The World Trade Organization (WTO) and the accession process, testing the implementation of the multilateral trade agreements

by Lanoszka, Anna

The geopolitical changes that have occurred over the last two decades have provided t3e impetus for the creation of the World Trade Organization (WTO). And yet the Uruguay Round of negotiations that eventually gave birth to the WTO took over four years ot' preparations and seven more years of taIks to complete. Unlike its predecessor. the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade of 1947 (GATT). the WTO is a fornial miebased member institution with its own strengthened dispute settlement rnechanism. Furtherrnore. and in contrast to the GATT, the WTO scope is vastly enlarged to include such new issues as investment. services and intellectual property. The WTO accession process is a test of what it means to be a WTO rnember. Since the organization has changed dramatically the criteria for joining it reflect the magnitude of these changes. WTO accession is difficult and lengthy because it corresponds to implementing a demanding package of WTO agreements. For the candidate countries the WTO membership has enormous political and other implications, since it goes to the heart of the most fundamental questions about the role of the state in the econom! and the meaning of economic globalization. The establishment of the WTO brings attention to the fact that new developments in the world economy have intensified the interaction between international and domestic law. Particularly in transitional and developing economies. international niles play a significant roIe in guiding the reform of political. legal and economic institutions. The WTO instructs reforming states to build the legal institutions needed to coordinate a market economy and to ease the integration of those states into the global econorny. However. in a bargaining situation for WTO accession where candidates have no power and face highly intrusive demands for intmal reforms, the process raises the questions of what are the long lasting consequences of implementing international legal mies by economically weak states. vii Abbreviations ATC EC EU FDI GATS GATT GDP HS IMF IPRs MFN NAFTA OECD R & D TRiMs TRIPS UNCTAD WIPO World Bank WTO Agreement of Textiles and Clothing European Communities European Union Foreign Direct Investment General Agreement on Trade in Services General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade Gross Domestic Product Harmonized System International Monetary Found Intellectual Property Rights Most-Favored-Nation North American Free Trade Agreement Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development Research and Development Trade-Related Investment Measures Trade-Related Intellectual Property Rights United Nations Conference on Trade and Development World Intellectual Property Rights Organization International Bank for Reconstruction and Development World Trade Organization viii