Abstract
Today’s trade involves all aspects of human life and challenges States sovereignty as much as it offers opportunities for growth and development. It is governed by norms of quasi-universal nature largely adopted and furthered during the past 70 years of existence of the GATT and its institutionalised successor, the WTO.
But what trade rules are we talking about? The law “as it is”? Is a purely positivist approach to trade law relevant while there is much more to trade than trade? What sort of international society does this technical trade law contribute to create or maintain? Far from the United Nations utopia for peace, trade law is fuelling a dystopia of unequals as conducive to the development of conflicts as it is prone to solve their technicalities on the basis of a long celebrated and now moribund Appellate Body.
The Dystopia created under the pressure of financial globalisation and justifying the existence of parallel international law regimes is not yet to end if trade lawyers refuse to question the nature of trade law and keep referring to what is not “mainstream” as “Non-Trade Concerns” (NTC). Written against the backdrop of an interrogation on the utopian/dystopian nature of the WTO regime, this short piece proposes to critically address the concern with “non-trade concerns” (1) and sketches the basis lines for possible change in calling for a political approach to international trade law (2).
Professor of International Law and Director of the University of Portsmouth Thematic Initiative in Democratic Citizenship.
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- 1.
WTO (2019) Trade available at: https://www.worldbank.org/en/topic/trade/overview.
- 2.
- 3.
See Stiglitz (2007), p. xiv.
- 4.
See Rodrik (2011).
- 5.
For an interesting historical perspective on the incorporation of labour in trade treaties, see for example, International Labour Organisation (ILO), Ebert FC and Posthuma A (2011) Labour Provisions, in Trade Arrangements: Current Trends and Perspectives, available at: https://www.ilo.org/wcmsp5/groups/public/%2D%2D-dgreports/%2D%2D-inst/documents/publication/wcms_192807.pdf. See also, US Congressional Research Service (2019) Labour Enforcement Issues in US FTAs, 23rd August 2019, available at: https://fas.org/sgp/crs/row/IF10972.pdf.
- 6.
See European Parliament Research Service (2019) Human Rights in EU Trade Agreements, The Human Rights Clause and Its Application, July 2019, available at: http://www.europarl.europa.eu/thinktank/en/document.html?reference=EPRS_BRI(2019)637975.
- 7.
See the UN data on modern slavery and its acknowledgment that it is a “feature” of our societies, 2 April 2019 at: https://news.un.org/en/story/2019/04/1035751.
- 8.
On “mode four” and trade in services, see the WTO at: https://www.wto.org/english/tratop_e/serv_e/mouvement_persons_e/mouvement_persons_e.htm.
- 9.
See WTO (2004) ‘Non-trade’ concerns: agriculture can serve many purposes, available at https://www.wto.org/english/tratop_e/agric_e/negs_bkgrnd17_agri_e.htm.
- 10.
See OECD, Ministerial communiqués related to agricultural policies, available at http://www.oecd.org/tad/agricultural-policies/ministerialcommuniquesrelatedtoagriculturalpolicies.htm#mar98.
- 11.
- 12.
See Appellate Body Report., European Communities — Measures Prohibiting the Importation and Marketing of Seal Products, WT/DS400/AB/R (May 22, 2014) available at: https://www.wto.org/english/tratop_e/dispu_e/cases_e/ds400_e.htm. In this case, the Appellate Body upheld the Panel’s finding that the EU Seal Regime is “necessary to protect public morals” within the meaning of Article XX(a) of the GATT 1994, but that the European Union had not justified the EU Seal Regime under Article XX of the GATT 1994 and in fact applied its exception in a discriminatory manner inconsistent with the GATT and the Agreement on Technical Barriers to Trade (TBT). For a synthetic perspective on the dispute, see: http://www.ictsd.org/bridges-news/biores/news/the-litmus-test-non-trade-interests-and-wto-law-after-seals; on interpreting the WTO agreements and developments in interpretation of the Article XX, see Trachtman (2014), pp. 323–327.
- 13.
On India’s willingness and challenges to build up trade capacity, see Nedumpara (2016), pp. 33–51. See also Non trade Issues at the WTO: Lack of Capacity Worries India, The Hindu, 3 May 2016, available at http://www.thehindu.com/business/Economy/nontrade-issues-at-wto-lack-of-legal-experts-worry-india/article8548230.ece.
- 14.
- 15.
Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties, art. 31(2), May 23, 1969, 1155 U.N.T.S. 331
- 16.
See H.E. Judge Gilbert Guillaume, President of the International Court of Justice, Speech to the General Assembly of the United Nations (Oct. 30, 2001), available at: http://www.icj-cij.org/files/press-releases/5/2995.pdf; and ILC Analytical Study 2006, ILC Study Group on the Fragmentation of International Law. Fragmentation of International Law: Difficulties Arising from the Diversification and Expansion of International Law; Report of the Study Group of the International Law Commission, Finalized by Martti Koskenniemi. UN Doc A/CN.4/L.682; Add.1 and Corr. 1. New York: International Law Commission, 2006; and ILC Conclusions 2006. ILC, Report of the Study Group, Fragmentation of International Law: Difficulties Arising from the Diversification and Expansion of International Law: Conclusions (A/CN.4/L.702) (18 July 2006).
- 17.
See Appellate Body Report, (1996) United States – Standards for Reformulated and Conventional Gasoline (US – Gasoline) at 17, DSR 1996:I 3, para. 16. (WT/DS2/AB/R).
- 18.
Ibid.
- 19.
On the reintroduction of politics to respond to fragmentation, see Koskenniemi (2007), pp. 1–30.
- 20.
See OHCHR (2011) UN Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights HR/PUB/11/04 available at https://www.ohchr.org/documents/publications/guidingprinciplesbusinesshr_en.pdf.
- 21.
See WTO at: www.wto.org/english/tratop_e/dda_e/dda_e.htm.
- 22.
- 23.
The 2019 WTO Review of Aid for Trade is available at: www.wto.org/english/tratop_e/devel_e/a4t_e/gr19_e/gr19programme_e.htm.
- 24.
WTO (2019) An Undifferentiated WTO: Self-Declared Development Status Risks Institutional Irrelevance Communication from The United States (14 February 2019) WT/GC/W/757/Rev.1.
- 25.
- 26.
African Charter on Human and People’s Rights adopted in Nairobi June 27, 1981, entered into Force October 21, 1986.
- 27.
WTO (2019) The Continued Relevance of Special and Differential Treatment In Favour Of Developing Members To Promote Development And Ensure Inclusiveness: Communication From China, India, South Africa, The Bolivarian Republic Of Venezuela, Lao People’s Democratic Republic, Plurinational State Of Bolivia, Kenya And Cuba (26 February 2019) WT/GC/W/765.
- 28.
Ibid.
- 29.
See WTO, Who are the developing countries in the WTO? available at: www.wto.org/english/tratop_e/devel_e/d1who_e.htm.
- 30.
See Chimni (2017).
- 31.
See Urbaser S.A. and Consorcio de Aguas Bilbao Bizkaia, Bilbao Biskaia Ur Partzuergoa v. The Argentine Republic (2016) Award ICSID Case No. ARB/07/26, para. 1195.
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Choukroune, L. (2020). The Concern with Non-concerns: For the End of Trade Dystopia. In: Lewis, M.K., Nakagawa, J., Neuwirth, R.J., Picker, C.B., Stoll, PT. (eds) A Post-WTO International Legal Order. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-45428-9_12
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