Multilateral trade negotiations, bilateral opportunism and the rules of GATT/WTO

Trade negotiations occur through time and between the governments of many countries. An important issue is thus whether the value of concessions that a government wins in a current negotiation may be eroded in a future bilateral negotiation to which it is not party. We identify rules of negotiation that serve to protect the welfare of governments that are not participating in the bilateral negotiation. Our main finding is that the two central principles of GATT/WTO—nondiscrimination (MFN) and reciprocity—preserve the welfare of nonparticipating governments and therefore offer a “first-line of defense” against bilateral opportunism.     

Erratum to Multilateral trade negotiations, bilateral opportunism and the rules of GATT/WTO

Trade negotiations occur through time and between the governments of many countries. An important issue is thus whether the value of concessions that a government wins in a current negotiation may be eroded in a future bilateral negotiation to which it is not party. We identify rules of negotiation that serve to protect the welfare of governments that are not participating in the bilateral negotiation. Our main finding is that the two central principles of GATT/WTO—nondiscrimination (MFN) and reciprocity—preserve the welfare of nonparticipating governments and therefore offer a “first-line of defense” against bilateral opportunism.     

Feasible multilateralism and the effects of regionalism

Recent research shows that the GATT/WTO negotiating rules are capable of delivering a politically efficient equilibrium. Such an equilibrium is, however, economically inefficient. Global free trade, in particular, is unattainable even in a fully cooperative world, if governments have political motivations. In such a context, we show that regional trade agreements can help move the world towards a welfare-superior equilibrium. The reason is that, when members of regional trade agreements lower trade barriers against one another, they tend to reduce their multilateral tariffs as well. Once we account for these endogenous changes—and only then—we find that regionalism can raise world welfare even in a fully cooperative (but political) world. Regional integration can, however, harm outsiders.     

世界贸易组织多哈回合谈判受挫原因及启示

文章指出,世界贸易组织最主要的职能是组织和推动多边贸易谈判,多哈回合是世界贸易组织成立以来的第一轮多边贸易谈判,自启动至今屡遭挫折,其主要原因是:区域经济一体化组织深入发展,世界经济力量对比发生了变化;谈判领域和内容越来越敏感,改革接近零和博弈;谈判中发展中成员联合程度提高,影响力扩大;世界贸易组织自身决策机制等存在缺陷。文章提出,为促进世界贸易自由化发展,世界贸易组织应加快改革进程,慎重增加谈判议题,扩大管辖范围;切实做好现有规则和协议的执行与落实;改革决策机制,提高解决现实问题的效率;平衡各方利益,进一步增强世界贸易组织的民主性和公平性,以继续发挥自由贸易主导者和推动者的作用。     

The WTO promotes trade, strongly but unevenly

This paper furnishes robust evidence that the WTO has had a strong positive impact on trade, amounting to about 120% of additional world trade (or US$ 8 trillion in 2000 alone). The impact has, however, been uneven. This, in many ways, is consistent with theoretical models of the GATT/WTO. The theory suggests that the impact of a country's membership in the GATT/WTO depends on what the country does with its membership, with whom it negotiates, and which products the negotiation covers. Using a properly specified gravity model, we find evidence broadly consistent with these predictions. First, industrial countries that participated more actively than developing countries in reciprocal trade negotiations witnessed a large increase in trade. Second, bilateral trade was greater when both partners undertook liberalization than when only one partner did. Third, sectors that did not witness liberalization did not see an increase in trade.     

世贸组织反倾销谈判及中国的立场

由于反倾销制度的最大特征在于其灵活性和不确定性,各国适用反倾销的标准不一,反倾销对国际贸易自由化的负面影响越来越明显。世贸组织内部关于反倾销制度的谈判也随之硝烟再起。同时,出于不同的政治与经济利益的考量,成员国关于反倾销制度的改革方向的立场也不相同。世贸组织反倾销制度的改革方向对我国的对外贸易发展将会有重大的影响。我国一直是反倾销制度的主要调查国,因此我国应积极倡导在世贸组织中进行反倾销谈判,促使世贸组织出台更加严格的反倾销制度。     

区域贸易优惠与最惠国待遇关系的冲突与法律协调——兼论我国之应对措施

区域贸易合作与多边贸易体制虽具有互补性,但彼此不能相互替代;区域贸易优惠与多边最惠国待遇实质上存在冲突,但它作为一项特殊例外存续于世贸组织体制之内。世贸组织规则确立了区域贸易优惠的合法性,从而为区域贸易提供了前所未有的发展机遇。分析区域贸易合作与多边贸易体制的关系、区域贸易优惠与世贸组织最惠国待遇的冲突,以及世贸组织规则对两者间关系的协调,有助于了解区域一体化发展进程,及时采取积极的应对措施。     

WTO新一轮谈判中美国在补贴与反补贴规则修改上的立场和建议

WTO各成员方在2001年11月开始异常艰苦的多哈回合谈判,耗时八年有余,在去年年底举行的小型部长会议上各国表示了在2010年结束此轮谈判的愿望和决心。在过去的八年多,包括美国在内的各成员方就补贴的定义、禁止性补贴、进口替代补贴、出口信贷、严重危害、实质损害的救济、不可诉补贴、补贴通知、自然资源与能源定价,以及发展中成员方特殊和差别待遇等议题和反补贴措施程序方面的一些问题提交了提案,WTO也发布了两个有关的主席案文。由于美国一直以来都是多边补贴与反补贴规则的主导者,并且其在反补贴措施方面的运用也处于世界前列,美国的建议基本上代表了发达国家在WTO《补贴与反补贴协定》(ASCM)修订过程中的立场,在很大程度上也代表了ASCM未来的发展趋势。因此本文就美国在多哈回合谈判中所提出的建议进行梳理,希望对于研究和判断ASCM的未来走向提供一些借鉴。     

国际多边贸易体制改革面临的形势及中国应对策略

近年来,国际多边贸易体制改革遭遇困境,WTO改革出现停滞,暴露出其在多边规则制度规范、多边贸易谈判和贸易争端解决上的局限性。特别是贸易谈判的制度性、实体性局限,极大程度制约着现有问题的解决。针对WTO多边贸易体制改革,美国、欧盟、日本、加拿大等多个国家和地区都提出了各自的主张,中国也提出了"三原则五主张"的方案。基于研究结论,提出了进一步明确中国方案、维护多边贸易体制,进一步细化应对措施、推动多边贸易体制发展,进一步深化国内改革、实现主动应对的对策建议。     

Do countries free ride on MFN?

The Most-Favored Nation (MFN) clause has long been suspected of creating a free rider problem in multilateral trade negotiations. To address this issue, we model multilateral negotiations as a mechanism design problem with voluntary participation. We show that an optimal mechanism induces only the largest exporters to participate in negotiations over any product, thus providing a rationalization for the Principal supplier rule. We also show that, through this channel, equilibrium tariffs vary according to the Herfindahl-Hirschman index of export shares: higher concentration in a sector reduces free riding and thus causes a lower tariff. Estimation of our model using sector-level tariff data for the U.S. provides strong support for this relationship.     

从WTO投资规则对双边投资条约影响看中国选择

WTO框架下新的多边投资规则谈判陷入僵局,而双边投资条约却迅速发展,扮演着促进投资自由化的主角。造成这一局面的原因固然很多,但WTO下多边投资规则自身的弊端难逃其责。兼具发展中国家和资本输入国身份的中国应坚持多边投资规则和双边投资条约齐头并进之路,一方面积极参与WTO框架下多边投资条约谈判;一方面适当与其他发展中国家缔结双边投资条约。     

Trade Disputes and Non‐state Actors: New Institutional Arrangements and the Privatisation of Commercial Diplomacy

Critical aspects of commercial diplomacy in the United States and the European Union are undergoing a process of gradual privatisation. We examine institutional arrangements that permit private groups (predominantly industry associations and firms) to petition for the initiation of trade disputes, propose agenda items for multilateral negotiations in the World Trade Organisation, and conduct negotiations on proposals for regulatory reform outside state‐to‐state channels. These include the United States’ Section 301, the European Union's Trade Barriers Regulation, formal consultation processes surrounding WTO negotiations, and the Transatlantic Business Dialogue. We explore the reasons why governments have opened up these new access points for industry, draw comparisons among the institutions and between the US and EU experience of them, and outline patterns of industry use of the petition mechanisms by broad industrial classification. Along with building theory on comparative private‐sector policy substitutability, we consider some of the normative issues raised by institutions for privatised commercial diplomacy.     

世贸组织《农业协定》中的“蓝箱”支持

“蓝箱”支持是世贸组织《农业协定》国内支持中的一种措施,它的特征是在成员方实施限产计划的条件下对农民的一种补贴。目前,世贸组织有7个成员方使用“蓝箱”支持。2004年7月,“多哈议程”达成了农业谈判框架协议。本文就“蓝箱”支持的若干问题作了全面的介绍和分析。内容涉及:“蓝箱”支持的含义;“蓝箱”支持的实施;“蓝箱”支持引起的三个问题;“蓝箱”支持与世贸组织新一轮农业谈判。     

多边贸易谈判机制的逻辑:一种新贸易理论的解释

按照传统贸易理论的逻辑,在自由贸易最优的世界里,像WTO这样的多边贸易谈判的场所是没有存在的必要,因为各个政府从自身利益出发所做出的决策会自发地导致多边贸易自由化局面的产生。然而现实中的世界并非如此;多边贸易机构不仅存在,而且在国际经济中还发挥着十分重要的作用。目前WTO的存在,促进了自由贸易均衡的实现,而多边贸易协调解决机制保证了各国之间贸易政策博弈中的“冷酷战略”威协的实施,使博弈达到“共赢”的均衡。     

The Dispute Settlement Mechanism of the WTO: A Brief History and an Evaluation from Economic,Contractarian and Legal Perspectives

Any rule‐based system has to include a mechanism for the enforcement of its rules and a means for settlement of disputes about alleged violation of rules. The General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT), concluded in 1947, and its successor the World Trade Organisation (WTO) that subsumed it in 1995, embody rules governing the global trading system as specified in various agreements that their members have entered into over time. Naturally, both had a dispute settlement mechanism (DSM). It was a primarily political one in the GATT and was transformed into a largely legalistic one in the multilateral agreement that established the WTO. This paper reviews the history and evaluation of the two DSMs and examines their efficiency based on appropriate criteria. It views them from three alternative and overlapping perspectives: political‐diplomatic, legal‐economic and social. It concludes with a discussion of the unresolved problems in the operation of the WTO's DSM and the prospects of resolving them in the ongoing Doha Round of multilateral trade negotiations.     

A Multi-Agent Model for Overlapping Negotiations

In the last few years, research on multi-agent systems has addressed different aspects of intelligent negotiations using methods developed in different domains including game theory, decision theory, and economic models. The research proposed in Andersson and Sandholm (1999), Sandholm (1993), Sandholm and Lesser (1995) and Aknine et?al. (2004), Aknine (2002) are significant examples. However, only some of this work focuses on problems related to complex negotiations, particularly those concerning new generation applications. This new research raises fundamental difficulties we have encountered, especially in overlapping negotiations and combined negotiations. This article is interested essentially in overlapping negotiations, which include several agent roles in a same negotiation. One or more agents may play each of these roles. This work shows that the high-level negotiation models are necessary in order to control the execution of overlapping negotiation processes, since, in these negotiations we are facing both classical problems of multi-agent negotiations based on two agents’ roles and the problems concerned with the interdependence of these negotiations. Synchronization of these different processes is thus necessary because of the multiplicity of the roles. Thus, this paper presents a formalized negotiation model, which deals with this problem. It gives a theoretical analysis of the suggested model and discusses the results of the experimental evaluation. To perform this evaluation, we use the application of intelligent service agencies on the Internet.     

On automated e‐business negotiations: Goal,policy, strategy,and plans of decision and action

In recent years, there has been increasing interest in automated e‐business negotiations. The automation of negotiation requires a decision model to capture the negotiation knowledge of policymakers and negotiation experts so that the decision‐making process can be carried out automatically. Current research on automated e‐business negotiations has focused on defining low‐level tactics (or negotiation rules) so that automated negotiation systems can carry out automated negotiation processes. These low‐level tactics are usually defined from a technical perspective, not from a business perspective. There is a gap between high‐level business negotiation goals and low‐level tactics. In this article, we distinguish the concepts of negotiation context, negotiation goals, negotiation strategy, and negotiation tactics and introduce a formal decision model to show the relations among these concepts. We show how high‐level negotiation goals can be formally mapped to low‐level tactics that can be used to affect the behavior of a negotiation system during the negotiation process. In business, a business organization faces different negotiation situations (or contexts) and determines different sets of goals for different negotiation contexts. In our decision model, a business policymaker sets negotiation goals from different perspectives, which are called goal dimensions. A negotiation policy is a functional mapping from a negotiation context to some quantitative measures (or goal values) for the goal dimensions to express how competitive the policymaker wants to reach that set of goals. A negotiation expert who has the experience and expertise to conduct negotiations would define the negotiation strategies needed for reaching the negotiation goals. Formally, a negotiation strategy is a functional mapping from a set of goal values to a set of decision‐action rules that implement negotiation tactics. The selected decision‐action rules can then be used to control the execution of an automated negotiation system, which conducts a negotiation on behalf of a business organization.     

从WTO协议中“最惠国条款”及其例外看自由贸易区的兴起

最惠国待遇条款是WTO赖以存在的基石,GATT第24条作为最惠国待遇的最大一项例外为自由贸易区(FTA)的建立提供了正当性的基础。由于该条款谈判历史上的原因,GATT第24条的条款并不非常明确。自由贸易区的兴起和发展使其正成为平行于WTO体制之外的国际经贸法制。中国应根据本国经贸状况构建符合本国利益的自由贸易区体系和规则。     

On the Path to Trade Liberalisation: Political Regimes in Trade Negotiations

The number of free trade agreements (FTA) has increased substantially since 1990 despite efforts to promote multilateral trade liberalisation. While there is evidence on the determinants of FTA formation, still little is known on the processing of trade agreements, particularly regarding the pre‐implementation duration. This paper fills the research gap by using event data on the negotiation, the signing and the implementation of trade agreements. Duration analysis is employed to examine the connection between regime types and the lengths of the negotiation and the ratification stages. The results support the claim that higher levels of democratisation are associated with shorter negotiations, while political constraints lead to delays. Moreover, the depth of an agreement matters: a higher number of WTO‐X and WTO+ provisions do not only prolong the negotiation stage, but also the subsequent ratification. Against the background of potential anticipation effects of trade agreements, these results are of interest for exporting firms that assess the timing of implementation.     

多边贸易体制的博弈机制

以GATT／WTO为代表的多边贸易体制是摆脱贸易政策选择“囚徒困境”的制度性安排．它为各成员参与多边贸易体制提供了一个博弈平台。文章介绍了贸易政策选择“囚徒困境”．并从多边贸易体制的产生、建设者、互惠原则、最惠国待遇原则、争端解决机制、谈判机制等各方面分析了其运行的博弈原理,说明多边贸易体制本身就是一个博弈系统。