the chances of settlement between countries with moderate levels of affinity. We test this argument using a protocol-based proxy for diplomatic interactions—gifts given at the occasion of meetings between diplomatic counterparts—that would otherwise be difficult to observe. Using the case of the United States and its disputes in the World Trade Organization, we find support for our argument. This suggests that even when countries resort to legalized methods of dispute settlement, bilateral dealmaking still plays an important role.

Ways out of the Globalization Trilemma

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Carsten Herrmann-Pillath
Keyword(s):  
International Economic ◽  
International Trade ◽  
Civil Society ◽  
Trade Policy ◽  
World Trade Organization ◽  
World Trade ◽  
Dispute Settlement ◽  
Policy Issues ◽  
The World ◽  
Operational Criterion

Based on Rodrik’s diagnosis of a “globalization trilemma” in designing the institutions of international economic exchange, this chapter suggests a solution that applies Sen’s argument favoring realization-focused comparisons over transcendental institutionalism in evaluating institutions. In the paradigm of deliberative trade policy, this contribution approaches the World Trade Organization (WTO) as a regime of deliberation, reaching beyond the scope of interactions with civil society. This prepares the ground for normative principles of WTO reform that shift the emphasis from efficiency to justice, mainly in the procedural sense. The central operational criterion is the inclusiveness of international trade and trade policy. This is applied on the issues of multilateralism versus regionalism and the design of the dispute settlement process. A WTO renewed under the auspices of deliberative trade policy can meet the challenges of new trade policy issues such as coordination of regulatory regimes under the conditions of rapid and unpredictable technological change, and can resolve the tension between democracy and globalization as laid out in the globalization trilemma.

High Stakes: US-China Trade Disputes under the World Trade Organization (WTO)

2013 ◽  
Vol 41 (3-4) ◽  
pp. 352-380 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ka Zeng
Keyword(s):  
World Trade Organization ◽  
World Trade ◽  
Dispute Settlement ◽  
Bilateral Trade ◽  
Cost Benefit Analysis ◽  
Dispute Settlement Mechanism ◽  
Trade Disputes ◽  
The Past ◽  
China Trade ◽  
The World

Abstract This paper examines US-China trade disputes under the World Trade Organization (WTO) and argues that Chinese leaders are increasingly resorting to the WTO’s dispute settlement mechanism to target issues of most critical concern to domestic constituencies. The following overview of the WTO disputes initiated by China suggests that China’s WTO disputes tend to be dominated by cases involving anti-dumping duties (ADs) and countervailing duties (CVDs). The disproportionate share of such trade remedy cases in China’s WTO cases needs to be viewed in light of the fact that China has become the leading target of such cases worldwide in the past decades. The above pattern of China’s WTO initiation is explicable within the leader cost-benefit analysis, which would lead us to expect Chinese leaders to use the WTO DSM either to open foreign markets for Chinese businesses or to shield domestic firms from perceived unfair foreign trade practices. This paper further argues that the significant expansion of bilateral trade relations in the past decades has provided opportunities for Chinese leaders to identify or threaten retaliation against anti-protectionist groups in the other country in order to mobilise them against the disputed measure.

Reviewing dispute settlement at the World Trade Organization: a time to reconsider the role/s of compensation?

2006 ◽  
Vol 5 (1) ◽  
pp. 31-67 ◽  
Author(s):  
ARWEL DAVIES
Keyword(s):  
World Trade Organization ◽  
International Law ◽  
World Trade ◽  
Dispute Settlement ◽  
Trade Disputes ◽  
Financial Compensation ◽  
Unilateral Action ◽  
Natural Time ◽  
The World ◽  
Do So

The World Trade Organization provides a forum for the settlement of trade disputes arising between its 148 Members. Should consultations fail, the parties may choose to initiate formal proceedings in Geneva, and must do so in preference to taking unilateral action. The dispute settlement rules are presently under review with a view to their clarification and improvement, making this a natural time to ask whether the appropriate strategy has been identified. This article focuses on the functions of compensation in the overall context of WTO remedies. Particular attention is given to the prospects for new disciplines and increased practice connected with the granting of both trade compensation and financial compensation. Also considered is the extent to which financial compensation can and should be linked to reparation in the sense of correcting the injury caused by WTO violations. The discussion is informed by the general international law position, by proposals made during the on-going review process and by emerging dispute settlement practice.

scholarly journals Introduction: Anatomy of the WTO Impasse

2018 ◽  
Vol 112 ◽  
pp. 315-316
Author(s):  
Kathleen Claussen
Keyword(s):  
World Trade Organization ◽  
World Trade ◽  
Dispute Settlement ◽  
Uruguay Round ◽  
Major Change ◽  
Settlement System ◽  
Trade Disputes ◽  
The World ◽  
The Creation ◽  
Dispute Settlement System

With the creation of the World Trade Organization (WTO) in 1995, major changes were made to the dispute settlement system that had previously governed international trade disputes. Prior to the WTO, the dispute settlement system that had evolved under the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT) was widely believed to suffer from certain structural weaknesses. One perceived weakness was that the establishment of a dispute settlement panel or the adoption of a panel's report required a positive consensus of all the GATT contracting parties, effectively allowing respondents to block losing outcomes against themselves. Thus, one major change that resulted from the Uruguay Round of negotiations (which led to the creation of the WTO) was the replacement of the positive consensus rule with a negative consensus rule such that to block establishment of a panel or adoption of a panel report, all WTO members have to agree not to establish or not to adopt the report.

Free Trade vis-à-vis Morality: Revisiting the Public-Morals Exception Clause in the World Trade Organization

2021 ◽  
pp. 001573252110154
Author(s):  
Swargodeep Sarkar
Keyword(s):  
International Trade ◽  
World Trade Organization ◽  
Free Trade ◽  
World Trade ◽  
Dispute Settlement ◽  
Public Morality ◽  
The Public ◽  
The World ◽  
Restrictive Measure ◽  
Restrictive Measures

The most sanctified obligation of the World Trade Organization (WTO) is the promotion and facilitation of international trade and liberalisation of the world economy. Although WTO members are committed to the WTO principle of free flow of goods and services among its members, the WTO permits its members to retain certain regulatory powers under its system to impose trade-restrictive measures based on certain exceptions, like, among other things, public morality under Article XX(a) of the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT, 1994). Nevertheless, the question remains: what is public morality for a WTO member, and how far may this clause be invoked in defence of adopting trade-restrictive measures? Recently, the WTO panel on the US tariff case revived the long-standing debate on international trade versus public morality. Is a WTO member free to choose any trade-restrictive measure under the cloak of public morality? Then, what mechanism has the WTO panel/AB (Appellate Body) envisaged to check WTO members from adopting any trade-restrictive measure based on public morals? This article tries to answer these questions by analysing previous WTO disputes related to trade and morality. Against this background, this article looks back at the history of the public-morals exception clause, revisits previous WTO case laws on the public-morals exception and tries to ascertain the precise meaning of public morality—how the WTO Dispute Settlement Body (DSB) checks and balances two conflicting principles, that is, the right to regulate and the principle of free trade—and whether WTO has successfully developed a coherent jurisprudential approach to deal with contradictory interests, that is, trade versus morality. JEL Codes: F, F1, F13

How does the World Trade Organization know? The mobilization and staging of scientific expertise in the GMO trade dispute

2012 ◽  
Vol 42 (1) ◽  
pp. 75-100 ◽  
Author(s):  
Christophe Bonneuil ◽  
Les Levidow
Keyword(s):  
World Trade Organization ◽  
World Trade ◽  
Dispute Settlement ◽  
Animal Health ◽  
Main Task ◽  
Trade Restrictions ◽  
Trade Dispute ◽  
The World ◽  
Scientific Expertise ◽  
Dispute Settlement Procedure

The World Trade Organization (WTO) dispute settlement procedure is a key arena for establishing global legal norms for what counts as relevant knowledge. As a high-profile case, the WTO trade dispute on GMOs mobilized scientific expertise in somewhat novel ways. Early on, the Panel put the dispute under the Sanitary and Phytosanitary (SPS) Agreement through a new legal ontology; it classified transgenes as potential pests and limited all environmental issues to the ‘plant and animal health’ category. The selection of scientific experts sought a multi-party consensus through a fast adversarial process, reflecting a specific legal epistemology. For the SPS framing, focusing on the defendant’s regulatory procedures, the Panel staged scientific expertise in specific ways that set up how experts were questioned, the answers they would give, their specific role in the legal arena, and the way their statements would complement the Panel’s findings. In these ways, the dispute settlement procedure co-produced legal and scientific expertise within the Panel’s SPS framework. Moreover, the Panel operated a procedural turn in WTO jurisprudence by representing its findings as a purely legal-administrative judgement on whether the EC’s regulatory procedures violated the SPS Agreement, while keeping implicit its own judgements on substantive risk issues. As this case illustrates, the WTO settlement procedure mobilizes scientific expertise for sophisticated, multiple aims: it recruits a source of credibility from the scientific arena, thus reinforcing the standard narrative of ‘science-based trade discipline’, while also constructing new scientific expertise for the main task – namely, challenging trade restrictions for being unduly cautious.

Human Rights, Constitutionalism and the World Trade Organization: Challenges for World Trade Organization Jurisprudence and Civil Society

2006 ◽  
Vol 19 (3) ◽  
pp. 633-667 ◽  
Author(s):  
ERNST-ULRICH PETERSMANN
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
World Trade Organization ◽  
International Law ◽  
World Trade ◽  
Dispute Settlement ◽  
Director General ◽  
Trade Disputes ◽  
Trade Law ◽  
Wto Dispute Settlement ◽  
The World

Governments perceive UN human rights conventions and the law of the World Trade Organization (WTO) as separate legal regimes. WTO jurisprudence, by contrast, interprets WTO rules as parts of international law and may soon be confronted with legal claims that WTO obligations are to be construed with due regard to the human rights obligations of WTO members. The diverse constitutional traditions of WTO members, and their political opposition to linking WTO law to human rights, make it unlikely that WTO members will respond to the UN proposals for a ‘human rights approach to trade’ by adopting a WTO Declaration clarifying that WTO rules are flexible enough to be interpreted and applied in conformity with the human rights obligations of WTO members (section 1). Following the invitation by WTO Director-General Pascal Lamy to form ‘cosmopolitan constituencies’ in support of global public goods (like a rules-based world trading system), this article makes concrete proposals for the initiative by the International Law Association (ILA) to elaborate an ILA Declaration clarifying the complex interrelationships between trade law, human rights and WTO jurisprudence (section 2). As many human rights arguments presented in trade disputes in the EC Court and in the European Court of Human Rights could likewise be raised in WTO dispute settlement proceedings, the article examines whether the ‘constitutional methodologies’ applied by European courts offer lessons for further ‘constitutionalizing’ trade governance in the WTO in conformity with the human rights obligations of all WTO members.

scholarly journals A RELAÇÃO ENTRE ESTADO E AS ENTIDADES PRIVADAS NA REGULAÇÃO DO COMÉRCIO INTERNACIONAL POR MEIO DOS REGULAMENTOS E PADRÕES PRIVADOS

2021 ◽  
Vol 16 (1) ◽  
pp. 201-220
Author(s):  
Patricia Yurie Dias
Keyword(s):  
International Trade ◽  
World Trade Organization ◽  
International Law ◽  
World Trade ◽  
Dispute Settlement ◽  
Wto Dispute Settlement ◽  
Private Standards ◽  
Complementary Role ◽  
The World

RESUMOO trabalho analisa o papel complementar dos regulamentos e padrões privados dos Estados e das entidades não estatais às regras da Organização Mundial do Comércio (OMC) com o intuito de gerar maior segurança e qualidade para os produtos no âmbito do comércio internacional. A OMC visa promover a liberalização e eliminação da discriminação do comércio internacional. Dessa forma, por meio do estudo de alguns casos submetidos ao Órgão de Solução de Controvérsias (OSC) da OMC, em que pese a maioria dos casos submetidos ao OSC terem tido desfechos distintos, constatou-se que os padrões privados podem complementar as regras da OMC, desde que não sejam medidas protecionistas  disfarçadas de barreiras não tarifárias ao comércio internacional.PALAVRAS-CHAVE: Direito Internacional; Jurisdição Internacional; Padrões privados; Comércio Internacional; OMC.ABSTRACTThe paper examines the complementary role of the private regulations and standards of States and non-state entities to the rules of the World Trade Organization (WTO) in order to promote safety and quality for products in the scope of international trade. The WTO aims to promote the liberalization and elimination of discrimination in international trade. Thus, through the study of some cases submitted to the WTO Dispute Settlement Body (DSB), despite the fact that most cases submitted to the DSB had different conclusions, it was found that private standards can complement the rules of the WTO, if they are not protectionist measures disguised as non-tariff barriers to international trade.KEYWORDS: International Law; International Jurisdiction; Private Standards; International Trade; WTO.

The WTO Appellate Body's First Decision

1996 ◽  
Vol 9 (2) ◽  
pp. 337-360
Author(s):  
David Palmeter
Keyword(s):  
International Trade ◽  
World Trade Organization ◽  
World Trade ◽  
Dispute Settlement ◽  
Focal Point ◽  
Trade Law ◽  
International Trade Law ◽  
The World

The General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT) began more as a diplomatic forum where parties compromised disagreements than a court that settled them. The term ‘conciliation’ was used more frequently to describe the process than the term ‘dispute settlement’. However, over nearly half a century as the focal point of international trade law and diplomacy, GATT's dispute settlement procedures moved decidedly, if not steadily, from the diplomatic to the juridical. With the adoption of the Marrakesh Agreement Establishing the World Trade Organization (WTO), the juridical model clearly has prevailed.

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