دور النظام التجاري المتعدد الأطراف في الإدارة العالمية
النظام التجاري المتعدد الأطراف في الإدارة العالمية.
النظام التجاري المتعدد الأطراف في الإدارة العالمية.
النظام التجاري المتعدد الأطراف في الإدارة العالمية.
ارتفاع القوى في نظام التجارة العالمي - الصين و.
& كوت؛ جسرا مفيدا للغاية بين العلماء والممارسين المعنيين بمتعدد الأطراف & كوت؛ أولئك الذين يعملون في منظومة الأمم المتحدة معجبون بالحوكمة العالمية.
أرشد بالوا منظمة التجارة العالمية ورقة - دور التداول متعدد الأطراف.
02.05.2001 & # 0183؛ & # 32؛ مقالة مجلة الأكاديمية الحوكمة العالمية. النظام التجاري المتعدد الأطراف واتفاقات التجارة التفضيلية: هل يمكن أن تكون الآثار السلبية.
اتفاقات التجارة الحرة وحوكمة التجارة العالمية.
التجارة الدولية بوصفها محركا للتنمية يشمل هذا المجال التدابير الرامية إلى تعزيز النظام التجاري المتعدد الأطراف، "تعزيز الإدارة العالمية"؛
مسابقة الحوكمة العالمية: الاقتصاد متعدد الأطراف.
10.01.2018 & # 0183؛ & # 32؛ دور النظام التجاري متعدد الأطراف في الدور العالمي نظام التجارة المتعددة الأطراف في الحوكمة العالمية. ويستند النظام التجاري المتعدد الأطراف.
الجنية الكل في 1 - Всего за 800р. Гарантия качества.
وبالتالي فإن إدارة التجارة المتعددة الأطراف باعتبارها النظام التجاري المتعدد الأطراف، وبالتالي، تفرض منظمة التجارة العالمية دون هوادة على النظام التجاري العالمي.
يمكن أن يكون التكامل التجاري الإقليمي لبنة بناء.
يتطلب النظام التجاري العالمي المتعدد الأطراف أكثر من مجرد التعامل مع التخفيضات في التعريفات الجمركية، دور الأمم المتحدة في الإدارة الاقتصادية العالمية.
الصين والحوكمة التجارة الإلكترونية الكتاب الإلكتروني من قبل - راكوتين كوبو.
الربط المتعدد الأطراف لنظم تجارة الانبعاثات العالمية! سوق الكربون! من جانب! الطريق! التكامل!! من التداخل! مع! موجود! متعددة الأطراف! الحكم.
الحوكمة العالمية - التدوين مع بيجيش ميشرا.
النظام التجاري متعدد الأطراف: تطور لا جدال حول النظام التجاري العالمي لا ينبغي أن يكون النظام التجاري المتعدد الأطراف.
الجنس والحوكمة في التجارة المتعددة الأطراف | جنس.
الرجاء الضغط على زر للحصول على الاتحاد الأوروبي و متعدد الأطراف التجارة و التجارة المتعددة الأطراف نظام التجارة المتعددة الحوكمة. الصين والعالمية.
الصين والحوكمة التجارة العالمية - كتب على غوغل بلاي.
العلاقات الاقتصادية بين الآسيان واليابان في. حوكمة التجارة العالمية. التطوير المستمر للنظام التجاري المتعدد الأطراف إدارة التجارة العالمية في المستقبل.
مركز الحكم الدولي الابتكار العمل.
الصين وحوكمة التجارة العالمية: ولكن أيضا من بين أهم الأحداث في تاريخ منظمة التجارة العالمية والنظام التجاري المتعدد الأطراف.
منظمة التجارة العالمية: أزمة وحوكمة التجارة العالمية: روردن.
وقد واجه النظام متعدد الأطراف تحديات متزايدة منذ نهاية التحدي الآخر في الحكم العالمي من خلال التعددية يشمل الوطنية.
العلاقات الاقتصادية بين الاسيان واليابان فى ادارة التجارة العالمية.
29.11.2002 & # 0183؛ & # 32؛ الجنس والحكم في التداول متعدد الأطراف. النظام: المجالات الحاسمة لاتخاذ القرارات والاستجابات العالمية مرياما ويليامز، مرياما @ إيغتن.
النظام التجاري المتعدد الأطراف وحقوق الإنسان - روتليدج.
30.06.2018 & # 0183؛ & # 32؛ الفيديو المضمنة & # 0183؛ & # 32؛ تخطي التنقل تسجيل الدخول.
الحوكمة العالمية للتجارة - جامعة هارفارد.
اتفاقات التجارة الحرة وحوكمة نظام التجارة العالمي * نظام متعدد الأطراف، واعتناق عالم أكثر تعقيدا تتألف من شبكات.
دور النظام التجاري المتعدد الأطراف في الحوكمة العالمية.
وقال إن الصين ستتبع نهجا غير متعاون في منظمة التجارة العالمية، مما قد يؤثر تأثيرا سلبيا على حسن سير النظام التجاري المتعدد الأطراف أو حتى قابليته للاستمرار.
رياليسم والحوكمة العالمية: حلول تعتمد على الطاقة -
حوكمة التجارة العالمية ومجموعة العشرين: استجابة للاتفاقات التجارية الإقليمية الكبرى. فإنها تحتاج إلى ضمان اتساقها مع النظام التجاري المتعدد الأطراف،
حوكمة التجارة الدولية - جامعة برينستون.
وتحويل الحوكمة العالمية لنظم الحوكمة الإقليمية والعالمية بصورة متضافرة؛ والمؤسسات المتعددة الأطراف التقليدية غير ملائمة لهذا الغرض.
ما هو دور المفاوضات التجارية المتعددة الأطراف في الإدارة العالمية؟
واختبرت األزمة املالية العاملية األخيرة الهياكل احلالية للحوكمة الدولية. ووفقا لويز فيليبي لامبريا، وزير العلاقات الخارجية البرازيلية من 1995 إلى 2001، فإن قواعد منظمة التجارة العالمية عملت كحاجز ضد النزول إلى الحمائية خلال الأزمة. وكان السيد لامبريا كبير المفاوضين البرازيليين في جولة أوروغواي، وناقش مع المتحدث باسم منظمة التجارة العالمية كيث روكويل كيف شكلت تلك المفاوضات النظام التجاري العالمي اليوم.
وقد سجلت هذه المناقشة على هامش المنتدى العام لمنظمة التجارة العالمية لعام 2009.
مناقشة الفيديو.
وGT. تنزيل (انقر بزر الماوس الأيمن وحدد & لدكو؛ حفظ باسم & رديقو؛ للتنزيل وعرضها بلا اتصال) كواليتي: & غ؛ مساعدة.
التجارة وتغير المناخ ودور القيم في الحوكمة العالمية.
يواكيم مونكلبان.
وقد أسفر المجال الناشئ للحوكمة العالمية عن عدد من الاختراقات، فضلا عن أوجه القصور التي تهدف إلى إدارة المشاكل العالمية من خلال التعاون الطوعي والمخصص من جانب طائفة متنوعة من الجهات الفاعلة الدولية.
وتمثل المقالات في هذه السلسلة تقييم الطلاب المتقدمين والباحثين الشباب من جميع أنحاء العالم، وتوثيق الإنجازات الرئيسية والعقبات والتحديات التي تصور الميدان.
ومن خلال تسليط الضوء على بعض التحديات العالمية في مجال الحكم، مثل التجارة وتغير المناخ، يشير صاحب البلاغ إلى وجهة نظره بشأن أسباب تلك التحديات: الافتقار إلى الدعم من القاعدة إلى القمة والقيم المشتركة الضرورية للحكم العالمي الناجح.
عندما اندلعت الأزمة المالية في عام 2008، كانت هناك إشارات مثيرة للقلق بأن نوع الحمائية التي أدت إلى الكساد الكبير آخذ في الارتفاع. وبفضل النظام التجاري المتعدد الأطراف، الذي تجسده منظمة التجارة العالمية، لم تتحقق هذه التحذيرات. وفي الواقع، ساهمت منظمة التجارة العالمية بنشاط في التغلب على الاضطرابات الاقتصادية الأخيرة من خلال رصد عدم اليقين الاقتصادي المتزايد وتجنب الحمائية. ويؤكد هذا المثال على أهمية النظام التجاري المتعدد الأطراف ويؤكد أنه أبرز تطور تاريخي في مجال الحكم العالمي والتعاون العالمي.
وتستضيف منظمة التجارة العالمية المفاوضات التجارية المتعددة الأطراف بطريقة ديمقراطية تسمح للبلدان الضعيفة بتجميع نفوذها ومصالحها الجماعية ونداش؛ بدلا من المفاوضات الثنائية التي لا يوجد فيها أي نفوذ تفاوضي تقريبا. ويمكن لأي بلد أن يدافع عن حقوقه في نظام تسوية المنازعات التابع لمنظمة التجارة العالمية، والذي غالبا ما يعترف به باعتباره أكثر الآليات الدولية حل النزاعات فعالية وأكثر احتراما. والحاجة إلى تنسيق وفحص اتفاقات التجارة التفضيلية تنمو فقط في عالم إقليمي، ومنظمة التجارة العالمية مجهزة تماما مع الأدوات اللازمة لضمان تلك المناطق و [رسقوو]؛ التزامن.
ومن الإنجازات البارزة الأخرى في مجال الإدارة الاقتصادية العالمية إدماج الاقتصادات الناشئة في الحوكمة العالمية من خلال مجموعة العشرين. وساعدت الإجراءات المتضافرة لمجموعة العشرين في التعامل مع الانكماش الاقتصادي، وتوسيع نطاق التنظيم المالي، والإلغاء التدريجي لإعانات الوقود الأحفوري وإصلاح صندوق النقد الدولي والبنك الدولي على الطاولة.
وعلى الرغم من الإنجازات التي تحققت على مدى العقود القليلة الماضية، فإن الإدارة الاقتصادية العالمية ينبغي أن تراعي الروابط مع الاستدامة البيئية على نحو أفضل. ولا شك أن أهم عامل يساهم في توقف المحادثات المناخية الدولية هو القدرة التنافسية الاقتصادية، ولذلك ينبغي أن تحظى القضايا المتصلة بالتجارة بالأولوية في اتفاقية الأمم المتحدة الإطارية بشأن تغير المناخ، والعكس بالعكس، ينبغي أن تكون مواضيع المناخ مدرجة في جدول أعمال منظمة التجارة العالمية.
الفوائد الاقتصادية العالمية من الدوحة & لسو؛ التنمية و [رسقوو]؛ ويقدر أحيانا أن تكون الجولة 300 بليون دولار أمريكي سنويا. ولكن الآن بعد أن كانت جولة الدوحة كما تم تصورها أصلا هي على دعم الحياة، يقول البعض أن الوقت قد حان للمفاوضين في جنيف لإعداد وخدمة المفاوضات التجارية الأوسع التي قد حان للحصاد، مثل الاتفاق على الطاقة النظيفة. الاستثمار السياسي في & لدكو؛ الدوحة & [رسقوو]؛ كان كبيرا، حتى مع الاعتراف بأن المفاوضات أصبحت معقدة للغاية في عالم متعدد الأقطاب وفي عام الانتخابات في الولايات المتحدة، والمفاوضات بشأن بعض محددة & لسكو؛ غير الدوحة & [رسقوو]؛ البنود يمكن عقد حتى السماء مسح. وكانت استراتيجية تحديد الدوحة مع منظمة التجارة العالمية مكلفة وتناول الطعام في مؤسسة ناجحة خلاف ذلك تستحق أن تعزز. ولكن حتى لو كانت منظمة التجارة العالمية وجولة الدوحة مع كل فوائدها في حالة انحلال، ماذا يقول هذا عن مستقبل الحكم العالمي بشكل عام؟
ماذا يقول هذا عن آفاق الحكومات لوضع مصالح الأقلية قصيرة الأجل جانبا من أجل التوصل إلى اتفاق عالمي بشأن تغير المناخ والانتقال إلى اقتصاد مستدام وإيجاد نماذج نمو جديدة؟
وستتطلب معالجة قضايا الإدارة العالمية المتزايدة التعقيد والمتكاملة، مثل التجارة وتغير المناخ، دعما يتجاوز الحكومات. للحصول على المجتمع المدني أكثر انخراطا في الحوكمة العالمية، تحتاج العولمة لتكون أكثر من & لسو؛ من أسفل إلى أعلى و [رسقوو]؛ ويحتاج إلى دعم انتخابي.
ومثال جيد على العمل من القاعدة إلى القمة هو التجمع الخاص بالمحكمة الجنائية الدولية، وهو ائتلاف من المنظمات غير الحكومية يروج للمحكمة الجنائية الدولية عن طريق نشر المعلومات وتعزيز البرامج المتعلقة بالمحكمة إلى مجتمعاتها، والدعوة بنجاح للتصديق على المحكمة من قبل البلدان في جميع أنحاء العالم.
وما دام الإهمال واللامبالاة إزاء العولمة متفشيان، فإن الحكومات لا تملك أي حافز لتحسين الحكم العالمي. وسيكون الجمهور المطلع على دراية بفوائد التعاون الدولي الطويلة الأجل وأكثر استعدادا لتقاسم فوائد العولمة وتحدي المصالح الضيقة من أجل الحفاظ على دعم واسع النطاق للعولمة. وثانيا، ينبغي أن تنشأ شراكات بين البلدان لتيسير الانتقال إلى اقتصاد عالمي اجتماعي واقتصادي ولا سيما أكثر بيئيا. وبما أن الاتفاق الدولي الخطير بشأن تغير المناخ يبدو أنه سنوات، إن لم يكن عقدا من الزمن، فإنه يتعين استكشاف حلول عملية قصيرة الأجل. وأفضل خيار لمنع نشوب الصراعات العالمية على إعانات الطاقة المتجددة هو وضع إطار قائم على القواعد بشأن الطاقة والموارد الطبيعية في منظمة التجارة العالمية، سواء داخل أو خارج جولة الدوحة المتعثرة. (1)
وثالثا، فإن التحديث نحو مجلس أمن أكثر شمولا في الأمم المتحدة لن يعني فقط منح (نصف) مقاعد دائمة للبلاد مع رابع أقوى جيش في العالم (الهند) وغيرهم من المساهمين الرئيسيين في الميزانية العادية للأمم المتحدة وبعثات السلام، ولكن أيضا الحد من حق النقض، وبالتالي البدء في معالجة العجز في الديمقراطية والتسييس الذي لا هوادة فيه لمجلس الأمن حتى يكون مجهزا لمعالجة مخاوف القرن الحادي والعشرين. فالعدد المتزايد من الصراعات على الموارد الطبيعية، على سبيل المثال، أجبر مجلس الأمن على مناقشة تغير المناخ مؤخرا بوصفه تهديدا للسلم والأمن، ولكن بعض أعضائه رفضوا قبول تغير المناخ في حد ذاته. (2)
وأخيرا، فإن الميسر العالمي الذي يمكن أن يربط العالم الذي يزداد إضفاء الطابع الإقليمي سيكون مفيدا. وكان الاتحاد الأوروبي إنجازا رئيسيا للتعاون الدولي في القرن العشرين، ولكنه كان ينتحر خلال العقد الماضي. والإمكانية الوحيدة لمنع المزيد من التدهور في موقف الاتحاد الأوروبي في العالم هي إدراك دوره المحتمل من الميسر من ذوي الخبرة للتعاون بين مختلف البلدان. وعلى الرغم من التحديات على المدى القصير، فإن الأزمة المالية الحالية في منطقة اليورو هي في الواقع فرصة ممتازة لتعزيز الوحدة السياسية في أوروبا ودورها العالمي على المدى الطويل. (3)
إن التحديات التي تواجهها اليوم لتحكم تغير المناخ والتجارة والأمن على المستوى العالمي هي مجرد دلالة على أزمة أخلاقية أوسع بكثير تتجاوز مجرد انعدام الإرادة السياسية و [رسقوو]؛ والقيادة. ولماذا، نظرا للزيادة الهائلة في الآليات والمنتديات للتعاون، فإن العالم ينقسم عميقا في بعض الأحيان ضد نفسه؟ أي القيم قادرة على توجيه الحكومات ومواطنيها من فوضى المصالح والأيديولوجيات المتنافسة تجاه مجتمع عالمي قادر على غرس مبادئ العدالة والإنصاف والاستدامة على جميع مستويات المجتمع؟
أولا وقبل كل شيء، ينبغي أن يكون النموذج الجديد قائما - أي الطبيعة المترابطة لتحدياتنا وازدهارنا. وسواء كانت القضية هي الفقر، أو انتشار الأسلحة، أو الصحة، أو التجارة العالمية، أو الدين، أو الاستدامة البيئية، أو حقوق الإنسان، أو الفساد، أو حقوق الأقليات، فمن الواضح أن أيا من المشاكل التي تواجه الإدارة العالمية يمكن معالجتها على نحو كاف في عزلة من بعضها البعض.
ثانيا، يعتبر البحث عن القيم المشتركة أمرا بالغ الأهمية للعمل الفعال. فالموارد الاقتصادية والتكنولوجية ذات أهمية حاسمة بالنسبة للتحولات في مجال الاستدامة، غير أن الاهتمام بالاعتبارات المادية حصرا لن يقدر مدى تأثير المتغيرات الأيديولوجية والثقافية على الدبلوماسية وصنع القرار. وفي محاولة للتخطي عن مجتمع الأمم الذي يرتبط بعلاقات اقتصادية في المقام الأول بمجموعة من المسؤوليات المشتركة فيما يتعلق برفاه الآخرين وأمنهم، يجب أن تأخذ مسألة القيم مكانة مركزية في المداولات، وأن يتم التعبير عنها وجعلها صريحة .
إن التشديد على تعددية الأطراف، وإن كان خطوة في الاتجاه الصحيح، لن توفر أساسا كافيا لبناء المجتمع بين الأمم؛ فإن التعاون وحده لا يعطي الشرعية أو يضمن نتائج خيرة من أجل الصالح العام.
إن النظام العالمي الناشئ وعمليات العولمة التي تحدده يجب أن تقوم على مبدأ وحدة الجنس البشري. ويوفر هذا المبدأ الأساس العملي لتنظيم العلاقات بين جميع الأمم. إن الترابط الواضح على نحو متزايد بين التنمية والأمن وحقوق الإنسان على نطاق عالمي يؤكد أن السلام والازدهار غير قابلين للتجزئة - أنه لا يمكن منح أي فائدة مستدامة لأمة أو مجتمع إذا تم تجاهل أو إهمال رفاه الأمم ككل. وبالإضافة إلى ذلك، لا يمكن إقامة أي نظام دولي فعال وسلمي واستدامته ما لم يرتكز بقوة على مبادئ العدالة وسيادة القانون، واحترام حقوق الإنسان، والمساواة بين الرجل والمرأة، والديمقراطية.
والمطلوب هو عملية تشاورية - على جميع مستويات الحكم - يسعى فيها المشاركون الفرديون إلى تجاوز وجهات نظرهم، من أجل العمل كأعضاء في هيئة واحدة لها مصالحها وأهدافها. (4)
وفيما يتعلق بالثقافات المختلفة، يمكن أن يتجذر نهج التنمية التشاركية من القاعدة إلى القاعدة بدلا من النهج الحالي القائم على الخبراء من أعلى إلى أسفل. وسيتطلب ذلك تغييرات هائلة في المواقف ونظام تعليمي يعزز المواطنة العالمية، ورؤية عالمية شاملة، والمشاركة في الشؤون الراهنة. وإلى أن يتم إنشاء هذه القيم وتنفيذها على نطاق واسع في الحوكمة العالمية، يصعب تصور كيف يمكن إحداث التغيير في عالم آمن ومستدام ومزدهر نتيجة للتحول المنظم بدلا من الأزمات المتعددة.
(1) على سبيل المثال، قضية دعم طاقة الرياح في الولايات المتحدة والصين، والتي تم حلها مؤخرا.
(3) انظر أيضا مارك ليونارد، لماذا أوروبا سوف تشغيل القرن ال 21؟ وجيريمي ريفكين، الحلم الأوروبي.
سياسة التنمية الدولية | ريفو إنترناتيونال دي بوليتيك ديفيلوبيمنت.
المعونة، الاقتصادات الناشئة والسياسات العالمية.
التحديات التي تواجه النظام التجاري المتعدد الأطراف في معالجة أهداف السياسة العامة العالمية.
وعلى الرغم من زيادة قياسية في الصادرات السلعية العالمية بنسبة 14،5 في المائة، فإن آثار الأزمة المالية والركود العالمي لا تزال تعرقل الانتعاش الاقتصادي بشكل أسرع. وقد قوضت أسعار النفط المرتفعة نسبيا، إلى جانب استمرار البطالة والتدابير الرامية إلى تقليص العجز في الميزانية، آفاق النمو في الأجل القصير.
وفي حين أن التجارة بين بلدان الجنوب لا تزال تنفجر، فإن الاختلالات التجارية - أي الفجوة بين الصادرات والواردات - اتسعت في عام 2018 مقارنة بعام 2009 (وإن كانت أصغر من مستويات ما قبل الأزمة). وفي الوقت نفسه، وصلت المفاوضات التجارية في إطار جولة الدوحة إلى طريق مسدود، مما أثار شكوكا بشأن مستقبل منظمة التجارة العالمية كمحفل تفاوضي. وفي ظل هذه الظروف، هل ينبغي للنظام أن يعيد التفكير في عملية صنع القرار التي تقوم على هيمنة الدول الأعضاء، ومبدأ توافق الآراء ومفهوم التعهد الواحد، كما اقترح بعض النقاد؟ وإذا كان الأمر كذلك، فكيف يمكن البدء في برنامج الإصلاح هذا في منظمة التجارة العالمية؟ وعلاوة على ذلك، فإن شلل النظام يثير أيضا، بالإضافة إلى المهمة التفاوضية لمنظمة التجارة العالمية، مسائل عاجلة بشأن قدرة النظام على الاستجابة للتحديات الملحة التي تواجه عصرنا، مثل التجارة وتغير المناخ، أو الأمن الغذائي وتقلب الأسعار.
الكلمات الدالة.
الكلمات الرئيسية المواضيعية & # 160 ؛:
الكلمات الرئيسية المؤسسية & # 160 ؛:
نص كامل.
"ما نراه اليوم هو الشلل في وظيفة التفاوض لمنظمة التجارة العالمية، سواء كان ذلك على الوصول إلى الأسواق أو على وضع القواعد. وما نواجهه هو عدم قدرة منظمة التجارة العالمية على التكيف والتكيف مع أولويات التجارة العالمية الناشئة، التي لا يمكن حلها من خلال الصفقات الثنائية. '
باسكال لامي، في اجتماع غير رسمي لرؤساء الوفود.
لجنة التفاوض التجارية، 26 تموز / يوليه 2018.
1 المقدمة.
1 الأزمة المالية 2008 - 2008 وأزمة الديون السيادية الحالية في أوروبا لم تبرز فقط المستوى العالي من الترابط الاقتصادي القائم في جميع أنحاء العالم، ولكن أيضا التحديات المتزايدة في متابعة الإجراءات التعاونية الدولية للتصدي للتحديات الملحة للتنمية المستدامة. وفي عالم متعدد الأقطاب يتغير بسرعة تتغير فيه الثروات الاقتصادية تدريجيا نحو الشرق والجنوب، وتصبح فيه القيود على الموارد أكثر إلحاحا، يظل التعاون الدولي في أزمة. وقد أتاحت صعود البلدان الصاعدة مثل الصين والهند والبرازيل والانخفاض النسبي في القوى الاقتصادية التقليدية فرصا جديدة، كما يتضح من النمو غير المسبوق في التجارة بين بلدان الجنوب الذي لوحظ خلال العقد الماضي أو نحو ذلك. بيد أنه أدى أيضا إلى نشوء توترات جديدة، لا سيما بين البلدان ذات الفوائض التجارية الكبيرة والبلدان التي تعاني من عجز تجاري متزايد. وهذه التوترات متساوية في المفاوضات الدولية مثل المفاوضات المتعلقة بتغير المناخ.
وفي الوقت نفسه، يقدر أن عدد الجياع قد وصل إلى مليار في عام 2009، مما أعاد الأمن الغذائي إلى أعلى جدول الأعمال السياسي. ومع استمرار النمو في الطلب في االرتفاع بوتيرة أسرع من الزيادة في العرض - ويرجع ذلك أساسا إلى انخفاض اإلنتاجية - من المتوقع أن تظل أسعار المواد الغذائية مرتفعة ومتقلبة في السنوات القادمة. وقد أسهمت عدة عوامل في تعزيز تقلب الأسعار: انخفاض المخزونات الناجمة عن خلافة العجز في الإنتاج المرتبط بالطقس، وتزايد الطلب على الوقود الحيوي، وارتفاع أسعار الطاقة، وانخفاض قيمة الدولار الأمريكي؛ إلا أن هذه السياسات قد تفاقمت بسبب استجابات السياسة العامة مثل قيود التصدير.
(3) تتناقض هذه البيئة السريعة التغير والاحتياجات الملحة للعمل التعاوني الدولي لمعالجة الشواغل المتعلقة بالأمن الغذائي أو تغير المناخ أو اختلالات التجارة غير المستدامة تباينا حادا مع الشلل الحالي للنظام التجاري المتعدد الأطراف. وظلت جولة الدوحة للمفاوضات التجارية في إطار منظمة التجارة العالمية في مأزق منذ عدة أشهر دون أن تكون هناك وجهات نظر حقيقية للمستقبل القريب. وفي حين أن هناك عدة عوامل تفسر الجمود في المحادثات التجارية التي دامت عشر سنوات، فإن هذا الشلل يثير الشكوك حول مستقبل النظام التجاري المتعدد الأطراف.
4 كمساهمة في هذه المناقشة، يبحث هذا الفصل كيف سعى النظام التجاري المتعدد الأطراف إلى معالجة أهداف السياسة العامة العالمية، وكيف يمكن أن يفعل ذلك في المستقبل. وبعد استعراض موجز للاتجاهات الحالية في التجارة الدولية والتطورات الأخيرة التي أدت إلى الأزمة الراهنة في جولة الدوحة، ينظر القسم 3 في الخيارات الممكنة لإصلاح الطريقة التي تجري بها منظمة التجارة العالمية المفاوضات. وأخيرا، يركز القسم 4 على كيفية سعي منظمة التجارة العالمية إلى الاستجابة لأهداف محددة للسياسات العامة في الماضي - باستخدام حالة الأمن الغذائي كمثال - وما يخبرنا به هذا عن الطريقة التي يتصل بها النظام التجاري المتعدد الأطراف أهداف السياسات.
2 - السياق الدولي.
2-1 الاتجاهات الحديثة في التجارة الدولية.
(5) في أعقاب انخفاض حاد بنسبة 12 في المائة في عام 2009، زاد حجم صادرات السلع العالمية بنسبة قياسية بلغت 14،5 في المائة في عام 2018، مما سمح للتجارة العالمية بالانتعاش إلى مستويات ما قبل الأزمة. ويرافق هذا الرقم، وهو الأكبر منذ بدء جمع البيانات في عام 1950، زيادة قدرها 3،6 في المائة في الناتج المحلي الإجمالي العالمي. ووفقا لمنظمة التجارة العالمية) منظمة التجارة العالمية، 2018 أ (، ينبغي أن يستقر نمو التجارة العالمية بنسبة 5.8 في المائة في عام 2018، مع زيادة بنسبة 2.5 في المائة في الناتج المحلي الإجمالي العالمي (انظر الشكل 9-1). ومما لا يثير الدهشة أن آسيا سجلت أسرع نمو حقيقي في الصادرات - 23.1 في المائة - مع زيادة الصادرات الصينية واليابانية بنسبة 28.4 و 27.5 في المائة على التوالي. وفي الوقت نفسه، نمت تجارة البضائع بنسبة 10.8 في المائة في أوروبا، و 15.4 في المائة في الولايات المتحدة. وشكلت البلدان النامية والبلدان التي تمر اقتصاداتها بمرحلة انتقالية عموما 45 في المائة من مجموع الصادرات العالمية، وهي أعلى حصة على الإطلاق (منظمة التجارة العالمية، 2018).
6 إن ارتفاع أسعار السلع الأساسية وانخفاض قيمة العملة الأمريكية يعني أن نمو التجارة بالدولار - بنسبة 22 في المائة - تجاوز الزيادة في الحجم. وعلى وجه الخصوص، شهدت المناطق التي تعتمد على صادرات الموارد الطبيعية - مثل أفريقيا والشرق الأوسط وأمريكا الجنوبية - نموا أقل في أحجام التجارة، ولكن زيادة كبيرة في قيمة الدولار من صادراتها. وارتفعت الصادرات الأفريقية بنسبة 6.5 في المائة من حيث الحجم، ولكن بنسبة 28 في المائة بالدولار. وبالمثل، نمت صادرات أمريكا اللاتينية بنسبة 6.2 في المائة فقط من حيث الحجم ولكن بنسبة 25 في المائة بالدولار (منظمة التجارة العالمية، 2018 ب).
الشكل 9.1 - صادرات السلع العالمية والناتج المحلي الإجمالي، 2008-11 (نسبة التغير *)
* نسبة التغير مقارنة مع نفس الشهر من العام السابق.
المصدر: منظمة التجارة العالمية (2018b).
7 وفي الوقت نفسه، ووفقا لمؤتمر الأمم المتحدة للتجارة والتنمية (الأونكتاد)، زاد مجموع الاستثمارات الأجنبية المباشرة من 1.185 إلى 1.244 تريليون دولار في عام 2018، ويرجع ذلك إلى حد كبير إلى زيادة التدفق إلى البلدان النامية التي شكلت، إلى جانب الاقتصادات التي تمر بمرحلة انتقالية، أي أكثر من نصف إجمالي الاستثمار الأجنبي المباشر (الأونكتاد، 2018). كما وصل الاستثمار الأجنبي المباشر الخارجي من الاقتصادات الناشئة إلى مستويات قياسية، حيث توجه معظم استثماراتها نحو بلدان أخرى في الجنوب.
ورغم أن هذه الأرقام تبدو مثيرة للإعجاب، فإن الزيادة في تجارة البضائع لعام 2018 لم تكن كافية لإعادة الصادرات إلى مستويات تتفق مع اتجاهات الفترة 1990-2008. وعلى صعيد االستثمار، وعلى الرغم من الزيادة بنسبة 5 في املائة مقارنة بعام 2009، ظلت تدفقات االستثمار األجنبي املباشر العاملي أدنى من متوسطها قبل األزمة) 2005-2007 (، وقلت بنسبة 37 في املائة عن ذروتها لعام 2007) األونكتاد، 2018 (. وبينما شهدت الاقتصادات الناشئة في أمريكا اللاتينية وجنوب شرق آسيا نموا سريعا، استمرت تدفقات الاستثمار الأجنبي المباشر في التعاقد في البلدان المتقدمة النمو وأفريقيا وجنوب آسيا.
9 وبصورة أعم، ونظرا لأن الناتج العالمي في عام 2009 كان منخفضا، فإن منظمة التجارة العالمية ترى أنه من المتوقع تحقيق نمو أعلى في عام 2018، خاصة وأن نمو الناتج المحلي الإجمالي غالبا ما وصل إلى 4 في المائة أو أكثر في السنوات الأخيرة (منظمة التجارة العالمية، 2018). وقد تفسر عدة عوامل سبب نمو التجارة والمخرجات بوتيرة أبطأ مما قد تكون عليه. وفي عام 2018، رفعت أسعار النفط المرتفعة نسبيا تكاليف الطاقة بالنسبة للأسر والأعمال التجارية. كما أثرت معدلات البطالة المرتفعة على الاستهلاك المحلي والطلب على الواردات في البلدان المتقدمة. وأخيرا، أدت المحاولات في أوروبا والولايات المتحدة وأماكن أخرى للحد من العجز في الميزانية إلى خفض الإنفاق والإيرادات، مما قوض آفاق النمو على المدى القصير. ومن المرجح أن تظل الآثار السلبية للأزمة المالية والانكماش العالمي لبعض الوقت على الرغم من الارتداد القياسي للتجارة في عام 2018.
وفي الولايات المتحدة، استمر معدل الادخار الوطني المنخفض والاستهلاك الخاص المرتفع كنسبة من الناتج المحلي الإجمالي في الحفاظ على الطلب على السلع الاستهلاكية المستوردة، مما أدى إلى تأجيج النمو السريع الذي تقوده الصادرات في الاقتصادات الناشئة. وعلى مدى السنوات العشر إلى الخمس عشرة الماضية، أدت هذه التطورات إلى اختلالات كبيرة، مع تراكم عجز كبير في الحساب الجاري في الولايات المتحدة على وجه الخصوص، وفائض كبير في الحساب الجاري في بلدان أخرى، ولا سيما الصين وألمانيا واليابان. وقد ولدت هذه بدورها توترات سياسية، واضحة في الجدل بين الولايات المتحدة والصين بشأن سياسات سعر الصرف. وفي عام 2018، ظلت االختالالت التجارية أقل من مستويات ما قبل األزمة، ولكن بالنسبة إلى معظم البلدان، باستثناء الصين، اتسعت الفجوة بين الصادرات والواردات مقارنة بعام 2009) انظر الشكلين 9.3 و 9.4 (. وكما يظهر الشكل 9.2، ارتفع العجز التجاري في الولايات المتحدة من حوالي 550 مليار دولار أمريكي إلى 690 مليار دولار أمريكي، لكنه ظل أقل من 880 مليار دولار أمريكي في عام 2008. وفي الوقت نفسه، انخفض الفائض التجاري الصيني من نحو 300 مليار دولار أمريكي في عام 2008 إلى ما يزيد قليلا عن 180 دولارا مليار دولار في عام 2018. وفي عام 2018، اتسع العجز التجاري للاتحاد الأوروبي إلى ما بعد مستويات عام 2009، على الرغم من فائض الميزان التجاري الألماني البالغ 200 مليار دولار، على الرغم من أن العجز الإجمالي في الاتحاد الأوروبي كان أقل من عام 2008. وكانت اليابان استثناء من الاتجاه العام نحو اختلالات أصغر، حيث تضاعفت فائضها التجاري أربعة أضعاف تقريبا في عام 2018 مقارنة بمستويات ما قبل الأزمة.
(11) هناك إجماع واسع النطاق على أن الاختلالات الحالية ليست مستدامة على المدى الطويل. وسوف تضطر المستويات المرتفعة باستمرار لاستهلاك الأسر المعيشية الممولة من الديون في الولايات المتحدة إلى العودة إلى مستويات تاريخية أقل قليلا (ماير، 2018). وفي الوقت نفسه، دفعت معدلات الاستهلاك المنخفضة والمدخرات الوطنية المرتفعة في الصين نداءات إلى بكين لتطوير سوقها الداخلي والانتقال تدريجيا من الاستثمار والتصدير إلى النمو الذي يقوده المستهلك. ومن المرجح أن تؤثر هذه الاتجاهات على حجم وتكوين الطلب العالمي في السنوات المقبلة. ويرجع ذلك جزئيا إلى أن زيادة الاستهلاك الصيني قد لا تعوض بشكل كامل الانخفاض المحتمل في نمو الطلب الأمريكي، ولكن أيضا لأن الاقتصادين يميلان إلى استيراد سلال مختلفة من السلع، مع شراء الصين المزيد من المواد الخام والسلع والمواد الغذائية، على سبيل المثال. وما لم تعزز بلدان الفائض التجاري األخرى مثل ألمانيا أو اليابان أيضا استهالكها المحلي، فإن التغيرات في الطلب العالمي سيكون لها تداعيات سلبية كبيرة على صادرات البلدان النامية، وكذلك على العمالة - ال سيما في قطاعات التصنيع مثل المنسوجات والملابس) ماير، 2018 (.
الشكل 9.2 - الاختلالات التجارية في الاقتصادات المختارة، 2008-10 (بملايين الدولارات)
المصدر: منظمة التجارة العالمية (2018b).
12 - واصلت التجارة فيما بين بلدان الجنوب أيضا التوسع، وهي تمثل الآن نحو 50 في المائة من صادرات البلدان النامية. وقد تضاعفت أحجام التجارة في أفريقيا مع شركائها الناشئين بالقيمة الاسمية على مدى العقد وأصبحت الآن تبلغ 37 في المائة من إجمالي التجارة في القارة (أفدب إت آل.، 2018). وفي حين تمثل الصين الشريك الناشئ الرائد في أفريقيا، بعد أن تجاوزت الولايات المتحدة من حيث الحجم، فإن حجم تجارة القارة مع شركائها الناشئين الآخرين (مثل تركيا والبرازيل وكوريا والهند) أصبح الآن أكبر من تجارته مع الصين. وفي حين توفر هذه التطورات فرصا جديدة - أسواق التصدير، ونقل التكنولوجيا، والمساعدات وغيرها من أشكال التعاون - لا تزال الصادرات الأفريقية إلى البلدان النامية الأخرى تركز إلى حد كبير على المنتجات الأولية، مع وجود أدلة قليلة حتى الآن على أن التجارة فيما بين بلدان الجنوب قد دفعت إلى تحول هيكلي حقيقي.
الشكل 9.3 - الواردات والصادرات: الولايات المتحدة والصين، 2005-11 (بملايين الدولارات الأمريكية)
الشكل 9.4 - الواردات والصادرات: ألمانيا والاتحاد الأوروبي، 2005-11 (بملايين الدولارات الأمريكية)
2-2 انهيار مفاوضات جولة الدوحة.
14 ومنذ كانون الثاني / يناير 2018، استمرت جولة الدوحة في التراجع، حيث لم يتم إغفال المواعيد النهائية لإنهاء المحادثات التي دامت عشر سنوات في نهاية ذلك العام والقادم، ولم يعد لها الآن نهاية في الأفق. على مدار العام، دعت الولايات المتحدة مرارا إلى المشاركة الإلزامية في الاتفاقات "القطاعية" للمنتجات المصنعة، وذلك بسبب التعريفات المائلة عبر صناعة بأكملها. رفضت البرازيل والصين والهند مطالبة الولايات المتحدة للاقتصادات الناشئة الرئيسية بالاضطلاع بمسؤوليات معينة، وعارضت ادعاء واشنطن بأن مسودات نصوص ديسمبر / كانون الأول 2008 تعاقب الولايات المتحدة بشكل غير متناسب، حيث تدعو الولايات المتحدة بدلا من ذلك إلى توضيح التنازلات المحددة التي قد تقدمها واشنطن مقابل زيادة الوصول إلى الأسواق.
15 وفي الوقت نفسه، قدمت مجموعة البلدان النامية من مجموعة ال 33 مجموعة من المقترحات لصالح "آلية حماية خاصة" قوية يمكن أن تستخدمها للدفاع عن المنتجين الزراعيين المحليين من الزيادات المفاجئة في الواردات أو انخفاض الأسعار. وواصلت الولايات المتحدة وغيرها من البلدان المصدرة الإصرار على ألا تقوض مواطن المرونة في البلدان النامية النمو في التجارة العادية.
(16) بعد إجراء عملية تقييم لم يسبق لها مثيل في آذار / مارس 2018، اجتمع الأعضاء خلال معظم السنة المتبقية في مختلف المجموعات الثنائية والمتعددة الأطراف غير الرسمية التي وصفها المدير العام لمنظمة التجارة العالمية باسكال لامي بأنها "هندسة متغيرة". كما ظهرت التجارة فى المناقشات التى جرت على هامش اجتماعات منظمة التعاون والتنمية فى الميدان الاقتصادى ومنتدى التعاون الاقتصادى لاسيا والباسيفيك / ابيك / وعلى جدول اعمال قمة تورنتو وسيول لمجموعة مجموعة العشرين من الاقتصادات الرائدة - فقط للمسؤولين لتجد أن مصالح القوى التجارية الكبرى لا تزال غير قريبة بما فيه الكفاية من أجل التوصل إلى اتفاق الدوحة في المستقبل القريب. وفي أوائل عام 2018، قدمت المكسيك والبرازيل مقترحات منفصلة بشأن كسر حالة الجمود في الدوحة، بما في ذلك إمكانية إجراء مقايضات بين مجالات التفاوض المنفصلة مثل الزراعة والسلع المصنعة، غير أن هذه البلدان لم تجد دعما يذكر في هيئة التجارة العالمية. واعترافا بأن الفجوات تزداد صعوبة، بدأ المفاوضون التجاريون مناقشة خيارات "الهبوط الناعم". وقد أكد الإفراج عن النصوص المنقحة أو وثائق العمل في أبريل / نيسان 2018 مخاوف من تعثر التقدم، حيث لم يتمكن بعض رؤساء المجموعات التفاوضية إلا من الإفراج عن تقارير "حالة اللعب" بدلا من مشاريع جديدة.
17 ثم بدأ الأعضاء مناقشات هادئة حول ما قد تبدو عليه "الخطة ب". وأعلن عن الخطة رسميا في أيار / مايو: سيضع الأعضاء الصيغة النهائية لحزمة صغيرة تركز على شواغل أقل البلدان نموا بالنسبة للوزراء الوزاريين في كانون الأول / ديسمبر، وستضع أيضا خطة عمل لحل المسائل المعلقة الأخرى. وبناء على إصرار الولايات المتحدة، تم توسيع الحزمة لتشمل قضايا غير أقل البلدان نموا أيضا. ومع ذلك، بدأت الحزمة بسرعة في كشفها حيث أصبح الأعضاء غير قادرين على الاتفاق على البنود التي تشمل أقل البلدان نموا والبلدان غير الأقل نموا. وقد ثبت أن التوصل إلى توافق في الآراء بعيد المنال بشأن القضايا الرئيسية الأربعة التي سعت أقل البلدان نموا إلى تضمينها: إتاحة صادراتها بدون رسوم جمركية؛ والتنازل عن خدمات أقل البلدان نموا، و "خطوة إلى الأمام" بشأن القطن، وتحسين قواعد المنشأ. وبالمثل، لم تتمكن القوى التجارية من الاتفاق على العدد المتزايد من القضايا "غير المتعلقة بأقل البلدان نموا" التي تراوحت بين إعانات مصايد الأسماك وتسهيل التجارة والمنافسة التصديرية.
18 وبحلول آب / أغسطس، تحولت الخطة الوزارية التي عقدت في كانون الأول / ديسمبر 2018 بعيدا عن إنتاج مجموعة من البلدان الأقل نموا: قرر الأعضاء بدلا من ذلك التركيز على القضايا غير الدوحة وعلى خطة عمل ما بعد كانون الأول / ديسمبر لإبرام الدوحة، والنتائج المحتملة لأقل البلدان نموا.
3 - إدارة التجارة العالمية العادلة والشاملة للجميع.
19 وتفسر عدة عوامل عدم قدرة الأعضاء على اختتام المحادثات التجارية. Some point to the fact that the negotiating process has become too politicised and complex, given the growing diversity and varied expectations of the WTO’s 153-country membership. Others blame the rise of emerging economies such as Brazil, China and India, together with more assertive developing country coalitions. Others still link it to the global financial crisis and recent domestic difficulties in the EU and the US which have prevented those countries from fully exercising a leadership role in WTO negotiations. Finally, countries’ positions and negotiating interests have changed over time reflecting nowadays geopolitical dynamics. All these factors are relevant, but critics are increasingly pointing to a more fundamental flaw in the system, which relates to the way in which negotiations are conducted. Some observers have therefore argued that thorough reform of the system is needed to overcome the current paralysis.
20 Others remark that it is not necessarily the WTO’s institutional procedures that have paralysed the organisation, but rather the way in which members have chosen to use its rules and practices (Rodriguez Mendoza and Wilke, 2018; Rolland, 2018). In fact some experts argue that the WTO has served as a model governance system at the international level, predominantly because of its automatic and enforceable dispute settlement system. Moreover, through its set of rules and disciplines, it is argued, the WTO has also been successful in preventing protectionist tendencies during economic crisis.
1 The Warwick Report , for example, provides one of the most notable and comprehensive stock-taking e (. )
21 Nonetheless debate over institutional reform – whether it is needed, in what form and via what kind of process – has continued ever since the WTO was first established (Deere-Birbeck and Monagle, 2009). In 2003, after the failure of the Cancún Ministerial Conference, Pascal Lamy – then EU trade commissioner – qualified the WTO as ‘medieval’ and called for its decision-making process to be revamped (Lamy, 2003). In recent years, various actors have proposed reforming virtually every aspect of the WTO’s functioning – from management and administration through the conduct of trade negotiations and dispute settlement, to capacity-building and cooperation with other institutions or the public at large (Deere-Birbeck and Monagle, 2009). The objectives behind those proposals and the pace of proposed reforms have been equally diverse, going from incremental improvements to radical changes in the way the institution functions. While some proposals have been introduced by governments, others have been put forward by academia, research institutes, civil society and other international organisations.1 The multilateral system itself has not been static in the face of these demands. Reforms – or incremental changes – have happened on a number of fronts, including at the management level, in external transparency, public participation in dispute settlement proceedings or in the way in which negotiations are conducted (Deere-Birbeck and Monagle, 2009). There are, however, diverging views on the desirability and impact of these changes and on whether they go far enough.
2 When governments launched the Uruguay Round of trade negotiations under the GATT in 1986, the decl (. )
22 The debate sparked renewed interest as members prepared for the November 2009 Ministerial. After ten years of complex negotiations, characterised by missed deadlines and few substantive dividends, critics have argued that the body’s established rules, principles and practices of decision-making, carried over from the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT),2 are simply ill-suited to the fast changing challenges of our times. Some even argue that the GATT/WTO’s ‘golden triangle’ of decision-making – the dominance of contracting parties, the consensus principle and the logic of the ‘single undertaking’ – is unable to meet the challenges of modern global trade governance (Cottier and Elsig, 2009).
23 Strengthening the WTO’s negotiation functioning will require balancing three competing demands: greater efficiency in the conduct of negotiations; enhanced legitimacy including by better addressing public policy concerns; and greater inclusiveness, so as to overcome power asymmetries and foster mutually beneficial outcomes. The following sections review some of the criticism and the proposed reform options for the WTO’s conduct of negotiations in light of these objectives.
3.1 The principles of consensus and the single undertaking.
3 The consensus principle dates back to the International Trade Organization (ITO) and with it the e (. ) 4 ‘With the exception of the improvements and clarifications of the DSU, the conduct, conclusion and (. )
24 WTO negotiations are guided by the consensus principle and by the idea that they represent a single undertaking . Consensus is not interpreted as requiring unanimity; however,3 if no present member state objects, consensus is assumed. The single undertaking, on the other hand, requires that all areas are negotiated and adopted by all parties at the same time .4 Both principles derive directly from the WTO’s nature as a member-driven organisation. With the secretariat assuming an almost marginal role and the consensus principle on the basis of sovereign equality permeating all areas and functions of the organisation, the dominance of contracting parties is its main characteristic.
25 Each concept can be seen as a double-edged sword. The consensus principle is important for developing countries as, in theory, it guarantees that every member can veto any decisions, irrespective of its political or economic power. The single undertaking, on the other hand, has supported developing countries on numerous occasions, for instance when a group of Latin American members halted the establishment of the WTO until certain concessions of vital interest to developing countries had been made (Croome, 1995).
26 Both pillars nonetheless need to be seen in the context of the overarching power asymmetries at the WTO. In practice, wealthier nations can hold trade talks hostage more easily than poorer ones, because of the fact that they are better able to withstand political pressure to join a consensus even against great opposition (Steinberg, 2002; Cottier and Elsig, 2009; Low, 2009). The consensus principle is thus less about the actual consensual adoption of a final decision than about the process of consensus-building (Ismail and Vickers, 2018). The largest trading nations therefore bear particular responsibility for helping countries to reach agreement by guiding the process of consensus-building and facilitating an atmosphere of compromise. Ismail and Vickers thus note that, in the Doha round, ‘[d]eveloped countries also share considerable blame – even responsibility – for frustrating the process of consensus-building. It is […] disturbing that critics of the consensus principle raise efficiency concerns only when smaller developing countries and larger emerging economies (e. g. Brazil, China, India and South Africa) do not join the consensus of the developed countries’ (Ismail and Vickers, 2018).
27 This is similarly true for the single undertaking and the use of ‘linkages’ to condition concessions in one area to progress in others. While in principle these could foster compromises by focusing negotiators’ attention on the greatest gains, in practice members tend to overemphasise the losses (Van Grasstek and Sauvé, 2006). This is particularly true for the current round, where negotiators do not seek to establish linkages systematically with a view to achieving long-term benefits, but focus instead on achieving short-term gains for tactical reasons (Rodriguez Mendoza and Wilke, 2018). The introduction of linkages prevents certain areas from moving ahead independent of progress in others. As a result, even small deals cannot be reached, as new proposals prompt further linkages.
28 Proposals to reform those two core negotiating principles (Deere-Birbeck and Monagle, 2009) can be summarised in two categories: those introducing different voting systems, and those relating to ‘variable geometry agreements’ including so-called ‘plurilateral’ and ‘critical mass’ agreements.
5 Note that weighted voting at the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund (IMF) is based on (. )
29 Proposals on weighted voting (one suggestion for reforming the consensus principle) and critical mass agreements share a common idea. Power – be it for voting, agenda setting or participation in negotiations – would reflect a country’s economic significance. The allocation of votes could thus reflect a country’s share in global trade, GDP or the level of market openness. Some experts also suggest taking into account country size or population, arguing that this would ensure power is shared fairly among developed, emerging and other developing countries (Cottier and Takenoshita, 2008; Elsig, 2009). However, experience with weighted voting approaches in the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and World Bank show that the approach can easily manifest real power asymmetries rather than overcoming imbalances (Warwick Commission, 2007).5.
30 The current voting system does not suffer from a large group of small countries blocking negotiations, but instead from a handful of powerful countries that are unable to reach agreement among themselves. The alternative, a simple majority vote, could be difficult to introduce as it would undermine the currently powerful position of developed countries by enabling groups of smaller countries to overrule them. Experience in the United Nations (UN) General Assembly indicates that many countries would systematically oppose the introduction of a simple majority vote (Anghie, 2005).
31 The concept of ‘variable geometry’ agreements is an alternative to the single undertaking. Plurilateral agreements, for example, have already been used in the past. Here, the participation of all WTO members is not required in order to strike a deal and interested members are free to join the negotiation or not. Several experts have suggested reviving and enhancing this approach (Consultative Board, 2004; Elsig, 2008). The critical ‘mass approach’ is slightly different in the sense that it requires that participating members represent at least a critical mass or a certain threshold of a sector under negotiation based on their collective level of economic activity, production, consumption or exports (Jackson, 2001). Supporters argue that the inclusion of import share in the threshold would ensure that critical mass agreements could not be misused by exporters to harmonise their export systems to the detriment of importers – an issue they consider to be of increasing importance as, for instance, high-technology producing countries face shortages in needed raw materials that are extracted in only a handful of countries (ICTSD, 2018d). Proposed thresholds range from 75 to 90 per cent. Proponents argue that the threshold could further be coupled with the requirement to include at least a minimum number of countries. If constructed in a sensitive way, supporters suggest, this second requirement could ensure the legitimacy of a particular critical mass rather than only its efficiency. The Warwick Commission, for instance, notes that ‘a positive global welfare benefit, to protect the principle of non-discrimination, and to accommodate explicitly the income distribution effects of rule-making’ would need to be part of a critical mass consideration, in particular ‘when it relates to the formation of an agenda’ (Warwick Commission, 2007, 3).
32 It needs to be cautioned, however, that most of the proposals for a critical mass approach focus on negotiations on ‘downstream’ modalities and concessions (basically market access), thus limiting thresholds to purely economic considerations. As the WTO moves towards addressing a greater array of trade-related policies, such a critical mass concept might be inappropriate. Small countries, for instance, may not have a particular export or import trade share in a certain sector and are thus not indispensable for a critical mass, yet they would be critically affected by any new rules – be this on agriculture commodities or new regulation on services trade. This is particularly true as ‘trends in rule-making’ increasingly serve as a reference for legal interpretation and new regulatory approaches are used as a reference and argument in non-related yet similar negotiations. Each negotiation is thus also about shaping global policy and law trends.
6 ‘ The agreements and associated legal instruments included in Annex 4 (hereinafter referred to as ‘ (. )
33 Another aspect that continues to be disputed among the supporters of a critical mass approach is the ‘most favoured nation’ (MFN) character of the final agreements. Current plurilateral WTO agreements (where no critical mass was required) only apply among the members that have signed them.6 If further strengthened, this approach has the potential to turn the WTO into an umbrella organisation facilitating group arrangements while losing its multilateral and thus participatory and inclusive character. To meet this concern, alternative proposals suggest extending the rights and benefits deriving from critical mass agreements on an MFN basis to all WTO members (Warwick Commission, 2007). This could preserve the multilateral character of the WTO and thus its integrity while supporting ‘fast-track’ negotiations.
34 However, even the latter construct raises certain questions. First, assuming that a given sector was irrelevant for a particular country at the time when a critical mass negotiation was concluded, it remains unclear how the country could be induced to join the agreement if the benefits already apply on an MFN basis. Also, it is unclear whether a country would be required to join the existing agreement or whether there would be an option to renegotiate the terms (Harbinson, 2009). If no changes were allowed, powerful groups could now conclude agreements that become relevant for developing countries only at a later stage, thus indirectly imposing their terms and conditions. Criticisms regarding a trend towards WTO-plus commitments in FTAs and the fear over the Anti-Counterfeit Trade Agreement (ACTA) introducing a new global benchmark for the protection of intellectual property come to mind in this respect (ICTSD, 2008b).
3.2 Redirecting the dominance of member states.
35 While some of the proposals discussed above might be promising, neither a review of the voting procedures nor a critical mass approach in isolation of other reforms seem to have the potential to fully achieve the three objectives of WTO reform, namely, efficiency, legitimacy and inclusiveness. Instead, if implemented in their simplest form, both concepts risk excluding smaller countries and exacerbating power asymmetries. Also, none of the proposed reforms would be likely to resolve the current deadlock in the Doha round which results, to a large extent, from political differences rather than weak procedural rules. In this respect, some critics have challenged the ‘member-driven’ nature of the institution. They argue that a stronger WTO secretariat could be useful, particularly in times where members fail to initiate needed deliberations or where discussions are paralysed by individual member states’ political actions. ‘If members are not prepared to defend and promote the principles they subscribed to, then the Secretariat must be free to do so’, the Sutherland report noted already in 2004 (Consultative Board, 2004).
7 See for instance the 2003 ‘Memorandum on the Need to Improve Internal Transparency and Participati (. )
36 Such proposals, however, need to be seen in the light of already existing criticism over a too powerful and partial WTO secretariat. The same stakeholders fear that strengthening the secretariat could create a strong institution following its own internal agenda.7 Consequentially, the challenge would be a strong, yet neutral secretariat. Proponents agree that this could only be guaranteed if member states were to ensure a constant participation and oversight. Efforts on strengthening the secretariat would thus focus primarily on increased political support by member states rather than a budgetary increase or a mandate extension as advocated by others. The idea behind this is to redirect but not replace the preponderant role of member states, i. e. to strengthen the WTO through increased policy deliberation among its members.
8 For instance, during the 7th Ministerial Conference in 2009, the delegation of Uruguay called upon (. )
37 One important starting point could be the election process of the Director General (Consultative Board, 2004; Steger, 2009). This process provides a critical opportunity to reflect on the most pressing challenges facing the organisation. If candidates were to take a strong position while countries provided them with clear indications on what is expected over the coming term, directors would receive a strong mandate to lead and guide even in critical times (Deere-Birbeck and Monagle, 2009, 74). The current practice of ‘nodding through’ rather than ‘electing’ a new Director General, without any internal and external reflection process, on the other hand, weakens the position of the Director General, the member states and the WTO as an institution (Keohane and Nye, 2000). A second point of entry could be the regular Ministerial Conferences. If members used the meetings to reflect on the standing of the WTO, the way forward and the actions expected in the coming years, the secretariat could guide the organisation accordingly over the coming months. In fact Ministerial Conferences were originally meant to provide for such a forum. Only with the launch of the Doha Round they have turned into pure negotiation gatherings. Numerous developing countries have consistently criticised this development.8.
3.3. Forum and process.
38 As described above, there has been no shortage of thoughtful ideas and recommendations from a variety of different sources and study groups. But some critics argue that these ideas have gone nowhere because they have had no process to feed into. Currently only one set of proposals is being discussed in a formalised manner at the WTO, namely those related to dispute settlement (WTO, 1999b). As foreseen by the original WTO agreements a special session of the Dispute Settlement Body (DSB) has been reviewing related reform proposals since 1997. Formally it proceeds outside of the Doha Round and is not part of the single undertaking. In practice, however, the review is used as a trade-off opportunity in the Doha Round which has prevented any conclusion over the last 14 years. To allow for a proper debate, other reform proposals will also need to be addressed in a formalised process at the WTO. Such a process would probably need to involve and engage trade ministers themselves to generate sufficient credibility and political traction. Ideally, the process should be co-chaired and co-owned by a developing and a developed country trade minister.
39 At the same time, the experience of the Dispute Settlement Understanding (DSU) review shows that any reform discussion must be de-linked from trade negotiations. Enforcing such an objective and non-concession-based discussion could be easier if various reform proposals were debated in a joint forum with a common objective and a single plan of action. Moreover, a joint process would facilitate the coordination of different reforms ensuring that the executive, legislative and judicial branches of the WTO do not develop in opposite directions but are mutually supportive.
40 A first opportunity to initiate such a process was missed at the 7th Ministerial Conference, in December 2009, essentially due to a lack of political will to push this agenda through. During the preparatory process and under the leadership of India, 18 developed and developing countries had proposed to address the need for an institutional reform in a formalised and long-term manner. The coalition, backed by almost the entire WTO membership, called upon the WTO to ‘[…] periodically engage in a process of review of its functioning, efficiency and transparency’ and upon the member states ‘[to] consider systemic improvements, as appropriate. […] to establish an appropriate deliberative process to review the organization’s functioning, efficiency and transparency and consider possible improvements, while bearing in mind the high priority […] attach[ed] to the successful conclusion of the DDA [Doha Development Agenda] negotiation’ (WTO, 2009).
41 However, the proposal was dropped from consideration following opposition from Bolivia, Cuba, Ecuador, Nicaragua and Venezuela ( ICTSD , 2009) . An earlier communication submitted by India in summer 2009, entitled ‘Strengthening the WTO’, likewise remained without further consideration ( Deere-Birbeck, 2009) . These missed opportunities further aggravate the dilemma of the WTO as political guidance becomes hampered at the very first stage ( Deere-Birbeck, 2009) . If the secretariat assumed a more active role in preparing ministerial conferences and guiding towards processes as those called upon by the country coalition, initial opposition might be overcome. As a formal forum for discussing reform proposals continues to be missing, this could be the first step towards reform.
4. The WTO and global public policy goals: the example of food security.
42 Beyond institutional reform, the current paralysis in the Doha Round is affecting the ability of the system to address pressing global challenges. Over the last 17 years, public perceptions of the organisation’s relevance and legitimacy have greatly depended on the degree to which it can credibly claim to be responding effectively to broader public policy demands in areas such as food security, environmental protection, labour standards and, more recently, the transition towards a low-carbon economy. However, the difficulty the WTO has experienced in bringing its troubled Doha Round talks to a successful conclusion is arguably hampering its ability to respond and adapt meaningfully to new public policy challenges.
43 From its inception in 1994 as an organisation outside the UN system, the WTO has consistently been obliged to demonstrate that its decision-making processes, rules and negotiating outcomes are consistent with broader public policy goals – in the areas of health, the environment or development, to name but a few. While calls for greater policy coherence have often come from the governments that constitute the membership of the global trade body, they have also come from civil society groups, the media and even from other intergovernmental agencies concerned with the relationship between trade and public policy objectives.
9 Policies directed at ensuring food security certainly reach beyond the trade arena. Investment in (. )
44 The evolution in the way in which food security concerns are addressed at the WTO can serve to illustrate the organisation’s attempt to take wider public policy goals into account.9 It also demonstrates the challenges that remain in establishing policy coherence with other global governance mechanisms, and in responding to the scale and ambition of the aspirations and commitments that governments have agreed to in the post-war period (United Nations General Assembly, 1948, art. 25; 1 966, art. 11; 2000, goal 1) (FAO, 1996, para. 2).
45 At the global level, evolving consumption patterns, combined with demographic changes, urbanisation and low agricultural productivity growth, are widely expected to mean that regional and international trade will play an increased role in many developing countries’ food security strategies. Combined with increased investment in agriculture, international trade mighthelp offset future climate-induced production decreases in certain regions, ensuring that local populations can purchase food that may be unavailable in sufficient quantities through domestic production.
10 ‘Food security exists when all people, at all times, have physical and economic access to sufficie (. )
46 Two years before the 1996 World Food Summit agreed on a landmark definition10 of food security that is still widely used and accepted today, the concept was mentioned in the preamble to the Agreement on Agriculture at the end of the Uruguay Round, and in some paragraphs within the text of the accord. These included provisions dealing with export prohibitions and restrictions (article 12), subsidies for public stockholding for food security purposes (Annex 2, para. 3) and a clause permitting exemptions to be made from market access binding and reduction commitments (Annex 5, para. 1d). However, while food security is also related to numerous other aspects of the agreement, such as subsidy reform or market access considerations, it is not explicitly mentioned anywhere else in the text.
11 See, for example, proposals from the developing country ‘Like Minded Group’ (23 June 2000), G/AG/N (. )
47 As governments concluded the Agreement on Agriculture, they also finalised the Marrakech Decision (WTO, 1999c) on least developed and net-food importing developing countries, supposedly intended to ensure that these countries would remain able to purchase food from external sources ‘on reasonable terms and conditions’. The decision has since been widely criticised by developing countries, who have argued that loopholes in the text prevent them from requiring developed countries and the international financial institutions to implement its provisions.11 Essentially, the decision characterises the challenge that net food-importing countries could face as a trade and balance-of-payments problem rather than a food security problem, and provides a fairly limited set of solutions centring mainly on the provision of food aid.
48 Arguably, the way in which food security concerns have been approached in the multilateral trading system has evolved considerably since the end of the Uruguay Round, along with the way in which other public policy goals have been treated. In the years running up to the 2001 Doha ministerial conference, developing country governments expressed growing concern that they were ill-equipped to implement the Uruguay Round agreements, that the provisions of these agreements undermined domestic food security, or – as in the case of the Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS) – that they had signed on to texts which affected their food security without fully understanding the practical and legal implications that might result. In some cases, these concerns were also echoed by development agencies and campaign groups, farmers’ organisations, research centres, academic experts and the staff of various intergovernmental organisations.
12 Cuba, Dominican Republic, Honduras, Pakistan, Haiti, Nicaragua, Kenya, Uganda, Zimbabwe, Sri Lanka (. ) 13 India (15 January 2001), G/AG/NG/W/102, wto/english/tratop_e/agric_e/negs_bkgrnd02_p(. ) 14 Domestic support measures that are exempt from reduction commitments on the basis that they cause (. )
49 In the summer following the WTO’s Seattle ministerial conference in 1999, a cross-regional group of 11 developing countries known as the Like-Minded Group submitted a proposal12 for a ‘development box’, under the built-in agenda of negotiations foreseen in article 20 of the Agreement on Agriculture. The sponsors called for a development box that would aim to ‘increase food security and food accessibility’ by allowing developing countries to select which products would be disciplined under the rules of the Agreement on Agriculture; allowing developing countries to re-evaluate and adjust their tariff levels; provide greater flexibility for developing countries to use limited amounts of trade-distorting support under the de minimis provision (WTO, 1999a, art. 6.4); and allowing developing countries to use the special safeguard clause. Measures to reform developed country subsidies and tariffs were also included as part of the same proposal. The Indian government echoed many of these proposals in an early 2001 submission13 calling for the establishment of a ‘food security box’, which also contemplated measures to reform rules on ‘green box’ subsidies.14 Several of the elements outlined in the development box proposal were later to appear, in modified form, in subsequent negotiating submissions and texts.
50 The Doha declaration launching a new round of trade talks – dubbed the ‘Doha Development Agenda’ by the WTO – also made explicit reference to food security goals. It stated that developing countries would be accorded special and differential treatment so as to enable them to take account effectively of their development needs, ‘including food security and rural development’ (WTO, 2001, para. 13). Such treatment was to be an ‘integral part’ of all elements of the negotiations, the declaration said, in language that was to be echoed in a large number of negotiating proposals submitted in the years that were to follow.
15 ‘Substantial improvements in market access; reductions of, with a view to phasing out, all forms o (. )
51 The dozens of proposals that invoked food security during the Doha Round, and in the years immediately before its launch, can be roughly divided into a handful of broad, non-exhaustive categories, largely reflecting the emphasis of the agriculture negotiations on four main areas15:
52 On market access, many developing countries sought to be granted greater flexibility on tariff commitments, and access to an agricultural safeguard that would allow themselves to shield producers from the effects of import surges or price depressions.
16 A provision allowing developing countries to exempt some input and investment subsidies from reduc (. )
53 Food security concerns were discussed in relation to trade-distorting support in general, but were also given particular attention in proposals for reform of the WTO’s green box, and for maintaining or expanding article 6.2 of the Uruguay Round Agreement on Agriculture.16.
54 The issue of food security also arose in negotiations on proposed new disciplines governing the provision of food aid, and in debates on export credits and other export competition issues.
55 Finally, importing countries in particular raised questions and concerns over food security in proposals on export restrictions (including export taxes and export prohibitions).
56 In each of these areas, different political constituencies and country grouping were active in seeking concessions.
17 See, for example, G-33 proposals: 1 June 2004 (JOB(04)/65); 3 June 2005 (JOB(05)/91); 12 Oct 2005 (. )
57 On special products and the special safeguard mechanism, a group of import-sensitive developing countries that came to be known as the G-33 argued in favour of greater flexibility on market access disciplines, on the basis that this was needed to safeguard the livelihoods, food security and longer-term development of their rural populations, including large numbers of small-scale producers that would be ill-equipped to compete with industrialised (and often also subsidised) agriculture elsewhere in the world.17 Analysis by the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), the International Centre for Trade and Sustainable Development (ICTSD) and the South Centre – including country level studies – helped contribute to the evolution of countries’ negotiating positions on these issues (Mably, 2007; Wolfe, 2009; ICTSD/FAO, 2007; Matthews, 2018).
18 See, for example, various exporting country proposals: 2 May 2006 (JOB(06)/135); 3 May 2006 (JOB(0 (. )
58 The G-33 proposed allowing developing countries to designate a limited set of products as ‘special’ based on objective indicators of food security, livelihood security and rural development. Such indicators included, for example, the share of local income spent on a particular product, employment by product, productivity levels, rates of self-sufficiency, or the contribution of a product to local nutrition. Based on this country-specific analysis the tariffs of the selected products would then qualify for gentler reduction under the Doha Round, or would even be exempt from any cuts. The G-33, however, encountered opposition to their proposals from developed countries seeking greater access to developing country markets, such as the US, but also from exporting developing countries, such as Argentina, Paraguay and Uruguay.18 Controversy over the special safeguard mechanism played a significant role in the breakdown of talks in July 2008 (ICTSD, 2008a).
59 Despite the disagreements in this area, the debate over special products in particular probably represents the most sophisticated attempt at defining food and livelihood security concerns in the WTO and how they relate to international trade. It is also symptomatic of how the discussion evolved over time in the trade body from a fairly narrow understanding of food security to a highly complex and differentiated approach based on indicators.
19 See African Group proposal, 20 Nov 2007 (JOB(02)/187).
60 Food security concerns were also given particular attention in the review of the criteria for green box subsidies, as well as in the negotiations on domestic support more generally. The African Group (a group of developing countries that seeks reform of developed country agriculture), along with the G-20, has sought to expand the flexibility that the green box allows developing countries in being able to use domestic support to pursue national development goals.19 Among other things, these proposals would involve modifying the language on support for public stockholding for food security purposes so as to remove the existing requirement that developing countries count purchases from low-income or resource-poor producers towards their ‘aggregate measure of support’ (AMS) – an upper ceiling which would be reduced as part of the Doha Round negotiations.
20 16 May 2006 (JOB(06)/145). 21 Arguably, civil society organisations also played an important role in highlighting some of these (. ) 22 See, for example, proposals dated 27 Sept 2002: Cairns Group (JOB(02)/132) and Canada (JOB(02)/131) 23 21 Dec 2000 (G/AG/NG/W/91), wto/english/tratop_e/agric_e/negs_bkgrnd11_nontrade_e. h(. ) 24 14 Dec 2000 (G/AG/NG/W/90), wto/english/tratop_e/agric_e/negs_bkgrnd11_nontrade_e. ht(. )
61 In addition to proposals favouring greater flexibility for developing countries to subsidise their own agriculture sectors, two other main trends can be identified in the discussions on green box reform and in the debate over domestic support more generally (Hepburn and Bellmann, 2009). The first of these is the concern expressed by the G-2020 and by efficient agricultural exporters in the Cairns Group, which have argued that trade-distorting support undermines competitiveness and food security in countries that do not subsidise their agricultural sectors.21 These countries have also argued that green box programmes may be causing more than minimal trade distortion, and called for the criteria for these payments to be tightened.22 The other major trend is characterised by the proposals of countries with highly protected and heavily subsidised agricultural sectors, which have resisted such demands. These countries – which include Japan23 and others in the G-10 coalition, as well as, to a lesser extent, the EU24 – have instead historically called for greater flexibility to allow WTO members to address ‘non-trade concerns’, including food security.
25 See WTO (2005), para. 6. The text further specifies:‘On food aid, we reconfirm our commitment to m (. ) 26 6 March 2006 (TN/AG/GEN/13). 27 25 Apr 2006 (JOB(06)/122). 28 7 Apr 2006 (JOB(06)/78).
62 Food security was also debated extensively in the negotiations over new rules on food aid. In exchange for agreeing, at the WTO’s Hong Kong Ministerial in 2005, to the elimination of export subsidies, the EU had pressed trading partners to adopt ‘disciplines on all export measures with equivalent effect’ – including food aid.25 At the heart of the debate was the notion that in-kind food aid or practices such as monetisation have sometimes disrupted local food markets and affected local producers. While members agreed that a ‘safe box’ would cover bona fide emergency situations, they also agreed to introduce rules that would prevent aid from undermining local producers in non-emergency situations. A proposal from the African and LDC groups26 formed the basis for negotiations, with further contributions from the European Community27 and the US28 – the world’s major provider of in-kind food aid (ICTSD, 2006).
29 Cairns Group, 21 Dec 2000 (G/AG/NG/W/93); Japan, 15 Nov 2002 (JOB(02)/164); Mauritius, 19 Nov 2002 (. )
63 While the impact of export restrictions on food security has been a concern of various WTO members since the start of the Doha Round,29 debate and controversy over this issue has recently intensified, as two episodes of unusually high food prices and predictions of a long-term upward price trend for agricultural products increase the pressure on food importing countries, especially in the developing world (ICTSD, 2018, 2018b, c). While net-food-importing countries have drawn on analysis (FAO et al., 2018) by FAO staff and other experts to argue that export restrictions endanger food security by exacerbating shortages and volatility on world markets, exporting countries have thus far resisted any attempts to introduce more systemic disciplines in this area that go beyond the relatively limited disciplines set out in the Agreement on Agriculture or contemplated in the latest draft Doha agriculture accord. In part, this may be because of the role such measures play in supporting a strategy of enhancing value-addition in the exporting countries’ agriculture sector, and partly because of concerns that they could serve a useful role in responding to potential domestic food shortages. However, possibly more important is a more generalised reluctance on the part of exporting countries to make concessions in the absence of more far-reaching disciplines on trade distortions on the import side.
64 Despite the post-2008 stalemate in the WTO’s Doha process, the same price trends and projections have helped to push food security back towards the top of the agenda in a number of political and policy-making processes, with the role of trade receiving some attention in this context. A series of high-level meetings – the G-8’s meeting in L’Aquila in 2008, the FAO’s World Summit on Food Security in 2009 and the G-20 gathering of agriculture ministers in 2018 – reflected the increased political importance being accorded to the question. However, while heads of state and ministers reaffirmed the importance of access to markets and pledged their commitment to raise agricultural productivity by boosting aid and investment, the WTO continues to be seen as the sole forum where concrete market access and subsidy commitments can be made. Even where agreement on trade-related measures has been reached, such as the G-20’s June 2018 accord on exempting humanitarian food purchases from export restrictions, governments have recommended that further action be taken at the WTO (ICTSD, 2018a). Other trade-related issues such as biofuel subsidies have proven to be too controversial to be addressed meaningfully by the G-8 or G-20 (Tangermann, 2018), leaving their food security implications unresolved for the time being.
65 The establishment of the UN’s High Level Task Force on the Global Food Security Crisis , the elaboration of its Comprehensive Framework of Action and the reform of the Committee on World Food Security (CWFS) were significant steps in the effort to improve global governance and enhance policy coherence in this area. The WTO, FAO and eight other relevant bodies also collaborated around the inter-agency report to the G-20 in the first half of 2018 (FAO et al., 2018). However, much more could still be done in this regard. Recent suggestions have included ensuring that the WTO Committee on Agriculture takes a more active role in reviewing food security issues related to trade, and strengthening the collaboration between the CWFS, the WTO, the World Bank and the Rome-based institutions (Ahmad, 2018). Reforming and improving the international governance framework is a necessary step towards overcoming current shortcomings on trade and food security, even though by itself it will not be sufficient to do so.
66 Measures to enhance policy coherence and to reform governance structures at the international level will, however, need to be accompanied by similar moves at the domestic level, especially in key countries. The disconnect between governance mechanisms responsible for development and aid, for the environment and for agricultural policy can mean that, for example, EU or US policies on farm subsidies may be at odds with policies pursued on related issues such as climate or poverty. Furthermore, to a great extent, the geopolitical tensions between countries and blocs that have thwarted progress on international trade issues are mirrored by similar tensions on climate change, food security and development issues more generally. Behind these lie configurations of domestic interests and political constituencies at the national and sub-national level. The shifting global economic landscape of the last decade has thrown up new opportunities and threats for different actors, in developed countries as well as in the so-called ‘emerging’ countries of the developing world, and created new challenges for the world’s poorest people – whether they live in the group of countries that the UN officially recognises as LDCs, or elsewhere.
67 Even among trade negotiators, there is a growing awareness that the multilateral trading system is proving increasingly incapable of demonstrating that it is flexible and adaptable enough to prove its relevance in a changing world. At the same time, negotiators are reluctant to abandon the investment that has been made in elaborating a package of farm trade disciplines that are perceived to go some way towards restructuring an agricultural trading system that has been heavily criticised for failing to deliver on a range of global public policy goals, including food security. Any decision to abandon the Doha talks, or place them in deep freeze, would arguably leave a large ‘Doha-shaped hole’: current patterns of trade-distorting support and tariff protection would remain unchanged, in addition to the new trade and food security challenges that are emerging. Until countries are able to resolve the growing contradictions between domestic policies on trade, food security, climate and international development, there is little prospect of achieving greater policy coherence in these areas at the global level.
5. Conclusion and the way forward.
68 The WTO is not what it used to be a decade or so ago. Many new developing countries have since joined, and shifts in the balance of global economic and political power have transformed the playing field. Accordingly, new needs and different expectations have emerged, including demands on the decision-making processes, and their fairness and transparency. As described above, modern global trade governance requires a careful balance between greater efficiency, legitimacy and inclusiveness. These objectives are not incompatible, but would require WTO members to move from essentially promoting their individual short-term mercantilist interests to developing a shared vision to effectively advance global public policy goals. Numerous proposals have been put forward to strengthen the multilateral trading system. But as for any intergovernmental institution, change must come, and be agreed to, from the inside. This calls for the establishment of an inclusive and bottom-up process, one that seeks input from all WTO members, as well as seeking submissions from the different actors in the international trade community. Only with such a process will ideas have a realistic chance to be considered, and be transformed into agents for strengthening the system.
30 See WT/GC/W/605, July 2009, wto/english/thewto_e/gcounc_e/meet_jul09_e. htm (accesse (. )
69 Years of near-exclusive focus on the Doha Round have inhibited institutional evolution and even diminished some of the WTO’s permanent, non-negotiating functions such as the work of the regular committees. Beyond the WTO negotiating function, there might be therefore merit in strengthening the work of the regular WTO committees. In the run-up to the 2009 Ministerial Conference, several such proposals were put on the table, notably by India.30 These covered a variety of issues such as the need to enhance the WTO trade information system by including data on non-tariff barriers; monitor developments in regional trade agreements (RTAs) and develop non-binding best practice guidelines for negotiating new RTAs; establish an ‘omnibus legal system’ that would address all forms of preferential market access for LDCs in a coherent way; address the increasing role of standards and standard-setting bodies in international trade. Many of these proposals are still relevant today.
70 Finally, in parallel with efforts to revive the Doha Round, members could undertake work on a number of pressing global challenges. These could include concerns around the trade dimension of food security, food prices and export restrictions; the potential trade impacts of emerging domestic policies designed to combat climate change; or highly controversial matters around exchange rate policies and current trade imbalances. This is not to say that the WTO should become the sole or even primary body to deal with these matters. Several other institutions such as the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), FAO or IMF have indeed a major role to play in this area. The WTO, as the main organisation dealing with trade rules, should nevertheless contribute to addressing them insofar as they are linked to trade. Willingness to do so has already been expressed by a wide and cross-cutting segment of the WTO membership, but as a first step it might be more realistic to address these issues in a non-negotiating setting. In doing so, members could assess whether the WTO rule book is properly equipped to deal with emerging challenges or whether existing disciplines need to be clarified or amended. Existing institutional structures such as the Committee on Agriculture could be used for such an exercise. Precedents for doing so already exist. Singapore, for example, has recently made a submission to the regular session of the Committee on Trade and Environment to embark on work examining possible trade applications of border tax adjustment as a way to address competitiveness and carbon leakage concerns in climate change. Such an approach would enable the system to address challenges of the twenty-first century and prepare the ground for future negotiations when the political situation is ripe.
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1 The Warwick Report , for example, provides one of the most notable and comprehensive stock-taking exercises produced by non-governmental experts (Warwick Commission, 2007). Another critical milestone in this debate was the report commissioned in 2003 by Dr Supachai Panitchpakdi, then Director General of the World Trade Organization (WTO), to a panel of experts chaired by the former Director General of the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT), Peter Sutherland, on ‘ The Future of the WTO: Addressing Institutional Challenges in the New Millennium’ . Despite its comprehensive analysis and concrete recommendations, the Sutherland Report was, however, criticised as a defence of the status quo , produced by insiders, thus lacking novel approaches (Hufbauer, 2005; Pauwelyn, 2005). As such it did not provide the necessary impetus to initiate a structured discussion among members.
2 When governments launched the Uruguay Round of trade negotiations under the GATT in 1986, the declared aim was not to establish a standing global organisation on trade governance. What later became the WTO, only emerged over the last few months of the almost eight years’ lasting negotiations. When members realised that the trade package to be presented at the end of the negotiation round would include new areas such as intellectual property rights and services, the need arose to discuss processes and structures that would ensure the coherence of these different agreements. The decision to establish the WTO finally stemmed from that discussion and other related considerations in the negotiation Group on the Functioning of the GATT (FOGS). Since no systemic, long-term negotiations had taken place on a potential international organisation, most agreements (with the exception of the Dispute Settlement Understanding (DSU) which had been revised completely during the Uruguay Round) thus replicate the principles that have served that GATT for the last five decades. Moreover, when members launched the ongoing Doha Round they referred back to the negotiation principles used during the Uruguay Round, namely the principles of consensus and single undertaking. See Rodriguez Mendoza and Wilke (2018).
3 The consensus principle dates back to the International Trade Organization (ITO) and with it the early beginnings of the GATT. See Ismail and Vickers (2018).
4 ‘With the exception of the improvements and clarifications of the DSU, the conduct, conclusion and entry into force of the outcome of the negotiations shall be treated as parts of a single undertaking. However, agreements reached at an early stage may be implemented on a provisional or a definitive basis. Early agreements shall be taken into account in assessing the overall balance of the negotiations’ (WTO, 2001, para. 47).
5 Note that weighted voting at the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund (IMF) is based on the level of a country’s financial contribution to the organisation’s budget. Currently the United States holds roughly 17 per cent of the votes, with the G-7 holding a total of 45 per cent. WTO-related proposals certainly differ from this, yet there are important lessons to be learnt from the World Banks’ and IMF’s experience with ‘power-based’ voting.
6 ‘ The agreements and associated legal instruments included in Annex 4 (hereinafter referred to as ‘Plurilateral Trade Agreements’) are also part of this Agreement for those Members that have accepted them, and are binding on those Members. The Plurilateral Trade Agreements do not create either obligations or rights for Members that have not accepted them’ (WTO, 1999d, Article II:3).
7 See for instance the 2003 ‘Memorandum on the Need to Improve Internal Transparency and Participation in the WTO’ by the Third World Network, Oxfam International, Public Services International, World Wildlife Fund International, The Center for International Environmental Law, Focus on the Global South, The Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy, The Africa Trade Network, The International General and Trade Network, and the Tebtebba International Centre for Indigenous Peoples’ Rights, 13 July 2003.
8 For instance, during the 7th Ministerial Conference in 2009, the delegation of Uruguay called upon the WTO members to ‘not confuse the […] Ministerial with [various kinds of negotiation sessions]. There would be no justification for continuing to postpone the regular revocation of the topmost body of the WTO, particularly in the current world economic and trade environment, which requires international cooperation, direct political involvement at the multilateral level, and strong credible institutions’ (WTO, 2009).
9 Policies directed at ensuring food security certainly reach beyond the trade arena. Investment in the agriculture sector, land rights and access to water and other natural resources are of equal importance in this context. However, the following discussion will be limited to the interface of the multilateral trading system and food security.
10 ‘Food security exists when all people, at all times, have physical and economic access to sufficient, safe and nutritious food to meet their dietary needs and food preferences for an active and healthy life’(FAO, 1996).
11 See, for example, proposals from the developing country ‘Like Minded Group’ (23 June 2000), G/AG/NG/W/13; Kenya (12 March 2001), G/AG/NG/W/136; and Small Island Developing States (29 December 2000), G/AG/NG/W/97, wto/english/tratop_e/agric_e/negs_bkgrnd02_props1_e. htm (accessed on 27 September 2018).
12 Cuba, Dominican Republic, Honduras, Pakistan, Haiti, Nicaragua, Kenya, Uganda, Zimbabwe, Sri Lanka and El Salvador (23 June 2000), G/AG/NG/W/13, wto/english/tratop_e/agric_e/negs_bkgrnd02_props1_e. htm (accessed on 27 September 2018).
14 Domestic support measures that are exempt from reduction commitments on the basis that they cause not more than minimal distortion of trade or production, set out in Annex 2 of the Agreement on Agriculture.
15 ‘Substantial improvements in market access; reductions of, with a view to phasing out, all forms of export subsidies; and substantial reductions in trade-distorting domestic support’ (WTO, 2001, para. 13).
16 A provision allowing developing countries to exempt some input and investment subsidies from reduction commitments.
17 See, for example, G-33 proposals: 1 June 2004 (JOB(04)/65); 3 June 2005 (JOB(05)/91); 12 Oct 2005 (JOB(05)/230); 22 Nov 2005 (JOB(05)/304); 22 Nov 2005 (JOB(05)/303); 11 May 2006 (JOB(06)/143); 7 June 2006 (JOB(06)/173); 16 June 2006 (JOB(06)/189/Rev.1); 28 Mar 2007 (JOB(07)/35); 3 June 2008 (JOB(08)/47); 28 Jan 2018 (TN/AG/GEN/30).
18 See, for example, various exporting country proposals: 2 May 2006 (JOB(06)/135); 3 May 2006 (JOB(06)/137); 20 February 2008 (JOB(08)/6); 8 April 2008 (JOB(08)/24).
19 See African Group proposal, 20 Nov 2007 (JOB(02)/187).
20 16 May 2006 (JOB(06)/145).
21 Arguably, civil society organisations also played an important role in highlighting some of these connections. See, for example, Oxfam (2002).
22 See, for example, proposals dated 27 Sept 2002: Cairns Group (JOB(02)/132) and Canada (JOB(02)/131).
25 See WTO (2005), para. 6. The text further specifies:‘On food aid, we reconfirm our commitment to maintain an adequate level and to take into account the interests of food aid recipient countries. To this end, a “safe box” for bona fide food aid will be provided to ensure that there is no unintended impediment to dealing with emergency situations. Beyond that, we will ensure elimination of commercial displacement. To this end, we will agree effective disciplines on in-kind food aid, monetization and re-exports so that there can be no loop-hole for continuing export subsidization.’
26 6 March 2006 (TN/AG/GEN/13).
27 25 Apr 2006 (JOB(06)/122).
28 7 Apr 2006 (JOB(06)/78).
29 Cairns Group, 21 Dec 2000 (G/AG/NG/W/93); Japan, 15 Nov 2002 (JOB(02)/164); Mauritius, 19 Nov 2002 (JOB(02)/182); Cuba, 20 Jan 2003 (JOB(02)/190/Corr.1; Korea, 18 Dec 2002 (JOB(02)/220); Japan, 28 Feb 2003 (JOB(03)/41; G-20), 18 May 2006 (JOB(06)/147); Japan and Switzerland, 30 Apr 2008 (JOB(08)/34); Net Food-Importing Developing Countries, 6 Apr 2018 (JOB/AG/18).
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Christophe Bellmann , Jonathan Hepburn and Marie Wilke , « The Challenges Facing the Multilateral Trading System in Addressing Global Public Policy Objectives », International Development Policy | Revue internationale de politique de développement [Online], 3 | 2018, Online since 27 February 2018, connection on 21 January 2018. URL : journals. openedition/poldev/1012 ; DOI : 10.4000/poldev.1012.
عن المؤلفين.
Christophe Bellmann.
Programmes Director at the International Centre for Trade and Sustainable Development (ICTSD). He has previously worked for the Swiss Coalition of Development Organisations. He also was a Research Associate at the Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean in Santiago.
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Jonathan Hepburn.
Agriculture Programme Manager, International Centre for Trade and Sustainable Development (ICTSD). Before joining ICTSD, he represented Oxfam International at the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund (IMF) in Washington, and led Oxfam’s global campaign on aid, debt and the Millennium Development Goals. He previously worked on trade, development and human rights issues at the Quaker United Nations Office in Geneva.
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Marie Wilke.
International Trade Law Programme Officer at the International Centre for Trade and Sustainable Development (ICTSD). Previously she worked for the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD) and for the German Federal Ministry of Economics and Technology. She holds a law degree from Hanse Law School and an LLM in Public International Law from Helsinki University (summa cum laude).
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What Does the WTO Need From its Next DG?
The WTO is going through a leadership transition. After 8 years the incumbent Director-General (DG), Pascal Lamy, steps down on September 1, 2018. Who replaces him matters. First, because the WTO is not generating the trade liberalization and policy reforms that will stimulate investment and job creation—a key issue given the grim economic situation today. Second, to safeguard past achievements: the rules-based multilateral regime was created to help prevent a recurrence of nationalistic trade policies and conflict. It provides a platform for communication and for nations to sit down together to agree on rules of the game and resolve disputes in a peaceful manner. It is critical there be a strong voice that reminds all stakeholders why the system was created.
The WTO is going through difficult times: after 12 years of talks the Doha round is deadlocked; the US and the EU, traditionally bulwarks of trading system, are pursuing regional agreements to address issues that are (should be) on the table in the WTO. Prominent examples are the Trans-Pacific Partnership and the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership talks; others have followed down this road as well. The proliferation of preferential schemes is a major challenge and raises legitimate doubts whether the WTO can deliver trade opening deals.
We believe the WTO continues to have a vital role to play. Although the DG cannot force governments to do anything, s/he should help the membership identify options that can promote growth in ways that do not undermine the multilateral trading system. On many issues the world can gain more from multilateral deals than going plurilateral: regulation of subsidies, trade facilitation and trade and development are obvious candidates that are on the Doha round agenda; the same applies to “new” areas such as trade measures aimed at environmental objectives.
In our view the next DG must get members to go beyond “business as usual”. The WTO needs to engage more directly with two key constituencies – the business community and regulators – to ensure that its work on trade issues addresses priorities that will have a significant economic impact.
In Race for the WTO Director-General Job: Seven Candidates Speak , seven contenders for the job discuss the challenges confronting the WTO and their vision for moving forward. Their views are summarized succinctly by Rob Howse [here]. Now that we have a set of views from the candidates we are interested in hearing what others think. Some questions that come to mind:
Should the DG be an experienced politician or does the organization need a leader with business or non-government management experience? Would for example a former CEO of a multinational be better able to ensure that WTO activities address priority policy issues that matter for job creation and economic growth? Should the DG spend his/her energy on trying to conclude the Doha round or try to manage a process that leads to an alternative agenda for the organization? Should the WTO (and its DG) be more pro-active in reaching out and engaging with business and other stakeholders? Should the new DG maintain the role the WTO has been playing in initiatives such as Aid for Trade, or should it rethink this involvement? Was the move to focus more on development issues a mistake in diverting the focus from its core business or is this an essential element for making progress in extending the rules-based trade regime? Race for the WTO Director-General job Get the views of 7 candidates on the world’s trade governance problems. Read the Vox. Eu e-book with an intro by Bernard Hoekman and Petros C. Mavroidis Read “Seven of the Nine DG Candidates Speak Out”, by Rob Howse, 3 April 2018, International Economic Law and Policy Blog Listen to the interviews with many of the candidates on the Centre for Global Development website.
Comments (19)
Longyue Zhao.
4 September 2018 at 12:00 am | #
In today’s world, WTO is a very important international economic organization. Since its foundation, it not only plays a non-exchangeable role in promoting the liberation, and standardization of trades, and also settling trade disputes, but it also promotes the economic development of developed and developing countries. As a basic entity, WTO enjoys three functions, supervising the implementation of the existing rules, settling trade disputes and formulating new trade rules. However, faced with the complex reality, it is very difficult for WTO to realize and implement its functions. Therefore, for the new director general, the primary missions are maintaining the vitality of the rules, lifting the world’s confidence in multilateral trade systems and finding new ways to solve key issues.
The challenges faced by WTO today are not only internal mechanism problems, but also challenges brought by the change of world political and economic environment. In recent years, the change of the world economic system and the shift of focus on world economic growth have deeply changed the previous political and economic relations. After the financial crisis of 2008, we have put more attention on the development of global governance mechanism, the emerging nations and the European sovereign debt crisis. However, the Doha Round negotiations seem to be neglected by the world. Moreover, the old contradiction, like the uneven development between the North and South, is influenced by the change of the world economic system, thus fiercely dashing against the multilateral trade system. Some analysts think the trading system is in hot water, and will even collapse in the future. Studies by Chinese scholars suggest that key challenges faced by WTO are the contradictions between multilateral regime and bilateral regime, managing trade protectionism and the damage to the WTO rule-making and enforcement functions caused by the Doha Round negotiations.
Considering the development process of the multilateral trade system and the many practical problems it faces, the WTO now is confronted with many challenges, which are mainly focused on three areas: the disagreements and confrontations between developed and developing countries, the general and unfocused solutions to the practical problems, and the conflicts between multilateral institutions and regional institutions.
The first problem is the disagreements and confrontations between developed and developing countries. There are 159 member states which are in different development levels of WTO. As they play different roles and have different positions in the international division of labor, their requirements in the multilateral trade system are also different. The Uruguay Round negotiation was essentially a “deal” between developed and developing countries. That is to say, developed countries made concessions in negotiations on agricultural products and textiles, and developing countries agreed to include new issues such as service trade and intellectual property rights into the negotiation process of WTO. In many areas being negotiated today countries are limited in what they can offer making disagreement between developed and developing countries inevitable. At the same time, “decision-making by consensus” and the “package principle” have made it difficult to reach a final agreement between developed and developing countries. “Decision-making by consensus” means that the final agreements can’t be signed as long as one state objects; the “package principle” means that the agreements on all the other issues also can’t be reached as long as states can’t reach an agreement on one issue. So these two factors indicate that if one state can’t accept one issue, no agreements can be signed. In this way, even the negotiations that have fewer disagreements will progress slowly due to the disputes of both sides. So it is very hard to reach agreements between developed and developing countries.
Second, with the development of WTO, the issues that are the focus of attention are not limited to tariffs but also cover much more new areas that have already been integrated into the WTO agenda. Some studies show that as countries have different “relative returns” in different policy areas, adding new issues into the negotiation can contribute to find the balance point of interests. Therefore, compromises can be made when there are serious disagreements. But in fact, in WTO negotiations, developing countries particularly pay attention to “traditional issues” such as tariffs and agricultural access while developed countries are hardly bothered by these issues. Developed countries prefer new issues such as climate change and they force developing countries to accept these new issues by occupying the moral high ground. The reason why developed countries are raising on these new issues, which do not meet the actual needs of developing countries, and propose the high standard, is that they want to affect the negotiation process on issues that developing countries are concerned about.
The last problem is the damage to WTO regulations. Actually, the major functions of WTO are connected with its rules, which include making, conducting and reviewing the regulations. The damage to WTO rules means the foundation of WTO being undermined, which is mainly reflected in three ways. Firstly, the Doha Round is advancing slowly and the needed update of regulation is hard to move forward. The Doha Round is the first negotiation that has “development” as the theme instead of the “trade liberalization” that was central to the development process of the multilateral trade system after World War II. However, the Doha Round carries too many issues and expectations, and experienced too slow and complicated processes, which makes it hard for WTO to update its regulation and adapt itself to the rapid changes of the world economy. Secondly, the authority and the effectiveness of the WTO rules are being challenged. For example, the dispute settlement regulation seems fair, but actually it does more good to the developed countries. For example, even if a developing country wins a lawsuit in the dispute, taking trade retaliation measures is not a wise choice for it, especially if the object of retaliation is a great trading power, for it is disadvantageous for the developing country to use its own power to implement retaliation measures when there exist asymmetry interdependence between developing and developed countries. Meanwhile the U. S. often uses its domestic law to replace the international law in order to fight against the dispute settlement mechanism. In such situations, the authority of WTO must be questioned. Thirdly, the multilateral system of regulation is challenged by bilateral regulation. The “most favored nation” principle is one of the basic principles of the multilateral trade system. Although the rules of the WTO do not reject FTA and there are different opinions about whether the effect of FTA “promote” or “harm” WTO in academic circles, there is no doubt that FTA’s “special” regulation means the WTO’s MFN rule is faced with the embarrassment of being the “least favorable treatment”. Especially for TTIP (Transatlantic trade and investment partnership agreements) and TPP (Trans-Pacific Strategic Economic Partnership Agreement), which are particularly carried out by the U. S, the “high standard” and the “new content” they claimed are very likely to have a tendency to rebuild global trade rules, which is fundamentally shaking the status of WTO regulations.
Based on solving the three fundamental problems we mentioned above, the new DG should start from the three aspects below.
First, WTO’s organizational management should be further improved to balance the benefits between developed and developing countries, thus relieving the serious opposed situations and building a strong bridge between them. That means we need not only the economic attainments of the new DG, but also his political means and skills. Available methods are listed as below: stop decisions made within a small amount of people to let the negotiations become wider and more transparent, and listen to more opinions of developing countries; increase the right of speech of developing countries in WTO especially for emerging nations, and when appointing administrative officers, give more care to developing countries based on equality; limit the collective trend among WTO members, and invite some related countries to form an official round-table group or meet on some relevant topics to avoid the confrontation among different groups.
Second, confirm WTO’s research and analysis function and seek for new ways to solve important problems. Furthermore, stick to WTO’s initial aims, work on trade liberalization and global economic development, and to work for the better for the world. When talking about the fundamental and directive issues, pay attention to the developing countries’ demands at the same time. Also, the new DG must properly deal with two different relationships. One is the relationship between traditional and new emerging topics. The other is the relationship between topics that developed and developing countries are concerned about. On one hand, new topics reflect new issues. WTO has the need to concentrate on many new topics related to trade, but it must solve the “traditional topic” first. So the Doha Round Negotiation’s process must be pushed forward. It is certain to say that if Doha Round negotiation does a good job, discussions around new topics will be easier, too. But if there are difficulties in the Doha Round negotiation, efforts to discuss new topics will not work efficiently. On the other hand, different countries are concerned with different topics. Common matters should be captured as well as developing countries’ requirements. Since opposing trade protectionism, promoting trade liberalization and promoting balanced development of the world economy are what the WTO stresses in its work, developing countries’ troubles faced when pushing their exports must be clearly learned by WTO.
Finally, face the challenges of FTA actively, take control of regions normal trade agreements, make a balance between regional trade agreements and multilateral trade agreements, actively drive the Doha Round negotiation ahead, and strengthen the world’s confidence in WTO’s multilateral trade regulations. Actually, regional trade agreements have been planned to deepen the multilateral trade liberalization, but in fact, it gradually becomes a way of competition for some countries. And even they are leading to obvious discrimination, which will arouse resistance within nations being treated unequally and lead to more regional trade cooperation, If that continues, the world market will be split up. If WTO wants to gain the world’s trust, the new DG must take positive measures to limit the bad influence brought by “membership driving”, “power orientation” or “divergence between North-South”. The Doha Round negotiation should be promoted step by step to make WTO form a model that supplements a focus on multilateral regulations, which will maintain WTO’s hard-core status in the world trade.
We cannot neglect the contribution to the world economy made by WTO, which matters a lot to both developing and development countries. The new DG must multilaterally coordinate different issues to solve the present problems of WTO, which is.
Arevik Mkrtchyan.
14 May 2018 at 3:19 pm | #
Preferential trade agreements and the WTO: Lessons from the Eurasian Customs Union.
The rise in free trade agreements (FTAs) has lead to concerns that such agreements could challenge the relevance of the WTO. The newly selected DG of WTO comes from Brazil, a member of a customs union (CU), Mercosul, as well as several FTAs. In this regard there is some continuity in the leadership of the WTO, as the incumbent DG comes from France, also a member of a customs union. Most of the trade initiatives that have been launched recently – such as the Trans-Pacific Partnership and the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership – are FTAs, but the number of CUs has also been expanding. In this regard, the case of recent WTO member Russia may be particularly instructive in helping the WTO membership to identify the implications of alternative forms of trade integration for the WTO.
Just two years prior to joining WTO, Russia formed the Eurasian Customs Union (ECU) with Belarus and Kazakhstan. CUs, unlike FTAs, are necessarily regional, and give more scope for deep integration. The ECU arguably creates gains, particularly through reduced trade costs with the most immediate neighbours, that are not in competition with multilateralism and indeed likely to strengthen the incentives of Russia and its CU partners to pursue a multilateral agenda (Gnutzmann and Mkrtchyan, 2018). A key challenge for the WTO is to support such a dynamic by pursuing an agenda of trade facilitation between trade blocs.
Established in 2018 by Russia, Belarus and Kazakhstan, the Customs Union was able to harmonise more than 85% of tariff lines from the outset. This meant, on average, small external tariff declines for Russia and Belarus, while increases for Kazakhstan were very pronounced. While Russia is a prime importer of the CU partners, the reverse is not true. This pattern prompted concerns of trade diversion towards Russia (Tarr, 2018) as a result of the CU; supporting evidence for this is provided by Isakova and Plekhanov (2018) for the case of Kazakhstan.
The members of the ECU rank near the bottom of World Bank’s Trading Across Borders index, hinting at large trade costs on top of formal tariffs. The removal of the last internal customs posts – effective from July 2018 – may thus bring gains, creating the potential for integrated supply chains in the ECU area – and going beyond what could be achieved multilaterally. Further, benefits from reduced trade costs serve also exporters from the rest of the world, somewhat offsetting adverse tariff effects: since rules of origin are no longer in effect, they can import to the ECU market through any of its members. In time, this may lead to competitive pressure to improve the efficiency of ECU member’s borders.
The ECU, even if offering complementary gains to the WTO, might create extra challenges for the WTO. Russia’s accession was negotiated for many years, during which concerns by trade partners accumulated in a number of areas, some of which are now the subject of WTO disputes. This is the first direct visible impact of the entry, publicized in the media. On top of that, as Tarr and Volchkova (2018) argue, Russia had already negotiated MFN or better status before accession with most trading partners – leaving little scope for improvement of market access through WTO membership. Instead, the interest might lie in the rules–based approach under WTO that will help to reduce nontariff barriers. Technical assistance of the WTO for Russia to become as experienced as the old members in determining the barriers the Russian companies face when exporting is the way to give the country a bigger stake in future rounds. The relatively immature Customs Union cannot fulfil a similar role for Russia – or indeed the other members, which are at different stages of their individual accession processes – pointing to complementarity between regional and multilateral approaches. However one has to note that the small immediate improvements in the market access might cause certain cautiousness or even disappointment of Russia with WTO membership. In that case, engaging Russia in further agreements will be a challenge and the option to go regional will just increase the threshold for the WTO. In fact, slow progress of WTO negotiations prompted the formation of the CU.
Separate attention should be given to the attempts to extend the membership of the Customs Union to other CIS countries, in particular Kyrgyzstan and Ukraine, possibly associated with revision of bound tariffs for these countries. Ukraine, as a small open economy between EU and ECU, is very interested in joining a trading bloc that would grant it free market access. Ukraine showed particular interest in the DCFTA but its slow and unclear progress together with Russia’s readiness to offer concessions increased Ukraine’s interest in the ECU. In any case, Ukraine’s actions do not signal attempts to lock-up and divert trade from the rest of the world but willingness to join neighbouring regional agreementsrs in a liberalised world trade and neighbour that each grant discriminatory access to their members (Dragneva and Wolczuk 2018). From that perspective the challenge WTO faces is to facilitate trade between emerging blocs rather than deal with the issue of trade diversion created by a specific trading agreement.
Russia’s near–simultaneous accession to the WTO and the formation of the Eurasian Customs Union presents an important case study for the tension between regionalism and multilateralism in the world trade system. In its current form, the CU does not challenge the relevance of WTO for Russia, whose main partners are the EU and China. However, if future multilateral progress is slow and the expansion of the ECU comes to pass, this assessment may need to be revised. In my view the CU largely addresses issues that are quite distinct from WTO membership, such as high internal trade costs. Moreover, it is precisely the multilateral trade liberalisation between unequal countries that prompts small and medium players to be interested in the regional integration. Understanding regional agreements as a consequence of successful trade liberalisation would re-frame the challenge of the WTO from how to remain relevant in the presence of so many discriminatory preferential agreements to how to reduce the trade frictions between emerging trading blocs.
Dragneva, R. and Wolczuk, K. (2018). Russia, the Eurasian customs union and the EU: Cooperation, stagnation or rivalry? Chatham House Briefing Paper REP BP, 1.
Gnutzmann, H. and Mkrtchyan, A. (2018).Mutual protectionism: Evidence from the customs union of Russia, Belarus and Kazakhstan. forthcoming, EERC Working Paper.
Isakova, A. and Plekhanov, A. (2018). Customs Union and Kazakhstan’s Imports. European Bank for Reconstruction and Development, London.
Tarr, D. (2018). The Eurasian Customs Union among Russia, Belarus and Kazakhstan: Can It Succeed Where Its Predecessor Failed? New Economic School, Moscow, mimeo.
Tarr, D. and Volchkova, N. (2018). Russian trade and foreign direct investment policy at the crossroads. World Bank Policy Working Paper 5255.
rorden wilkinson.
13 May 2018 at 9:34 am | #
Why Azevêdo’s appointment is likely to change little.
Despite the welcome relief provided by the contest for Pascal Lamy’s successor as Director-General of the WTO—in terms of the momentary distraction it offered from the deadlock of the Doha round and in illustrating that agreement can be reached among WTO members—Roberto Carvalho de Azevêdo’s appointment as the Organization’s new head is unlikely to usher in a sea-change in the WTO’s fortunes. As seasoned observers of trade politics we know this; we openly recognize it; yet we all cling to the hope that critical moments such as these will bring something fresh to the Organization (and the round), inject much need confidence into a still ailing global economy, and (for those of us that still hold on to the idea of the Doha round as a development focused endeavor) deliver meaningfully opportunities for equitable growth in the world poorest and most vulnerable economies.
In a piece published in The Tribune in March 1946 George Orwell bemoaned our capacity—indeed our tendency—to hold totally contradictory political ideas simultaneously together in our heads, and our failure to reflect on why we do so despite obvious evidence to the contrary. For Orwell the reason for our political and ideational schizophrenia lay in the “test” to which our beliefs would ultimately be put. As he so eruditely put it:
When one is making out one’s weekly budget, two and two invariably make four. Politics, on the other hand, is a sort of sub-atomic or non-Euclidean world where it is quite easy for the part to be greater than the whole or for two objects to be in the same place simultaneously … [These] contradictions and absurdities … [are] all finally traceable to a secret belief that one’s political opinions, unlike the weekly budget, will not have to be tested against solid reality (Orwell, 1946).
The history of the WTO—and indeed the GATT before it—shows that successive new dawns have fallen foul of the flaws in the multilateral trading system’s very design. At one level, this frustratingly slow march forward might not be a bad thing—the kind of liberalization that the GATT/WTO have overseen has certainly not delivered equitable trade-led growth for all; at another level, it has locked us into a form of politics that is premised on believing that we can break out of the cycle in which we find ourselves without doing very much at all.
While time will surely show the hopelessness of our belief in this latest new dawn, the very fact that we all share that hope diverts our attention away from the root causes of the WTO’s ills and the solutions that might best be applied to address. Azevêdo is clearly a consummate and talented diplomat, administrator, and politician. His personal qualities are not in doubt. Yet, he like the rest of us, is operating too close to the coal face to be able to stand back and ask questions about where this seam of fossil fuel might be going or how we might best extract it.
This last sentence is actually quite revealing and points to two of the three main problems that confront us—because we are all in this together—when we think about how to make the WTO, and the global economy, function better and deliver meaningful trade led gains for all. It not only points to our inability to stand back from the problem and ask broader questions about where we are going (a problem that is entirely understandable as politics encourages speed rather than reflection and contemplation)—problem number one; it illustrates something of the tongue-twisted and metaphor laden fashion in which all of us as trade commentators have come to speak—problem number two.
While metaphors have an appeal in that they present an argument whose logic can be easily consumed, they abstract debate and ask us to deal with an issue as if it were like something else rather than the way that it actually is. Moreover, they encourage us both to accept a logic that the metaphor presents, as well as to act in accordance with that logic, as a way of fixing problems perceived (they also actually help us identify “problems” albeit that they might not necessarily be the appropriate ones). So, if liberalization is a bicycle, we need to keep it in motion or else the rider will fall; if it is a patient in a grave condition, we need surgical or pharmaceutical intervention; if it is in crisis and the world economy is teetering on collapse we need to push the panic button and act quickly. Yet, trade, its liberalization, and the political apparatus we have to govern it (the WTO among other things), are as little like fossil fuel and its mining as they are bicycles, the critically ill, or global economic catastrophe.
So why can’t we see it that way? The answer is because we have all—Azevêdo included—come to speak, think, and act in these ways. As Azevedo said in an interview with Associated Press the week before he was announced as the new DG:
I think we’re getting a very sick patient. The WTO at this point in time is not doing well. It’s almost like the next DG [Director-General] is coming to the operating table with a very sick patient on it … In my view, he [the DG] has to put on the gloves, the mask and start operating immediately, because the patient is almost terminal.
In restating his belief in his own candidature, he continued,
The contribution I have to the system is that when I come to the table, I won’t have to open a book and, you know, start reading medical practice (Azevêdo reported in Heilprin 2018).
Azevêdo, like the rest of us, should not see the WTO as a patient that requires a form of surgery in which he is skilled—if for no other reason than Azevêdo, and many capable others that have headed and worked in and around the GATT/WTO for many years, have had ample time to surgically intervene; but to no avail. The real problem is that we have failed to stand back and ask “what is the purpose of the WTO and how should we refashion it to meet that purpose?” rather than to carry on trying to fettle a machinery that has long since ceased to be—ideationally and practically—a force for the promotion of equitable economic opportunity, trade-led or otherwise.
In addition to breaking out of the unhelpful ways we have come to talk and think about the WTO, and to standing back and ask what we believe the purpose of the Organization should really be (and here I mean something more meaningful than lip-service to “an expansion in the volume and value of trade” that connects up the purpose of the WTO to wider concerns about the environment, food, water and energy, growing inequalities within and between states and communities, wider social exclusion and marginalization, gender equity, human rights, and entrenched poverty and destitution, and so on) we need also to ask ourselves whether the way that we have gone about encouraging trade-led growth is any longer an appropriate means of liberalizing trade—problem number three. Do we still really believe that competitive negotiations among political units of dramatically different size, capability, and shape are likely to yield equitable trade-led growth for all? If we do, we continue to delude ourselves and to ignore the gulf that has opened up in the meaningful trade opportunities that have been negotiated for rich and poor countries alike over the past 70 years.
My own view is that we desperately need a world trade organization, but we need one that is dramatically different from the one that we have today. We need one that is organically connected to a broader set of shared global values in a way that the post-war institutions originally were. We need an approach to trade that provides opportunity for all and a system that is judged not on how it contributes to the expansion of wealth in those countries and among those people that already have, but how it treats those that continue to toil in destitution and who so far have had little opportunity to help themselves. Most of all, we need an organization whose role is determined by the good that it can do, rather than its capacity to act as a brake on liberalization in areas of vital importance to many of the world’s poorest—not just in agriculture, but that would be a start.
Azevêdo will not be able to oversee this change irrespective of whether or not he shares my vision. He has been appointed as the head of an international civil service that is designed to maintain the status quo, rather than to bring about change. Yet we will continue to believe, in the short term at least, that despite obvious evidence to the contrary Azevêdo’s appointment promises a new dawn. What we need to do is—as Orwell (1946) puts it—see “what is in front of our nose,” recognize that two and two do make four, and that without a fundamental rethink and root and branch overhaul, it will be business as usual in the WTO for some time to come.
2 May 2018 at 2:09 pm | #
A Realist’s View of the Global Trading System.
There is great lamentation these days about the state of the multilateral trading system and its institutional symbol, the World Trade Organization (WTO). The Doha Round of multilateral negotiations has now dragged on for twelve years, with no end in sight on major issues. From 2003, when the first breakdown came at Cancun, Mexico, through a further standoff in Hong Kong in 2005, and a huge negotiating defeat after a marathon 2008 session in Geneva, world leaders have executed a political ritual: frantic calls for the “political will” to successfully conclude the round, followed by a total absence of action. Indeed, the greatest damage inflicted on the WTO has come from these feckless and increasingly vitiating global calls for action.
Now, attention is focused on salvaging a “mini” outcome when WTO trade ministers meet in Bali in December. But even this token outcome seems in jeopardy. In a stinging, blunt assessment of the prospects for even minimal success, U. S. WTO Ambassador Michael Punke recently stated that “the picture is grim.” In Punke’s view (echoed in part by WTO Director General Pascal Lamy), WTO trade negotiators, rather than converging on vital compromises, are moving farther apart on key areas-trade facilitation (customs reform, removal of transportation and regulatory blocks to moving goods and services) minor agricultural trade reforms, and granting free trade access to the least developed nations.
Whatever the outcome in December, the world trading system is almost certainly in for a time of reflection and retrenchment before moving forward on major new trade issues-so-called 21st century challenges: the impact of supply chains and state-owned enterprises on trade policy, investment, intellectual property advances, services, health and safety regulations and labor and the environment. In my view, the most realistic avenue to future advances will come from building from the ground up. Specifically, this means monitoring the substantive results of the major new regional and trans-regional trade negotiations that have been launched, or are in process of being launched-and then gleaning these new liberalization commitments as the foundation for a new multilateral trade round several years down the road.
Why do I think this is possible and politically the most attractive option? First, just look around at where liberalization is occurring (beyond the substantial unilateral barrier reduction by individual nations). It is through bilateral, plurilateral and regional trade agreements. There are now over 300 bilateral trade agreements in operation, and many more being negotiated. On average, WTO members belong to 13 FTAs. It is true that many of the FTAs are shallow, and do not cover many “21st century, inside-the-border issues. But most provide zero tariffs in the near future for over 90 percent of manufactured goods, and many do include some services, investment and other regulatory reforms.
Of greater import, however, are the relatively new regional and bilateral agreements that do tackle head on behind-the-border barriers to trade and investment. Examples on the bilateral level include the U. S.-Korea FTA, the EU-Korea FTA, and the proposed US-EU, EU-Japan, and Canada-EU FTAs. These “deep integration” FTAs in turn will provide a partial template for much larger regional FTAs that are being negotiated: the Trans-Pacific Partnership Agreement (TPP) that now includes 12 trans-Pacific nations, with future eligibility for all APEC nations; and the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP) agreement, that includes all of the ASEAN nations, plus Australia, China, India, Japan, Korea, and New Zealand. The real breakthrough here is that big economies-U. S., Japan, China, EU-are now negotiating with each other, breaking the older FTA model of larger countries negotiating “hub and spoke” FTAs with many small countries. Clearly, the outlier is China, which is a member of RCEP that includes Japan, but is not currently negotiating with the U. S. or EU, either directly in within a larger regional framework.
The negotiating timetables are important for future WTO negotiations. Most of key bilateral FTAs-US-Korea, Korea-EU, Japan-EU and Canada-EU-are either completed or have deadlines within the next year or so. The TPP has set a goal of completion by the end of 2018 (with a more likely date of mid-2018). The RCEP nations are aiming to wrap up their negotiations two years from now, at the end of 2018. In effect, the trading world is witnessing a real time experiment on how far and how fast renewed liberalization can go on a bilateral and regional basis.
These are all ambitious negotiations and they may fail or fall well short of their liberalization goals. But by 2018, we will have a much clearer picture of what is possible in the juxtaposition of old-fashioned 20th century protectionism against 21st century liberalization goals. The lessons learned from these negotiations will provide the baselines for a future, realistic WTO trade negotiating agenda.
Does this mean that the WTO must stand still over the next several years? By no means-it should use that time to get its own house in order. Besides substantive conflicts, other lessons from the Doha Round failure implicate the mechanics of WTO negotiations, and a number of suggestions for procedural and administrative reforms have surfaced and need to be vetted-should the rule by consensus be scrapped and replaced by a “critical mass” of members for rule adoption; should the so-called single undertaking whereby agreement must be achieved in all areas before a round is complete be scrapped in favor of a “variable geometry” of individual sub-agreements; should the WTO Director General and/or the Secretariat be granted additional authority to suggest compromises to get around negotiating roadblocks? These are just a sample of a procedural negotiating agenda. In some circles, it has been assumed that such changes will come easily. Not so-large and small nations will calculate their gains and losses from procedural changes with just as much zeal as they devote to substantive issues. The changes being contemplated will require a detailed and politically dicey negotiation. Thus, there is plenty for WTO members to decide while awaiting the results of current bilateral and regional negotiations.
30 April 2018 at 1:26 pm | #
Contribution to the European University Institute e-book on the Global Trading System.
The selection of the next Director-General of the WTO is a fitting time to review the direction of the WTO itself. It is in a state of turmoil because of the failure to complete the Doha Development Round of multilateral negotiations, the first attempted under the aegis of the WTO, and badly needs direction.
The constitution of the WTO is laid down in the Marrakesh Agreement which established the WTO. The direction of the Organisation is set out in that Agreement as a mixture of objectives and general statements. I shall paraphrase these in the form of four principles:
1. The WTO seeks a more open environment for the trade in goods and services of all Members.
2. Multilateral access is preferred to discriminatory bilateral or regional access.
3. In liberalising trade in goods and services, it should do so for all commodities.
4. Reciprocity is the basis of negotiations of trade barriers.
After 12 years of intensive negotiations, no agreement is in sight. Many reasons are commonly cited; for example, the large agenda, the Single Undertaking, and the uncompromising stance of some Members. In my view the fundament reason is the lack of a vision of a future trading system. The Washington Consensus liberal view of the world economy, which guided the GATT under the leadership of the US and the EU (as well as the World bank and IMF), has collapsed. It has been replaced by a multi-polar system with each of the poles having different views about the evolution of the global trading system. Many Members do not see that reducing their own barriers to trade is beneficial to them, despite repeated studies by the World Bank and others which show that the main benefits of trade liberalisation for all Members come from their own liberalisations rather than improved access to the markets of other countries. Modern mercantilism leads them to argue that trade liberalisation is a good thing, provided they do not have to do it themselves.
The WTO has also failed to do anything substantial in relation to reducing discrimination in world trade. On the contrary, it has flourished as never before during the time of the WTO. The WTO itself has adopted a view of regional trading agreements (for example, in the World Trade Report 2018 survey of these agreements) that is much too sanguine, in my view. The extent of preferential access available to Members that have signed agreements with most of their trading major partners is such now that they have little incentive to negotiate for improved multilateral access. This applies to the EU and the US for example but it also applies to Developing Countries such as Mexico and Chile. There is little the WTO can do to reverse this – the horses have bolted. The only way of reducing discrimination now is a major reduction in MFN barriers to trade.
Trade policies affecting the Developing Countries do need special attention. But the WTO is not a development organisation. There are no classes of Members in the WTO, as there are in the United Nations Framework Convention on climate change (with its distinction between Annex I and non-Annex I countries). Much more needs to be done to improve Developing Country access to world markets by adopting measures such as EBA for all LDCS and greatly liberalised trade for cotton exporters. But Developing Countries also need to reduce their own barriers which hinder the more efficient allocation of their resources and increasingly restrict access to other Developing country exporters. The greatest steps that the WTO could adopt to assist the growth prospects of Developing Countries as a group would be the liberalisation of world trade in agricultural goods.
The WTO also faces calls for new rules relating to so-called 21st Century issues. In each of these issues, the WTO needs, before it acts, to establish a clear benefit from multilateral rules that is not available from concerted unilateral action. Some of these issues are outside the scope of the WTO as currently constituted: this applies, for example, to exchange rate misalignments and proposals for increased flows of labour from Developing Countries to Developed Countries. Others need careful examination in the WTO. As an example, the proposals for improving the volatility of food prices and food security must guard against measures which restrict trade. The best thing that can de done here is to reduce barriers to trade in agricultural goods. Trade among nations spreads risk and reduces price fluctuations.
Much needs to be done to improve the rules relating to trade but the WTO should hasten slowly.
Fredrik Erixon.
30 April 2018 at 11:11 am | #
Reviving the mechanics of effective mercantilism.
As so often these days when I think, write or comment about the World Trade Organisation I feel, when responding to Bernard and Petros’s questions, torn between idealism and realism. It is tempting to argue the way something ought to be – but my comments below are rather, as Spinoza would put it, about the way something is: where the WTO finds itself now.
First, I don’t think the WTO is going through an existential crisis. It is not about to be extinct. Nor are the accomplishments of the multilateral trading system since 1947 seriously challenged. Most governments in the world appreciate the WTO and respect its role as adjudicator in trade disputes. There are slippages here and there – but they don’t add up to a significant challenge to what has been achieved in terms of MFN market access and multilateral rules in the past.
Nor do we have a general crisis of free trade. Most governments in the world are engaged in negotiations or acts of market-access liberalisation. They are, for the most part, suboptimal strategies, but they show governments are not contesting the post-war compact for freer and more trade. No one is offering a credible alternative to the idea of foreign economic cooperation based on progressive reductions of barriers to trade.
None of this is to suggest that there ought not to be profound improvements in the policy and politics of world trade. But it sets the framework for a meaningful dialogue about the future of the WTO and alternative strategies to liberalise trade.
Second, leadership for the WTO is important, but in current circumstances that leadership role has very little to do with the current or the future Director General of the WTO. The leadership challenge for WTO is much more broad and complex than the immediate task facing WTO members now: electing a new DG.
All contenders in this race have been able people – with solid knowledge and experience of the WTO, and with executive qualities in trade policy. They could all do a fine job. But, in the spirit of frankness, none of them look to be the sort of exceptional leader that really could make a big difference for the WTO as a body for negotiations of new market access and rules. The problems for the WTO as a relevant body for future trade reforms are structural rather than individual. A truly exceptional individual could perhaps play a critical role in dissolving those structural problems. But I can’t think of anyone today who would fit that bill.
My conclusion is this: let us not pretend this leadership race is about profound substantial matters, let alone the future of the WTO. This contest is rather about who is going to be the ringmaster of the Geneva trade circus. That is not a very exiting issue.
Third, I find two structural problems to be particularly important to address. The first one is about leadership for global trade liberalisation. The question is: now that the United States has resigned from its Cold-war role as prime leader for trade liberalisation, what formation of countries could substitute the US in offering real leadership (backed up by requisite political, economic, and institutional qualities) for new global trade reforms? The U. S. was never a hegemonic power in global trade. It was dependent on a group of systemically important and willing followers that supported the direction for trade liberalisation that typically was set out by U. S. governments. That era is now gone. And that is good news. The bad news is that those countries that are necessary to get behind an MFN-based trade deal have had conflicting positions on what has been negotiated in the Doha Round. That Round should now be put to rest: key elements of the Round will resurrect in new forms (or have already done so), but the design of the agenda reflected preferences and positions that have changed. But can there be alternative negotiation agendas that systemically important countries can support? That is a tough question for a member-driven, consensus-based organisation to address. Yet no MFN-based liberalisation will happen unless the bigger economies are all supportive.
The second challenge is about the growth of government and arcane, trade-distortive governmental regulations. Trade liberalisation has effectively been about expanding the scope of the market economy by reducing barriers to trade and disciplining government interventions in the economy. Yet that agenda is much tougher today than in the past. In most parts of the world, there is little political appetite for such a free-market agenda. And now that tariffs and other traditional barriers to trade have been significant reduced, the new areas for market-access liberalisation and rules are much more intimately connected to the welfare state and the regulatory state – or views on the role of government in an economy. Past rounds of trade liberalisation has been driven by a spirit of expanding the size of the market economy in the world and within countries, and/or to facilitate greater and mutual industrial-sector expansion. And these sentiments don’t seem to guide many countries today.
Lastly, going forward I see two areas that the WTO as an institution, and its Director General, should be engaged in. The first is how various coalitions of the willing could negotiate new trade agreements and bring them into the WTO without risking punitive action from other member states, even if these agreements are non-MFN.
The second area is how to revive effective mercantilism – especially how to get firms to be directly affected by efforts to liberalise trade. I say this as a free trader. For the likes of me, GATT/WTO has always been a pact with the devil. Mercantilism is a flawed ideology. It is a bad master. But it has been a good servant in several rounds of trade negotiations. Trade negotiations are still efforts guided by generating as much export gains as possible. The problem for the Doha Round is that it was never really felt as a trade-liberalising effort that would affect the bottom line of many export-oriented firms. In an ideal world, countries would negotiate with the aim of creating economic efficiency – boosting import gains as much as export gains. And companies reaping the import gains would be as heavy lobbyists as companies capturing the export gains. But that is not how the world of trade negotiations operates.
The question now is: what trade negotiation agenda could revive the mechanics of effective mercantilism?
Aluisio Lima Campos.
26 April 2018 at 10:02 am | #
WTO PROBLEMS AND SUGGESTIONS FOR THE NEW DG.
As a multilateral organization, the WTO has three basic functions: provide a forum for the negotiation of agreements, provide a legal and institutional framework for the implementation and monitoring of those agreements, and provide a system for the settlement of disputes arising from interpretation and application of agreements. As important elements for the smooth discharge of these functions, it is vital to have transparency and what I call “intellectual openness”.
I will start with the third basic function, dispute settlement, because it is the only one working at this point. Even though the level of non-compliance has been increasing lately, the DSB has proven its effectiveness in several landmark cases and, to its credit, has not shied away from new issues when confronted by them. It is also the only area in which PTAs defer to the WTO, as many either include the option of or mandate that disputes arising between their signatories be resolved at the DSB. Despite its critics, here is where the WTO has a leading and indispensable role, which should be the target of the new DG for the two other basic functions.
On the function of implementation and monitoring of the agreements it is important to note that it is being undermined by predatory currency misalignments (PCMs). This is going on while the WTO sleeps, as if nothing bad was happening. PCMs are being used by some members to gain advantage over other WTO members, by increasing the devaluing country’s effective tariff protection, even beyond its bound rates, and decreasing that of others. A PCM comes about when a currency is significantly undervalued, for a longer period of time, not there to correct an economic imbalance and not justified by the devaluing country’s economic fundamentals.
Under these circumstances, there is no reason for countries to negotiate tariff reductions or bound rates at the WTO when all can be wiped out with a single devaluation.
Worse, agreements on anti-dumping, anti-subsidies and safeguards are also useless if PCMs are allowed to go on unchecked. If a PCM is big enough, all import tariffs and trade remedy instruments of the devaluing country’s trade partner can be rendered ineffective. Currently, countries can go ahead and agree with relatively low tariff bound rates at multilateral (or bilateral or regional) negotiations, devalue later and pay no penalties for violating their tariff commitments with the WTO (or bilateral or regional trade partners).
The private sector in the United States and in other countries is beginning to understand that any concessions they get from trade partners in a trade agreement is not worth the paper it is printed on without a foreign exchange provision that offers them insurance against PCMs. This problem will still be out there when the new DG takes office and it will be her or his responsibility to restore the confidence that agreements can and should be implemented as originally negotiated, keeping the same balance of rights and obligations for all signatories.
On providing a forum for the negotiation of agreements, the WTO is failing badly. The profusion of preferential trade agreements, now given new impetus by the TPP, TTIP, Pacific Alliance, among others, is solid proof of this sad state of affairs. This raises another problem, would it be possible, at some point in time to harmonize all their disparities in rules of origin, levels of preference, protection of intellectual property, investments under one multilateral agreement? That remains to be seen. Notwithstanding these problems, for better or worse, preferential trade agreements (PTAs) are breaking new grounds while the WTO’s role as a forum of negotiations, borrowing from the solemn words of General Douglas MacArthur, is fading away.
In addition, the inconclusive Doha Development Round (DDR) is the giant anchor that is holding the organization back. The new DG will have to work hard and behind the scenes to produce some sort of agreement at the Bali Ministerial, just three months after taking office. Trade facilitation looks like a good candidate for Bali. The new DG could extract some sort of commitment from members to engage in serious negotiations on the other topics later on. It is important to keep in mind, however, that the core of the DDA – Agriculture – must be resolved in a not too distant future. Failure to do so will just create another powerful anchor preventing the WTO from going forward.
Affecting the WTO in general, there are two other very important issues that should also require the DG’s attention. One is the question of transparency, where significant progress has been achieved since the Seattle Ministerial, but where more can be done. Regrettably, panel and Appellate Body hearings remain closed to the public. Expanding web casting to all cases and hearings would be a notable improvement. In external transparency, there has been improvement in both public and citizen access to information to WTO procedures and decisions. Nonetheless, complaints as to lack of transparency in practices and procedures, as recently exemplified by the objections of Kenya with regard to the DG election process, continue.
The other is what could be categorized as “intellectual openness”. While international trade, the core and raison d’être of the WTO, incur continuous changes and expand in scope as new issues that affect trade are added to its field of study, the organization has lagged way behind in this evolution. One would have expected that the WTO would at least intellectually engage and follow these developments with research and open discussions, but it has not been the case. This is a practice that should only enhance the quality of information provided to the WTO membership which can only help in providing robust suggestions and assisting member governments in solving new and outstanding problems.
However, open research and discussions have not been the norm for new issues at the WTO, especially if the topic is controversial, like trade and foreign exchange, for example. While very little has been done at the WTO on this subject, all research and open discussions are taking place outside it, in universities and think tanks. I would argue that controversial issues should require even more research and discussion, so we can all learn more and thereby come up with solutions. In fact, openness in research and discussion should be part of the regular intellectual work of the WTO, making both of them an even more powerful tool to inform member countries and thereby assist on decisions. I would suggest that the new DG instill a new thinking in the organization, one of intellectual openness, which welcomes rather than inhibit research and open discussions. This would allow the WTO to break free from the past and start looking towards a brighter future, more in sync with its context and times.
Aluisio de Lima-Campos is the Economic Advisor at the Brazilian Embassy in Washington and Chairman of ABCI Institute (Brazilian International Trade Scholars).
Sebastien Jean.
22 April 2018 at 10:53 am | #
Challenges ahead for the next WTO DG: Take the Doha loss and move toward an updated multilateral trading system.
Leading an institution like the WTO is an extremely challenging job. In the present context of enduring gridlock, with the prospect of taking office just before a potentially crucial Ministerial Conference in Bali, the task becomes utterly daunting, to say the least. Claiming the Doha Round to be alive has not been credible for some time. After twelve years of make-or-break meetings, last-chance conferences, and missed deadlines, the value of this claim has shrunk dramatically. One of the jobs of an investment advisor is to help their clients to decide when to accept stock market losses. The first challenge for the next DG is to help the members accept that this moment may have come for the Doha Round negotiations. The best outcome would of course be to find a deal, even one that is far more limited in scope and ambition than what has been discussed so far. Even a modest agreement would be invaluable in helping consolidate a rule-based system which remains unparalleled in international arenas. Calling it an early harvest, a development package, or whatever is not important. What is important is that such an agreement would clear the ground and allow progress to be made on updating the trading system. A lot has been invested in the Doha negotiations, and members seemed to have close to agreeing on the contours of a deal in 2008. But these negotiations are only an asset for the multilateral trading system to the extent that an agreement is possible. If this is not the case anymore, they will become a millstone, preventing members from focusing on a badly needed update of the WTO software. This is a second major challenge the next DG will face.
Such update will require boldness and open-mindedness, because several long-standing features of the WTO now appear out of date. One is the single undertaking principle, which may have been useful in the past to avoid free-rider strategies, but increasingly hamstrings negotiations by setting objectives that are impossible to reach. Another is special and differential treatment: duly taking into account the fragility of poor countries is more important than ever, but the traditional approach is outdated. It no longer makes sense to distinguish only between developed, least developed and other developing countries. Not taking into account the widening differences across developing countries is a sure recipe for failure, as illustrated by recent history.
The substance of the WTO agenda also needs to be rethought. In manufacturing, it should take into account the new status of emerging countries and the central importance of global and regional supply chains. In agriculture, the multilateral trading system will only be considered legitimate if it contributes significantly to food security. Efforts to address the risks of large-scale excess supply and low prices cannot remain the main – some would say the exclusive — focus of disciplines and rule-making, even though prices cannot be assumed to stay high forever. The only consistent approach here is to limit distortions to market-based adjustment mechanisms, whatever their direction. Finding a suitable way to translate this general approach into updated disciplines should be a priority, no matter that it is difficult.
Another challenge is to create a more favorable intellectual climate, and this requires support for – and relying more heavily on – sound analysis and accurate information. Despite some caveats, the virtues of trade liberalization have been widely documented by economic analyses. But the corresponding facts and mechanisms have become increasingly complex. It is well known that the gains from trade are diffuse, while the costs of greater international competition are more concentrated and therefore more easily visible. Sound policy making requires refined analyses to understand better what is at stake and how to make the best out of available policy options. This requires relying upon detailed analyses of trade policies and their consequences. Facilitating such analyses and bridging the gap between research and policy is an important task for the new DG. Export restrictions are an example: several studies have shown that such tools, initially presented as aiming at price stabilization, may actually entail significant destabilizing effects at the world level – even though their use should not necessarily be completely ruled out for the poorest countries. Non-tariff measures are another interesting case in point: their nature and objectives are so diverse that much work is needed to characterize accurately their economic consequences, and to strike the right balance between their costs and benefits. More broadly, research is critical in thinking consistently about the legitimacy of trade disciplines, by making it possible to go beyond a simplistic focus on trade impacts. Increased reliance upon scientific analyses when settling disputes has arguably been among the important achievements of the WTO so far. When agreement needs to reached on complex issues, between numerous and diverse partners, promoting a culture of evidence-based decision-making may prove to be a key ingredient in making advances possible.
gary Horlick.
18 April 2018 at 9:37 am | #
One of the most interesting aspects of the current contest for the Director General post at the WTO is the very large number of excellent candidates. An organization on its death bed would not logically attract so many people who think it is good for their career. Perhaps one attraction is the rich agenda available to the WTO in the near future if the Members choose to embrace it. As is frequently pointed out, the WTO is a “Member-driven” organization, and the fate of initiatives such as the Doha Round is determined by those Members, not the DG. That said, there are a lot of areas where the DG can make a major effort, and perhaps a major difference:
The most obvious to task is to preserve as much as possible of the vast amount of useful work done in the Doha Round. A package at the Bali Ministerial this December, including at least trade facilitation, would be a nice first step in that direction, but there is a lot more to be saved. Any WTO negotiation inevitably involves a lot of tradeoffs, some of them good for policy reasons and some not, but the initial stage of a negotiation, certainly the case in Doha, involves a huge amount of highly useful technical discussion, to sort out good ideas from bad ones, and to flesh out the details of the good ones. At some point, sooner rather than later, the WTO will have to take up the problems of trade in agriculture and food, and a succession of very capable chairman of the agriculture negotiation produced extremely useful solutions to numerous technical problems which had to be solved before tradeoffs could be made. Issues such as measurement of subsidies, ad valorem equivalents, and so on, even if not resolved already, were at the very least clarified in useful ways, and work should be moved forward. Similarly, in antidumping, numerous minor technical solutions included in the first chairman’s draft and then dropped for negotiating reasons should be agreed through the Committee on the Antidumping Practices and put into effect. And if the fishery subsidies issues cannot be agreed in Bali, the enormous amount of useful work in that area should be taken up again and a search for negotiating solutions undertaken urgently, before there are no more fish about which to negotiate. (Only slight hyperbole there.) Completion of the physical plant. This seems merely mechanical, but the disruption inevitably caused by the very necessary renovations should be completed as soon as possible. And definitive maps with office and telephone numbers posted on line! الشفافية. Halting strides have been made in WTO transparency, most notably the “opening” of several panel and Appellate Body hearings. But that “opening” consists of a censored televised version piped into another room. It would probably be cheaper to just stream the audio and video, rather than go through all the registration and security. It would certainly be more transparent and, even more important, fairer. The Law in its majesty apparently permits not only the rich and the poor alike to sleep under the bridges of Paris (Anatole France, The Red Lily), but also to fly to Geneva from all over the world to attend the “opening” hearing. I admit a clear bias—I teach this stuff, and the video would be a superb teaching tool for students, as well as clearing up a lot of misperceptions about the very honest way in which the WTO dispute resolution system works. A new DG should undertake a major project, including from multiple Divisions as well as people outside WTO, to start planning a negotiation leading to the “domestication” of all the major free-trade agreements into a more coherent package. This will be a lengthy and complicated process. Indeed, something similar had to be done in the original GATT negotiation because of the proliferation of such preferential deals before the war.
Patrick Messerlin.
18 April 2018 at 9:24 am | #
Being Director General (DG) of the World Trade Organization (WTO) is probably the most difficult job among all the international organizations. At a first glance, the DG’s status seems comparable to that of the President of the World Bank or of the Managing Director of the International Monetary Fund. But, this parallel is illusory for several reasons:
The WTO DG has a portfolio of issues that is much narrower than those of the two other institutions, and these issues are generally (incorrectly, but this is not the point) perceived to be much less important than the macroeconomic, monetary and development issues dealt with by the IMF and the World Bank. This difference in portfolios is best illustrated and magnified by the fact that the DG has no money to disburse. The WTO DG works with Trade Ministries which are junior ministries compared to Finance Ministries—the primary counterpart for the IMF and World Bank. Being part of the Finance Ministries does not enhance their status; being part of the Industry Ministries lowers its; it is only when Trade Ministries are part the Foreign Affairs Ministries that they may enhance their domestic, hence international, status—but this is a relatively rare occurrence. The WTO DG has (contrary to the heads of the IMF or WB) not enough staff to be able to exert strong leadership based on economic analysis and knowledge. This is not just a question of funds but reflects a much more important point, namely that the battle for convincing the populace of a country of the net benefits of freer trade has to be fought in each country—not in Geneva. The WTO DG can’t rely on a voting procedure that he/she may use for clarifying the situation (the balance of interests) at a critical point of time. Last but not least, as is well known, the true masters of the WTO are the Members—not the DG. This is not primarily a legal question. It is in the intrinsic nature of the WTO: Members are driven by mercantilist perspectives, leading to a permanent situation of conflicts among themselves. They do not have a strong sense that they are fighting the same battles (achieving low inflation and sustaining positive growth rates) and need to cooperate in order to achieve common objectives, as in most macroeconomic issues.
In short, the DG is at best an ‘international special envoy’ among the countries. He/she should have a strong sense of service “à la Suisse” and a good dose of Confucian humility. Such characteristics are extremely difficult to maintain in a world dominated by instant and repetitive media looking for big failures or successes in order to attract viewers, and prone to ‘personalize’ issues and events.
In addition to these constraints on what the DG can do, the post-1995 WTO period suggests two crucial points which are often ignored.
First is the much stronger role that should be played by middle-size economic powers. In the GATT history (as was true in the history of the EU) the role of the middle-size economic powers as a source of initiatives and compromises has always been crucial. The best illustration may be the effort by Columbia and Switzerland to create momentum on the agricultural issues in the mid-1980s. They were instrumental in putting together the famous “café-au-lait” coalition which was key for re-introducing farm and agro-business products under the GATT coverage—closing definitively the door to a host of negotiated or self-proclaimed waivers on trade negotiations in these goods.
The reasons for the “disproportionate” influence of middle-size economies are easy to understand. First, these economies are the best placed to realize the benefits from a multilateral trading regime: they are big enough to reap large gains from trade liberalization, and small enough to have no preferable alternatives. Second, initiatives launched by middle-sized economies are less likely to be received by the other WTO Members with negative prejudices and the fear that they reflect some Machiavellian motive. Third, initiatives tabled by middle-size economies are felt to be more malleable by both their initiators and the receiving membership. In short, they are a better basis for finding compromises.
The second aspect which too often has been missed during the last twenty years is that the WTO is above all a negotiating forum—a kind of ‘bazaar’ where countries negotiate commitments on their future trade and regulatory policies (regulatory policies since 21st century trade liberalization requires agreements on norms (goods) and regulations (services)).
The key actors in this bazaar are the Geneva-based Ambassadors, not the Trade Ministers. Of course, Ambassadors to the WTO convey the positions of their governments to the rest of the membership. But, ‘true’ Ambassadors have two faces, like the Roman god Janus. They also convey the position of the rest of the world (or at least of the most important trading partners of their country) to their Ministers. In this respect, they have to enlighten their governments, and even to convince them to do or not to do certain things. In this role, they are unique: their Ministers are highly unlikely to have the rich array of information that Geneva-based Ambassadors can get quickly (if necessary, an Ambassador can exchange views with a dozen key trading partners within a few days).
A DG needs to work closely with the Ambassadors. He is no substitute to them. He/she cannot achieve the same results by travelling from capital to capital, all the more because, when doing so, he/she will almost inevitably favor the large countries. His/her legitimacy for Member governments is an open question: it is strongly limited by the fact that he/she is not (or not anymore) a Minister, that is, a political decision-maker.
All these remarks may look terribly “GATT-minded” and hence seem old-fashioned. But, is it not the main lesson of the last twenty years (1995-2018) that we have lived too long on a costly “hype” about the WTO? The Uruguay Round was seen by too many as the starting point of a new bright era where powerful international institutions would become key decision centers. The reality is quite different. Countries largely remain in charge for a host of reasons (it is beyond the scope of this note to examine them). We have to come back to a more ‘GATT-minded’ approach, based on plurilateral agreements, multiple speed agreements and a DG who is more in tune with these realities. That is not so bad: after all, the GATT achievements compare well to those of the WTO.
17 April 2018 at 3:22 pm | #
Role of the next WTO DG: Addressing 21st Century Trade Challenges through Institutional Cooperation.
One of the most critical tasks for the next DG is the reinforcement of the continued relevance of the multilateral trading system in a single undertaking format at a time when countries are increasingly resorting to non-multilateral trading agreements, and also pushing for variable geometry.
This is particularly significant in the context of ‘shifting economic geographies’ where power is increasingly moving to the East at a time when the world is facing both economic crisis and disruptions triggered by unresolved 21st century issues such as climate change, food security, environmental damage etc. Though these disruptions have so far resulted in further eroding the stability of the negotiating system owing to the accrual of limited benefits to its populace as opposed to the costs, there is great potential to increase growth through tapping into global value chains.
The solution is to broaden/equalise the focus on developmental issues with the pivot on open trade considering that countries may resist policies which induce only trade-related reforms. This can be achieved through a Geneva Consensus on Multilateralism, an essential element of which is facilitating institutional linkages between the WTO and other intergovernmental organizations which are engaged in ‘global economic issues’.
The CUTS Survey: ‘Making trade a tool for poverty amelioration in the 21st Century’ had indicated that one of the foremost trade challenges being encountered concerns linkages between trade and global public goods such as climate change and food security, apart from the perils of non-tariff measures. The CUTS Survey also demonstrated that the linkages between the WTO and appropriate inter-governmental organisations to negotiate multilateral accords on trade and climate change, trade and food security could be facilitated through inter disciplinary working groups. Accounting for the shift in economic powers, the survey respondents note that while the WTO could provide the platform, the major developed and emerging countries have a responsibility to provide system stability.
Until now, the WTO’s coherence objective has revolved around just the Bretton Woods Institutions. leaving other critical issues such as food-security without a forum for discussion. Can this be improved by creating instruments or mechanisms to bridge the gap between the vastly different objectives which the pertinent organisations may have? The new DG will have to explore if questions pertaining to agricultural policy can be addressed in conjunction with the FAO, industrial policy can be formulated jointly with the UNIDO, monetary policy with the IMF, fiscal policy with the World Bank, labour policy with the ILO, health policy with the WHO and competition and investment policy with UNCTAD.
Achieving coherence may seem insurmountable in some cases – the ‘Access to Medicines’ debate is one of those issues where the need to reconcile the stand on policy is imminent. Is there a need for inter-institutional agreement between organisations like the WTO, WIPO and the WHO on global access to medicines? Another pertinent example is that of UNFCC norms of climate change and the increasing exercise of protectionist measures in developing countries owing to which trade in green goods is increasingly under the scanner.
Studies conducted by the WTO on 21st century issues should involve other multilateral organizations. A relevant example is the joint report on ‘Price Volatility in Food and Agricultural Markets’ addressing the food-security crisis by the IFPRI, the WTO, the FAO, the UNCTAD, the World Bank, OECD, the UN HLTF and IFAD in 2018 amongst others. The example of export restrictions in the report demonstrates the enhanced value of such studies. The report identified that export restrictions were prejudicial to food security not only in terms of trade, but also that policies exacerbated the food crisis. Such reports help decision-makers to devise a solution based on better access to information and analysis on both sides of the issue.
Another question which should be addressed by the next DG is what should the inter-institutional agreement encompass? Should institutional relations remain based on aspects of cooperation between the institutions that merely confer observer status and involve information-sharing, or should it extend to according responsibility for achieving real development?
As has been noted in earlier discourse over the issue of coherence between the WTO and other organisations, consensus has to be arrived at a domestic level prior to establishing global coherence. It is critical that national governments communicate the benefits of a coherent trade policy to all the possible stakeholders. The WTO DG has to consider whether the benefits arising from enhanced cooperation between the international institutions can be taken down to the countries themselves if linkages between the WTO and the other international organisations can be facilitated by establishing working groups in the capital of every country or at least in a region. These institutions can be facilitated by a UN agency.
Further, should the application of the trade policy review tool be expanded to identify not only measures which hinder free flow of trade, but also those policies and international operations which interfere with the achievement of the goal of poverty amelioration and reduction in income inequality? Especially during economic crisis situations, even amongst economic policies, trade policy has to be better aligned with monetary policy, fiscal policy, investment policy, and competition policy.
Another question is that should due attention be accorded to capacity-development programmes in developing countries by channelling aid for trade into funds which help developing countries develop the capacity to deal with the linkages between trade and non-trade issues.
Asanka Wijesinghe.
15 April 2018 at 3:16 pm | #
Challenges to new DG: Play the role of a political economist.
An important manifestation of economic globalization for developing countries is the impact of barriers to agricultural exports from developing countries, including the role of sanitary and phytosanitary (SPS) measures. The WTO’s success in the future, or at least its survival, will depend on the degree of integration of the developing countries and the benefits they obtain from the mutual liberalization of world trade. For this intra and inter-national reforms are required. The former should be done by sovereign nations, while the latter should be done within international bodies.
It is obviously true that the liberalization of tariffs and quantitative restrictions paved the way for developing countries to harvest more benefits, in terms of increased export performance of both traditional and non-traditional products. However, food safety and quality standards are still daunting the success of exports of developing countries. Is the WTO capable enough to address these conflicting interests of its member nations? My answer is no, and I would like to suggest that the deadlocked Doha rounds and lukewarm reactions of member countries indicate a serious threat to the future of this umbrella body for global trade. I see two possible reasons for the inability of the WTO to address the conflicting interests. First, the institutional weaknesses of WTO that are manifested by indicators of underperformance that include lack of progress on the Doha round and the poor involvement of a block of its members, largely from the developing countries. Second, the weak institutional capacities of the developing countries and their attitudinal biases against the WTO. Unfortunately these reasons are mutually reinforcing!
The fundamental question in the liberalized global trade arena is whether developing countries benefit from tariff liberalizations and easing of quantitative restrictions. The answer is undoubtedly yes! But agricultural and food exports from developing countries are still facing non-tariff measures, such as SPS measures imposed by the developed countries. The result is a severe blow to the export competitiveness of the developing nations as a result of escalated trade costs. If these environment and health related trade barriers are scientifically ill-found, and lack a justifiable cause, the affected countries can bring the cases to the WTO dispute settlement bodies. However, weak institutional capacities and lack of technological sophistication make this impossible. The net result is marginalization of the developing nations in the world trade arena. The political implication of this marginalization is quite significant. When developing countries’ agricultural and food production are not allowed in world trade, the popular discontent about the WTO and world trade increases. This discontent is critical as agriculture is the largest sector which still employs the greatest portion of the labor force. As this segment has a great political lobbying power in national politics, there is a tendency for the political forces that are in favor of the market economy, world trade and the WTO to be defeated.
The new DG of the WTO should consider this aspect through the eye of a political economist. At the moment, what is required is to integrate the developing countries in world trade and to ensure that the economic benefits reach the rural mass that holds the highly important domestic political power. What should be the mechanism? The mechanism should be essentially a meaningful dialogue, with genuine commitment of all the nations for greater domestic and international reforms for strong institutional capacities. While some may regard this kind of discussion as just a utopian idea, it is better to start it. Finally, I would like to add that the rise of the market economy, even at its preliminary stages, was a driving force for the freedom from suppressive social institutions. The WTO should play the role of guardian of such achieved freedom and be its promoter.
robert wolfe.
15 April 2018 at 2:05 pm | #
The new Director-General of the WTO takes office at an apparently critical juncture, barely three months before the supposedly make or break Bali Ministerial. If Members fail to agree on the mini package of issues proposed for that meeting, the WTO will be discredited, leading countries will give up on the WTO as a forum for negotiations, and global value chains will roam the earth unimpeded. I think in contrast that things are not as dire as all that. Many of the Doha Round problems were due to a general malaise in multilateralism and to structural changes in the world economy that undermined the premises of the round. Perhaps most of all the leading players changed in mid-stream. Until the U. S. and China learn how to develop a trans-Pacific accommodation comparable to the one painstakingly established across the Atlantic, new negotiations will be stymied. Improvements in how the WTO negotiates are possible, but the Doha Round did not fail for institutional reasons.
Nor should the new Director-General worry over much about the noodle soup of bilateral and regional trade negotiations. Politicians are showing an endearing faith in written rules. In the improbable event that all the negotiations succeed, and that strong obligations are actually implemented, firms in global value chains might have trouble learning how to navigate the thicket of rules. The so-called “mega-regional” trade negotiations may be exciting, but China, India, and Brazil are not participating, and probably will not. If their acceptance of any new disciplines is thought important, it seems likely that they will eventually have to be negotiated at WTO. But whether or not the current negotiations succeed, it’s good that countries are talking. If they develop good ideas, no doubt they will bring them to Geneva. In the meantime the new Director-General may need to rag the puck, as hockey defensemen do while waiting for their team to return to full strength.
Let me now turn to the questions posed by Bernard Hoekman and Petros C. Mavroidis.
Should the DG be an experienced politician?
At the outset I thought that the role of ministers was crucial, and that therefore ministerial experience was vital. Now I am not so sure. Whether or not the new Director-General has had political experience, s/he must be able to work closely with both domestic leaders and Geneva ambassadors.
Pascal Lamy, worried by a “disconnect” between Geneva and capitals, has always maintained close contact with ministers. Having been a minister himself, he saw ministers as his real peers and colleagues. He is always eager to call them back to Geneva to make the key decisions, ignoring ambassadors who would keep talking forever. Maybe he thought ministers and ambassadors live in different worlds, one participant told me late in the round, but hell has no fury like a bureaucrat scorned. The Secretariat could once pretend that if the ambassadors were intransigent it was because they were on their own, playing a personal role with no instructions from home. Appealing over their heads to ministers might have helped to break an impasse. Given the internet, however, it is unwise to assume that ambassadors are not in close contact with their capitals, or that their own constituencies at home are not able to follow events in Geneva. It is said that during an unscripted discussion at the Toronto G-20 Summit, other leaders were surprised that U. S. President Obama sounded just like his negotiators in Geneva. They should not have been. When ambassadors do not agree, it could be because a deal is not ripe. They are the only ones who are in a position to understand the whole round. For many countries their chief negotiator is the Geneva ambassador, not someone in the capital.
Unlike the Uruguay Round, the Doha Round has been marked by a remarkable number of so-called mini-ministerials. I thought they were important, and so was surprised when negotiators in Geneva were irritated by them, and even more surprised when the ministerial guidance had no apparent effect in Geneva. I discovered that announcing a mini-ministerial brought Geneva work to a halt because nobody wished to pre-judge what ministers might say. It turns out, however, that the drafting for the mini-ministerial statements was usually done in Geneva, because that’s where the experts are, for most Members. At some mini-ministerials some countries were represented by the Geneva ambassador, and those ambassadors usually accompanied their ministers.
Political engagement in trade negotiations is essential, but tough decisions must be well prepared for ministers with limited time and even more limited technical knowledge. Elements of a package have to be assembled bit by bit. A beast as cumbersome as the WTO cannot negotiate on the fly. If the Director-General had been allowed to keep the list of issues for decision at the July 2008 informal ministerial small, the gamble of bringing ministers to Geneva might have worked. He would have been better off had he been able to exclude all the second tier issues, including services, and if the list of open agriculture and NAMA issues had been shorter. The role for ministers is to knock off the last few square brackets, and to bless the assemblage when the Single Undertaking is ripe. I now think that while ministers have to understand the issues, they cannot drive the process.
The political challenge for the new Director-General will be constructing a functioning bridge club at ministerial and chief negotiator level, a task that will require a delicate approach with both political and bureaucratic actors. The absence of a functional equivalent to the old Quad hurt the Doha Round, despite valiant efforts by Pascal Lamy to bring one into being.
Should the DG spend his/her energy on trying to conclude the Doha round?
No: this parrot is dead. Since the grieving relatives do not want to face reality, the new Director-General should encourage them to send Doha to the Old Rounds Home and move on, whether Bali succeeds or not.
Some of the “Elements for Political Guidance” adopted by the WTO’s 2018 Ministerial Conference were delusional in their rhetorical claims that the Doha Round could and should be finished. Members had no inclination to re-open the delicate bargains that had been fought over at ministerial meetings in Seattle, Doha, Cancún, Geneva (July 2004) and Hong Kong. While accepting that they might agree on some areas now thoroughly chewed over, they want to retain the progress already made in parts of the negotiation not yet stabilized, because that too has been painfully achieved. But what made sense in 2005 or 2008 is no longer viable.
When it is time to discuss the post-Bali agenda, the Director-General should encourage Members to ask not where firms demand new rules (they are not experts in the alphabet soup) but what they ask for. Firms tell you specific interests, not general aspirations. And much of what they are asking for, as Hoekman and Mavroidis suggest, involves regulation. The Doha Round never got to grips with the regulatory issues that will be important in all new trade negotiations. I suspect that the major players will only be able to conclude deals among themselves on such domestic issues in Geneva. And it will not be easy. Regulatory agencies have different missions—safety, security, environmental protection—and regulators therefore do not always see a need for reciprocal negotiations. Some regulators need to work with their counterparts; others do not.
Should the WTO (and its DG) be more pro-active in reaching out and engaging with business and other stakeholders?
I think the WTO has made significant strides in this direction in the past four years, a pace of change which should continue, but I doubt that being even more active would be useful.
Was the move to focus more on development issues a mistake?
The new Director-General will have to grasp the differentiation nettle: all developing countries are not alike.
The development mandate never made sense. It arose from the pre-Doha debates about “implementation” of the Uruguay Round agreements, which had been based on the assumption that they were a “bum deal” for developing countries. Desire to “rebalance” all bargains led to the “implementation” debates, which led to the Seattle breakdown, which in turn led to the Doha Development Agenda and endless subsequent debate on the wrong issues.
When “policy space” is thought to mean water in tariffs, in the form of unnecessarily high bindings, and “special and differential treatment” comes to mean weaker disciplines for all developing countries, including emerging economies and new members of the OECD, then the structure of multilateral rules risks unraveling. The development framing rests on the outdated assumption that the obstacles to development are restrictions in north-south trade, whereas the largest remaining obstacles affect south-south trade.
The further delusion is that the United States should still be willing to pay for a stable trading system by offering unreciprocated greater access to its market. The same countries who happily point to the greater economic weight and therefore influence of the emerging economies fail to note the corollary: precisely because the U. S. counts for less in the world, Congress will be harder to move since any U. S. action will cost more and have a smaller payoff for Americans. With a greater role for developing countries eventually comes greater responsibility.
Pierre Sauve.
11 April 2018 at 11:00 am | #
Two core challenges for the next Director General.
Charting a future course for the WTO at a time when its membership is as mired as ever in the intractable challenges put up by the Doha Development Agenda is a decidedly daunting task. The next Director General will inherit a multilateral trading system that has seen better days. It has, sadly, become increasingly difficult to talk of the Doha Round in the present tense. In two and half decades of involvement in trade diplomacy, it is hard to recall a moment as uncertain – some might say as bleak ‐ as the one the multilateral trade community currently confronts.
There is, of course, undue hyperbole in the above comments. Trade policy has a marked propensity towards emotional overshooting. Undue WTO‐pessimism often derives from the predominant tendency to regard the trade body as a one‐trick (i. e. market opening) pony. There is little denying that the WTO’s trade liberalizing and decision‐making machinery show a number of worrisome signs warranting serious attention on the part of Pascal Lamy’s successor. Still, one would be hard pressed to sustain the argument that the WTO’s equally core adjudicatory and surveillance functions suffer from debilitating institutional shortcomings. Maintaining a sense of policy proportions is thus a precondition for thinking clearly about what might lie ahead for the multilateral trading system.
The next DG’s first clear priority will be to salvage what is salvageable at MC9 in Bali. What may ultimately transpire at the next Ministerial gathering will have probably long been established by the time the new Director General takes office on September 1st. None of the highly competent candidates still in the race can be expected to deliver miracles in such a time span. Nor should they be. Still, the new DG and his or her senior management team can help set a tone, send signals of a new way of doing things, provide hope and help restore confidence much the same way that Pope Francis has galvanized his troops with a discourse that is tinged with humility and a compelling call for a return to core beliefs.
Five years into one of the deepest economic crises the world has known, and at a time of growing restlessness over how the spoils of globalization are being shared both within and across countries, there is today a crying need for more economic justice. The very DNA of the WTO – its emphasis on transparency and on orderly, progressive, change, its promotion of the core values of fairness and non-discrimination, its embodiment of right over might – offers a potentially strong antidote to many of the ills of today’s world economy. The next DG will need to use the full – if constrained – power of his or her pulpit in voicing the moral imperative for greater distributive justice.
Beyond picking what is arguably the Doha Round’s lowest hanging fruit – a deal on trade facilitation – by no means an inconsequential outcome in a world where development economics ascribes increasing importance to the thinning of borders for income growth, the next DG’s first real test will be whether he or she can get Members to agree to a compelling development package. The elements of a development-friendly Doha Round package are by now familiar to all. If WTO members fail to muster the plain common sense to help the most disadvantaged among them to share more broadly in the benefits of trade liberalization and rule-making, they will supply the Organization’s many detractors a compelling reason to question the organization’s future.
A credible down payment on development is a crucial pre-requisite for looking forward, arguably the second most pressing imperative facing the next DG. To progress and chart a sustainable future path, the WTO system needs a revamped operating system – one that ensures greater adequacy between the world economy of today and the trade rules that should govern such a new environment. Absent such adaptive efforts, the multilateral community is left with a rule book designed in the early 1990’s. Tectonic changes have occurred in the world economy since the end of the Uruguay Round, not least the digital revolution that is fast changing the geography of trade, and the inability of the WTO membership to revisit its collective rule‐book seems certain to shackle the institution’s quest to stay relevant and negatively affect the legitimacy of those functions that the WTO has continued to perform well even with a dated rule‐book.
The costs of non‐Doha are thus not merely commercial in character. They also carry genuine institutional consequences. Any meaningful effort to “reset” the WTO button must thus focus on the need for change on both the liberalization and rule‐making fronts alongside the organization’s decision‐making machinery.
There is today a pressing need to consider constitutional changes in the WTO’s governance structure and modus operandi so as to allow greater flexibility in decision‐making, agenda‐setting and the very conduct of negotiations. Simply put, the time has come to reconsider the pros and (mostly) cons of the Single Undertaking and explore ways of embedding needed doses of flexibility into the multilateral trading system. Conceived at the end of the Uruguay Round by the Quadrilateral countries as a means to prevent free‐riding and ensure full compliance by all Members with the Round’s ambitious outcomes, the Single Undertaking has today become a powerful source of collective inertia, providing an effective veto to all members and a ready‐made excuse to foot drag for those wishing to do so, whether for substantive or tactical reasons.
The next WTO DG must have the courage to say loud and clear that, far from suffering from a democratic deficit, the WTO is arguably afflicted by an excess of democratic virtue! The next DG should help chart a way to embed greater doses of variable geometry in ‐ and/or critical mass approaches to – the way in which decisions are taken, agendas set, negotiations conducted and agreements reached.
On many rule‐making issues – take trade and competition or trade facilitation for instance, the risk of free‐riding on MFN‐brokered outcomes is arguably non‐existent. Critical mass or full (i. e. unconditional) MFN approaches can and should thus be envisaged in such instances. Where market access issues are more prominent – think services, government procurement or investment for example, there is clear legitimacy to the belief that non‐participating members should abstain from claiming or be rewarded with MFN benefits. In such instances, MFN‐constrained plurilateralism in the manner of the numerous codes brokered in the Tokyo Round could define the new norm, so long as all WTO Members are free to take part in the negotiations in a fully transparent manner, that these are serviced impartially by the WTO Secretariat, and that all Members are given the opportunity to opt‐in at a later date if desired through an accession clause designed for this purpose.
The experience from the Tokyo Round codes suggests that their “partial equilibrium” nature helped pave the way for their subsequent multilateralization in the Uruguay Round (admittedly with the help of the Single Undertaking!). The Organization’s increasingly diverse membership – and the overwhelming influence that developing countries already wield given their share of its membership – a trend that is set to grow as pending accessions proceed – make the quest for greater flexibility all the more justified and necessary.
Forward movement is not a luxury for the WTO system, it is an absolute necessity, not least because the world of trade and investment is ever changing, with new patterns of comparative advantage and, thus, of trade and investment integration emerging, new voices in need of being heard, both within and outside the trading system, trade and non‐trade sensitivities in need of greater policy reconciliation, new responsibilities assumed by those whose systemic influence has recently become significant, and new negotiating challenges taken up.
The WTO’s next DG cannot succeed without a clear vision of how and why the system must evolve to stay relevant and remain an indispensable anchor of shared global prosperity. There is little doubt that the WTO’s next Director General faces daunting challenges, deeper and more ominous perhaps than any of those faced by his or her predecessors. Doing the job well will require a combination of contrasted skills: steely resolve and humility, intellectual leadership and a capacity to work alongside Geneva-based delegates in search of workable solutions. Luckily, such a skills set seems in ample supply among the candidates vying for the position.
11 April 2018 at 10:55 am | #
I have known all the Directors-General, both of GATT and the WTO, in many cases very closely and in others a bit less. This experience allows me to look back and form a view of the virtues or otherwise of those who have held this key position in world trade, and of those who will succeed them.
Out of this vision, a certain number of aspects stand out as to what is in my opinion most important for the new Director-General who will soon be installed at the helm of the WTO Secretariat.
There are two obvious requirements that any candidate must fulfil: the first one is, of course, intelligence, and the second is complete familiarity with the working of the organisation. One cannot contemplate granting such responsibilities to anyone who would be learning as he went along. This is out of the question, least of all when the WTO is deep in the morass of an interminable Doha Round. Certainly, what is needed is a person who can simultaneously encompass both the great political and economic concepts which are part and parcel of world trade at the highest level, while being capable of following and contributing to negotiating processes of an extremely technical character.
The third requirement is the capacity to convey to the whole membership that the Director-General is truly impartial and trustworthy, and will keep exclusively to himself any confidence that is volunteered to him.
I cannot emphasise too much the importance I attach to this question. The membership of the WTO is very large and varied. It includes countries of widely differing cultures, languages, population, resources, and degree of economic development, and – as a consequence – equally varying needs and expectations. Everybody wants the Director-General to concern himself with their problems and, while recognising that this is a tremendous task, I believe it is a necessary one if credibility is to be attained.
There is always a fine balance to be kept between the permanent representatives of governments and the Director-General. The former rightly consider that it is incumbent upon them, acting collectively, to decide on all great issues. However, because of the conflicts of interests that inevitably separate them, they are well aware that there is only one person whose duty consists of bringing them together with tact and forward-vision to the point where they can reach consensus.
This is the key role of the Director-General, and if he does not have the confidence of the membership, then he cannot fulfil his basic obligation to the organisation.
To go back a long time, and so avoid any comparisons with more recent holders of the post, I can recall Sir Eric Wyndham-White in the GATT period. I knew him very well and – as his deputy for a time – we often had vigorous but friendly discussions, which do not influence in any way my opinion of him at this moment.
Eric was intelligent, had a strong personality that was evident to all, could talk on even terms with anybody at all and – most significantly – had the confidence and respect of the contracting parties. Thus, there was never a question of finding a successor, and he only withdrew from GATT at his own volition and after very many years, when he decided to switch his talents to the private sector.
Perhaps this is the best thumb-nail sketch I can provide for the new Director-General of the WTO, at a moment of indisputable institutional crisis arising from the stagnation of the Doha Round.
Intelligence, knowledge and trust, allied to the moral courage to show that the commitment to the WTO outweighs any consideration of job security, is my answer.
Ambassador Julio Lacarte, former Minister of Trade of Uruguay, was Chairman of the GATT General Council and served as Deputy Executive Secretary of the GATT at its inception. In 1995, Lacarte was selected as the first chairman of the WTO Appellate Body.
10 April 2018 at 10:07 am | #
As the next Director General of the World Trade Organization takes office, it might be useful to reflect on what awaits him or her. First, the good news. Despite the quite justified comments about the multitude of bilateral and regional trade deals that are overtaking the multilateral trade system centered around the WTO, global trade itself is not in crisis. A remarkable dog-that-didn’t-bark aspect of the current economic crisis is the resilience of trade flows and lack of any major trade disruptions in the past five years. For a group still looking for a landmark success, the G20 should be given some credit for having averted outright trade wars through the statements and actions of its leaders.
This might still change, if the three quantitative easing programs (in the US, Europe and now Japan) result in a currency war. Much depends on whether the programs work through the expenditure/investment channel rather than the exchange rate channel. If the latter, it is hard to imagine what the WTO might do to manage the consequences.
Another bright spot is the dispute resolution mechanism, a success in the sense that the number of cases brought to this process and the number of countries using it is rising. There is very little the head of the WTO can do to change matters in either direction, so best to garner the plaudits.
The albatross around the WTO’s neck that is the Doha Round must be shed. Rather than proclaim smaller and smaller visions of it still alive, the next head of the WTO is best placed to use whatever honeymoon period he or she is afforded by the member states to proclaim, doing the best impersonation he or she can muster of John Cleese in the Dead Parrot sketch, the Round over and to move on. To what? There is room for discussion here, but it is not clear if the single undertaking approach holds much promise going ahead. If even some of the current issues are to be tackled – intellectual property, investment, climate change, technology transfer – then they deserve to be treated on their own merit, and not part of a grander, fruitless bargain of the sort that got us into the Doha mess in the first place. At any rate, the challenge posed by countries voting with their feet and fleeing the multilateral arena for bilateral and regional ones cannot be met by clinging on to Doha. Best to disassemble it, add and subtract topics, and demonstrate the usefulness of the WTO as a negotiating forum by showing progress on a specific issue.
Unlike the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank, the WTO’s research, training and outreach arms are modest in their size and reach. This is one legacy left over from the GATT days which should be overcome, with the DG insisting to do so not just for the good of the organization, but to strengthen the global constituency for multilateral free trade. For starters, the WTO Chairs program could be expanded and deepened, and the WTO’s sporadic and frankly ineffective “training” courses could be systematized into an Institute along the lines of what the IMF and World Bank run.
Does it matter whether or not the head of the WTO hails from the developing or developed world? The IMF and World Bank are so sullied by their headship selection processes that there is an easy win for the WTO here. An open, competitive and transparent selection process is more important than the nationality of the person it yields. Perhaps a leader with vision and management skills selected through a credible process is not enough to change what appears to be an inexorable drift away from the WTO-centered global trade regime. But not even trying will guarantee irrelevance.
Robert Zoellick.
9 April 2018 at 1:22 pm | #
Starting this month, the 159 economies of the World Trade Organisation will begin the selection of a new director-general. Instead of the usual practice of a selection based on personality and nationality, the nine candidates for WTO chief need to answer questions of policy leadership.
Pascal Lamy, the current director-general, made every effort to complete the Doha round of global trade negotiations. But that deal, launched in 2001, has foundered on differences between developed economies and major emerging markets. As a result, the WTO is at risk of being pushed aside.
The action is shifting to other venues, with the announcement of a US-EU trade negotiation being just the most recent. The next DG needs to have a policy agenda to modernise trade multilateralism to meet new challenges. I urge that each candidate should be assessed by the substance of their answers to five questions, which are drawn from the work of Gary Hufbauer and Jeffrey Schott of the Peterson Institute.
First, will you push for a “small package”, drawn from the Doha negotiations, of special benefit to poorer countries? The years of work have identified potential deals, starting with removing quotas and tariffs on almost all the exports of the least developed countries, which account for less than 1 per cent of world trade.
Given the changing outlook for world agriculture – a shift from chronic surpluses to increased demand – the WTO could end agricultural export subsidies and exempt humanitarian aid from food export controls, as the Group of 20 recommends. The WTO has also identified steps to facilitate trade through streamlined documentation and customs procedures. And the package could include reforms to the WTO dispute settlement process that would boost transparency and encourage speedy decisions with more settlements. Such a package would benefit the most vulnerable economies, while demonstrating that the WTO can still do business.
Second, will you encourage the completion of an international services agreement that offers reciprocal liberalisation to all economies willing to join? Some topics – such as the rapidly increasing services trade – have been held back because all WTO members are not yet willing to commit to openings. But when the WTO stalls, the dealmaking moves elsewhere. The global trading system should encourage “liberalisation by the willing” with others joining when ready. The services trade is increasingly important to boosting productivity in developing countries seeking to avoid the “middle-income trap” and to lowering costs of critical infrastructure development.
Third, will you support zero-for-zero “plurilateral” accords that bind all signatories to eliminating tariffs and other barriers reciprocally, sector-by-sector? For example, the information technology agreement of 1996 led to a boom in global sourcing and supply chains for IT products, by getting rid of barriers to trade in this sector. But its list of goods needs to be updated for the digital age, and the ITA II should include services. If the WTO does not create opportunities to conclude new liberalising deals within its framework, the action – and the creation of new rules for new issues – will move elsewhere.
Fourth, are you willing to press for principles to require fair dealing by state-owned enterprises? The increased importance of SOEs in the world economy – in financial services, telecommunications, steel, chemicals and energy, and other natural resources – requires new rules so that private businesses can compete fairly with state capitalism. The rules need not push privatisation or rollbacks of state enterprises, but they should require transparency, commercial behaviour, declarations of subsidies, nondiscrimination and open procurement. As sovereign wealth funds discovered after they signed the Santiago principles in 2008, agreed, transparent rules build acceptance in the international system. Without such rules, many state enterprises, which seek to trade and invest abroad, will find themselves subject to new barriers.
Finally, will you agree to launch a discussion with the International Monetary Fund about the application of the existing WTO and IMF rules requiring that exchange rates shall not be manipulated to gain unfair trade advantage? Given the extraordinary monetary policies spawned by the financial crisis – and the risks of competitive devaluations of currencies – multilateral bodies should not abdicate responsibility on these questions. If multilateralism fails, unilateralism may prevail. Brazil has already urged the WTO to discuss these questions.
The WTO members need to face up to the key trade policy questions of the day, even if they do not yet agree on the answers. If the WTO members do not select a new leader with an agenda, global trade diplomacy will drift and other negotiations will fill the vacuum. A substantive selection process can give the WTO chief a mandate to get things done. That is what good global governance should be about.
9 April 2018 at 1:09 pm | #
Frustrations with the Doha Round aside, the World Trade Organization (WTO) is still one of the most effective international institutions around. The WTO demonstrated its continued strength during the Great Recession when trade protectionism remained muted. And even in more normal times, it remains relatively robust because its members, developed and developing alike, see benefits from having a rules-based trade system.
There is also no question that the WTO is facing serious challenges. One of the biggest will come in Bali just months after the new Director-General takes over: what to do about the comatose Doha Round. In their various statements, the candidates emphasized the importance of a positive outcome at the ministerial meeting in December. They were less clear on what should happen next. Assuming that the ministers are able to cobble agreement on a few things together—trade facilitation, duty-free, quota-free market access for the least-developed countries, and something on agriculture—my view is that they should declare victory and move on.
Moving on would not mean abandoning everything on the existing agenda. The WTO will have to address agricultural subsidies and tariffs in some fashion, but a fresh start would allow the agenda to be updated and reshaped in ways that would better meet members’ needs in the 21st century.
Moving on also requires understanding why the Doha Round turned sour. One argument is that there are too many cooks stirring the broth and too much democracy in settling on a recipe. My interpretation is that the Doha Round is deadlocked, not because poor countries are blocking it, but because the big players cannot agree among themselves. Beyond the substance of the issues, a key institutional factor is the policy of special and differential treatment for developing countries, combined with the lack of differentiation among developing country members (except for the UN-designated least-developed countries). It simply does not make sense for Brazil, China, and India to be treated the same under WTO rules as Bolivia, Kenya, and Sri Lanka. Industrialized countries clearly expect more from the larger emerging powers in exchange for opening their markets more widely. And, while few are willing to say so publicly, many smaller developing countries were leery of a Doha Round deal, not because they were afraid of opening their markets to the United States or Europe, but because they feared opening up to China.
Some would say that the answer is to end special and differential treatment, but that goes too far. Developing countries differ widely in their development needs and in their capacity to implement and enforce some rules, for example on intellectual property. The large emerging market economies are now members of the G20 and they are, rightly, demanding more of a say in running international institutions and managing the global economy. But more power also entails more responsibility and in the WTO context that should include accepting more disciplines than weaker members.
jayaroy@deloitte.
9 April 2018 at 1:04 pm | #
Adherence to multilateral trade rules remains a necessary condition to derive optimum results from trade liberalization, especially for the developing countries. Doing so supports rapid growth of exports of goods and, more so now, of services, greater inflow of FDI, and the employment generation needed for poverty eradication and income equality. In short, outward-oriented development strategies benefit from the multilateral rules of WTO.
But the focus of WTO has to drastically change from long comprehensive rounds. It needs to define and expand areas covered by the trade rules to allow achievement of the gains from trade through greater market access. Much closer partnerships are needed with the other multilateral institutions, with regional bodies, regulators and the private sector to help enforce these rules and in implementing trade policies. The WTO needs for example to champion a real and effective trade/transport logistics agreement that is fully endorsed and financed by the regional and multilateral bodies to drastically reduce the Number 1 bottleneck to global trade and investment flows: massive trade transaction costs. Trade facilitation reforms have not yet been able to reduce the trade transaction costs that plague most developing countries, and even stand in the way of meaningful pursuit of regionalism. Making progress requires joint action by WTO and the development institutions.
Similarly, we need clearer and fair rules on trade in services, which can only be achieved if regulators become a more integral part of the WTO process, and ensure that regionalism does not result in trade diversion outweighing trade creation. Here again this can only be achieved if the WTO becomes more inclusive and works with other organizations.
The next DG has a formidable task without having the luxury like several World Bank Presidents had of being able to pursue a major reorganization of the institution to reflect the new directions. The same-sized Secretariat has to perform the new tasks. He/she must also need to hear views of people from different groups, not just relying on the trade policy advice from internationally recognized trade experts, and the powerful and growing “Geneva Club”. The language of trade policy has to change from citing WTO articles to something a layman understands and business people can relate to.
The new WTO DG must recognize that trade policy is an integral part of national development strategy and is intrinsically interlinked with its other components. Hence it is of paramount importance to be in constant touch with the government, not just at the central level, but also at the state, and in some cases, local level, with the private sector, with parliamentarians, and the media across a truly representative sample of countries. The new DG must convince policy makers, the private sector, and the general public, of the importance of trade policy and the role played by WTO in promoting trade for inclusive growth.
The necessary qualifications for the next DG in my mind are:
1) A Trade minister/ Chief trade negotiator, preferably from a complex developing country, and who has grappled with trade facilitation, regionalism, and trade in services issues. Trade facilitation needs to be championed by a DG from the South to counter misgivings that it is an agenda imposed by the advanced countries.
2) Total familiarity with the WTO set up in Geneva.
3) Commanding respect of a vast network of politicians, industry CEOs, including of MNCs, top officials of multilateral institutions, and key bilateral donors.
Among the nine candidates, Mari Pangestu and Amina Mohamed fit this bill, with a definite edge for the former.
smarchi@marchigroup. ch.
9 April 2018 at 12:55 pm | #
First Moves For a New WTO DG.
The campaign to replace the Head of any international, intergovernmental organization is a mixture of ideas, intrigue, and politics. In this regard, the WTO is no exception.
However, underwriting these three elements is new energy, and the hope for renewal. In other words, the possibility of a fresh start. And this is a very healthy side of the current WTO DG selection process, especially since the organization has had a tough go of late.
Bernard, Petros and others have highlighted a number of valuable issues which, for them, would help constitute that fresh start in leadership. Let me complement their thoughts by sharing with you 6 practical moves that the new DG should consider from the very start;
First, the new DG should reach out and listen.
It is indispensible for her/him to reach out and broadly engage different people in the trade constituency. Ask for their candid advice and ideas. Pose questions and challenge their proposals. Listen to them.
The new DG — and all those involved — must learn from the shortcomings and mistakes of the last few years. She/ he must fully understand and appreciate the bumpy road that the trade institution has travelled, if they are to help pave a smoother road ahead. She/he must also be able to seize on some novel and creative solutions that will help address the challenges that confront the WTO.
With time, all DG’s run the risk of retreating into a small ‘bubble’; a cocoon of advisors. This is dangerous, given the globality of the task. Thus, seeking input should not be a one-off initiative at the start of the mandate. It must be an ongoing commitment. Just like education is a life-long endeavor, the DG must never stop learning from her or his trade base.
Towards this end, I would also propose that the new DG establish one or two permanent, informal bodies that would allow a constant flow of information to her/ him , and to WTO Members. She/he could easily set up a WTO Business Advisory Board and a WTO Public Advisory Board (consisting of civil society, academic, and other representatives), which would ensure ongoing counsel and sustained dialogue.
Second, the new DG should make a special effort to consult the private sector.
It is no secret that, in recent years, the business community has been less active and interested in the affairs of the WTO.
Rightly or wrongly, many of them believe that because the organization is still deadlocked on the DDA after 12 long years, it may not be worth their time and effort to engage. In other words, what they are really saying is, ‘call me when you have something to tell me’.
But I would encourage the new DG to ‘call’ them right away.
After all, the WTO is in the business of liberalizing trade so that the private sector can achieve more trade and in the process, create more economic opportunities, growth, and wealth which, all peoples, in all countries, are demanding.
If the business community is turning away from the WTO, then its future is in jeopardy, because it brings into question the very mission of the WTO.
The new DG therefore needs to hold a series of business roundtables. A business listening tour with CEO’s and Business Associations. Not to worry, they will come and they will definitely speak their minds — if only to ‘check out’ what the new Boss is made of.
Third, the new DG needs to motivate the WTO Secretariat.
From first-hand experience, I know that the Secretariat is a dedicated group of professional who believe in the cause. But, to be candid, they are down in the ‘dumps’. I have never seen them this demoralized. Their spirits need to be lifted, and this is a prime responsibility of the DG.
The new DG should hold an early ‘town hall’ meeting with all WTO staff. She/ he should open up to them. Tell them something about herself/himself. Outline some ideas for the job, and the organization. Then, invite the staff to speak about matters which are important to them. Listen, and do this at least annually, in an effort to create an open and honest relationship.
With WTO Directors — who are the ‘generals’ of the Secretariat for the DG — the new DG should have regular (weekly/bi-weekly/monthly?) sessions with them. Seek their advice, and find out what their priorities and concerns are in their respective divisions. This will be mutually beneficial and again, it would help build a trusting relationship with the Secretariat leadership, which is essential for a well-functioning Secretariat.
Fourth, immediately meet and consult the WTO Ambassadors on an on-going basis.
They just elected the new DG and like the Secretariat, they too are rather unmotivated.
The Ambassadors don’t like the fact that they are stalled on the DDA anymore that the next WTO supporter. But more importantly, they desire and need to have a first class working relationship with the DG.
I have seen DG’s overlook Ambassadors in favor of going directly to their respective Ministers, Presidents, or Prime Ministers. Don’t get me wrong, having a healthy rapport with Leaders is important for a DG.
But that should not come at the cost of her/his relationship with Ambassadors. Any DG that has tried this has paid a huge price. You see, at the end of the day, those Ministers and Leaders will rely and trust their own Geneva Representatives when it comes to promoting and protecting their vested economic interests.
Trade politics is also a circle.
Consequently, the new DG must send a clear signal that she/ he understands the importance of this relationship, and that this will be nurtured and sustained throughout the entire mandate.
Fifth, involve Trade Ministers beyond negotiations.
Again, from first-hand experience, the WTO does not come close to utilizing Trade Ministers to their fullest potential.
Ministers are only called upon to negotiate. While this is clearly an important obligation, it should not constitute their exclusive responsibility. In fact, if truth be told, the nitty-gritty of negotiations is not the strength of most Ministers. Not because they are incapable, but because their time is spent on so many other political fronts — caucus, Cabinet, local electors and constituencies, domestic issues, etc. — that they can’t afford to dedicate the space to master the intricate details of trade negotiations. As a result, they rely on officials for the micro, and they take care of the macro.
But when it comes to issues like the size and management of the Secretariat, the WTO Budget, WTO reform, running the Ministerial Conferences, and public and private sector outreach, Ministers can and should add much political value. Have them take strategic ownership of these issues and events, and become real partners of the DG.
Why, for example, is there not one single Committee of Trade Ministers working on a dossier (WTO reform?) of some significance, with a view of reporting their findings and recommendations to the next Ministerial Meeting in Bali?
This is not overly complicated. It’s just common sense.
Finally, the new DG should choose a Chief of Staff that understands both the WTO neighborhood, and the larger outside world.
I view this position as being of crucial importance to the DG, and a central conduit for the trade constituency at large.
Accordingly, that person should not just be a trade technocrat. Nor, should that person be a total stranger to the inner workings and culture of the WTO. The ideal candidate should be someone who can bridge both worlds — for the DG and for the trade community. Someone who can see the big picture, and think long term. Someone who can offer sound, balanced, and realistic advice to the DG and through their counsel, enhance the judgment call of the DG.
And the DG should know that such people do exist. She/ he should take the time necessary to pick the right woman or man for the job.
In closing, some may argue that these first moves are ‘small’ steps for the new DG in contrast to the trade policy agenda that awaits her/him. However, in the immortal words of Neil Armstrong, these could prove to be ‘giant leaps’ forward for the WTO.
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