Trade policy under the GATT/WTO: empirical evidence of the equal treatment rule

Abstract. A fundamental difference between multilateral trade agreements like the GATT and WTO and a preferential agreement is the multilateral agreements’ inclusion of a most‐favoured‐nation principle. Though MFN requires that members implement policies that provide equal treatment to all GATT/WTO countries, how far do members actually follow the MFN principle when so required? We empirically investigate a sample of GATT/WTO trade disputes and the effect of successful dispute settlement negotiations on the disputed product trade of third country exporters to the defendant country. We document evidence of trade liberalization consistent with defendant countries successfully applying the equal treatment rule. JEL classification F13     

On the emergence of an MFN club: equal treatment in an unequal world

Abstract .  Motivated by GATT, we endogenize the formation of a club whose members have to abide by the MFN principle of non-discrimination. The underlying model is that of oligopolistic intraindustry trade. While an MFN club does not alter average tariff levels across countries, it increases aggregate world welfare; makes non-members worse off; and can immiserize its high cost members. These results imply that (i) core WTO rules such as MFN are valuable even if multilateral negotiations deliver limited trade liberalization and (ii) the distributional effects of MFN maybe one reason why developing countries have been granted Special and Differential treatment at the WTO.     

中国加入WTO环境保护的对策研究

中国目前正积极准备加入世界贸易组织（WTO）,WTO的宗旨是实现世界贸易自由化,而贸易自由化与环境保护之间存在着密切的关系。本文总结了GATT／WTO的多边贸易协议中与环境保护有关的规定与条款,对加入WTO我国环境保护与国际贸易的协调发展提出了对策建议。     

Do Gatt Rules Help Governments Make Domestic Commitments?

We investigate empirically whether GATT rules may have helped the US government make trade policy commitments to its private sector. We study choices under two distinct environments. One environment is the determination of sectoral exclusions in the Tokyo Round of GATT negotiations. The other is the determination of tariff responses under GATT's escape clause. In each environment the US government was faced with a similar decision, but only in the former environment did GATT rules serve as a potential commitment device. Comparing decisions made across these two environments, we find evidence that GATT rules did help the US government make domestic trade policy commitments that it could not have made in the absence of these rules.     

The WTO dispute settlement system: a first assessment from an economic perspective

We explore the incentives countries face in trade litigationwithin the new WTO dispute settlement system. Our analysis yieldsa number of interesting predictions, First, because sanctionsare ruled out during the litigation process, the dispute settlementsystem does not preclude all new trade restrictions. However,the agenda-setting capacity of the complainant, including itsright to force a decision, make trade restrictions less attractivethan under the WTO's predecessor, GATT. Second, the system'sappellate review provides the losing defendant with strong incentivesto delay negative findings, and both parties with a possibilityto signal their determinacy in fighting the case. Third, a relativelyweak implementation procedure potentially reinforces incentivesto violate WTO trade rules. Fourth, bilateral settlements aremore likely at an early stage in the process and are biasedtoward the expected outcome of the formal dispute settlementprocedure. Empirical evidence based on a first dataset of casesat an advanced stage of the litigation process provides qualitativesupport for our claims.     

Cuba,Trade Dependency and the GATT/WTO System

Cuba sought economic independence from the U.S. and its reliance on sugar exports after its 1959 revolution, but subsequently developed new dependency relationships. In the meantime, Cuba remained inside the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT), despite conducting most of its trade outside it. This paper explores the political economy of Cuba’s participation in the GATT and later the World Trade Organization (WTO). Documents show that Cuba sought to use its participation to gain new markets and influence in the developing world. While Cuba has gained little economically from its participation, in recent years it has diversified its exports and trade partners, and its trade interests now align more closely with WTO rules. Economic reforms will be necessary in order for Cuba to benefit.     

Free Trade Agreements and the Prospects for Regional Integration in East Asia

Trade policy in East Asia has switched from non-discriminatory unilateral liberalization, reinforced by General Agreements on Tariffs and Trade/World Trade Organization (GATT/WTO) commitments, to discriminatory free trade agreements (FTA). The paper surveys the FTA activity of the major regional players: China, the ASEAN countries, Japan, and South Korea. It concludes that emerging FTAs are weak and partial. A hub-and-spoke pattern of dirty FTAs will not drive regional economic integration or further integration with the global economy. Rather, it could be a force of regional economic disintegration – especially if the multilateral trading system weakens further. At the same time, FTA activity is distracting attention from the WTO, and, more fundamentally, from unilateral liberalization and domestic structural reforms. Hence, East Asian trade policies need to be rebalanced, with better-quality FTAs and more focus on the WTO. However, more important than the WTO and FTAs is a fresh spurt of unilateral liberalization and structural reform outside trade negotiations.     

Which International Institutions Promote International Trade?

This paper estimates the effect on international trade of three multilateral organizations intended to increase trade: (1) the World Trade Organization (WTO) and its predecessor the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT); (2) the International Monetary Fund (IMF); and (3) the Organisation for Economic Co‐operation and Development (OECD) and its predecessor the Organisation for European Economic Co‐operation (OEEC). I use a standard “gravity” model of bilateral merchandise trade and a large panel dataset covering over 50 years and 175 countries. My results indicate that OECD membership has had a consistently large positive effect on trade, while accession to the GATT/WTO also increases trade.     

GATT/WTO Promotes Trade Strongly: Sample Selection and Model Specification

Some recent empirical studies examine the impact of the GATT/WTO on trade. This paper investigates the sample selection bias and the gravity model specification issues in the literature. First, the GATT/WTO not only makes existing trading partners trade more at the intensive margin, but also creates new trading relationships at the extensive margin. Most existing papers exclude zero trade observations and hence ignore the extensive margin. Secondly, due to the violation of some maintained assumptions, the traditional log-linear gravity regressions fail to uncover the role of the GATT/WTO even at the intensive margin. Using a large bilateral panel dataset including zero trade flows and a more appropriate econometric method, this paper finds that the GATT/WTO has been very effective in promoting world trade at both the intensive and extensive margins.     

INFANT INDUSTRY AND POLITICAL ECONOMY OF TRADE PROTECTION

Abstract.  This paper introduces infant-industry considerations in political economy determination of trade protection. I build a model where the government cares about both political contributions and national welfare. A potentially beneficial high-tech industry is not viable in the country whose initial human capital is low. In the political economy equilibrium, we find that the tariff schedule will be V-shaped: it decreases initially to maintain the viability of the industry but increases thereafter as the industry expands and gains political power. We use the model to explain both China's tariff offers in WTO negotiations and GATT/WTO rules regarding developing countries.     

Non-tariff measures: What's tariffs got to do with it?

After successive rounds of tariff reductions by GATT/WTO members, non-tariff measures (NTMs) have increasingly become the focal point of multilateral trade negotiations. It remains an open question whether the liberalization in tariff rates has subsequently been weakened or even erased by increases in NTMs. Using a product-level global panel of WTO members over the period 1996–2019, this paper systematically examines the empirical link between various tariff measures and the imposition of NTMs. I find that bound or applied tariff reductions do not correlate much on their own with NTM incidence. The relevant trade policy margin for detecting a tariff–NTM nexus is instead tariff overhangs, the difference between WTO members' bound and applied tariff rates. Countries impose more NTMs when their sectoral applied tariffs are close to their respective bound rates, indicating that small tariff overhangs signal limited legal trade policy flexibility.     

The GATT/WTO has promoted trade,but only in capital-intensive commodities!

This article uses gravity models to explore the impact of the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT)/World Trade Organization (WHO) on bilateral trade in a sample of 46 countries over the period 1965 to 1997. Our data enable us to disaggregate trade by broad commodity aggregates. The results for total trade are similar to those reported by Rose (2004). However, the disaggregated estimates reveal that the GATT/WTO has had a positive and statistically significant impact on trade in capital-intensive commodities, but no statistically significant impact on trade in other commodities. The article demonstrates that simple modifications of Rose's approach lead to results that are much more ‘common sense’ than his (JEL F10, F15).     

反倾销规则的悖论

WTO现行的反倾销规则基本是在1947年确定的GATT第六条的基础上，经1994年乌拉圭回合修订而来的。从其理论、行为、本质与事实上都有不尽合理的地方，其规则本身也漏洞百出。因此，WTO必须顺应时代发展的需要，加大改革的步伐，增加国际监管的力度。中国有责任敦促WTO尽快改革现有反倾销规则中不合理的部分，从根本上解决与各国之间的贸易摩擦，全面改善国际贸易环境。     

"世外桃源"--RTAs在WTO多边贸易框架外的新发展

区域贸易协定(Regional Trade Agreements RTAs)作为WTO最惠国待遇原则的例外,早在GATT时代就确立了其合法地位,制定了相关的规则,以规范引导此类协议的签订和发展。但由于受各种因素的影响,GATT/WTO相关规则并未能发挥其应有的作用。目前RTAs的迅猛发展,将在今后相当长一段时期内和经济全球化一起成为影响世界经济格局变化的主导因素和重要潮流。     

Electoral regime and trade policy

We study how trade protection varies with the electoral rules for legislative representation. In particular, we investigate different hypotheses about why trade policy differs between countries with legislatures elected by a plurality election rule in single member constituencies and legislatures elected by a proportional, or party-list, rule. Our results, which are in line with the existing literature, show that countries with list-PR systems tend to have lower trade barriers than countries with majoritarian systems. We expand on this literature by looking at the mechanisms through which this correlation can be explained. Our findings indicate that, contrary to existing theory, neither constituency size nor party strength are important when explaining this correlation. Country size does matter, but does not explain the whole of the correlation.     

Developing-Country Benefits from MFN Relative to Regional/Bilateral Trade Arrangements

Using a general‐equilibrium model of world trade, this paper evaluates the benefits of most‐favored‐nation (MFN) treatment to developing countries in multilateral relative to bilateral or regional trade agreements, from three sources. First, developing countries may be able to free‐ride on bilateral tariff concessions exchanged between larger countries in MFN‐based GATT/WTO rounds. Second, MFN benefits developing countries by restricting discriminatory retaliatory actions by other countries, evaluated here by a non‐ cooperative Nash tariff game. Finally, MFN changes threat points in bargaining and hence affects the bargaining solution of multilateral MFN‐based trade negotiation compared to a bilateral/regional arrangement. The authors find that the benefits to developing countries are small in the first case as the tariff rates are already low, and the benefits are small in the second case as the optimal tariffs under unconstrained retaliation are not very asymmetric. Benefits from the third case are large as large countries can extract large side‐payments if they bargain bilaterally.     

中国实施TBT的必要性文献综述

经过关贸总协定/世界贸易组织（GATT/WTO）等国际组织的多年努力,关税水平有了大幅度的削减,与此同时,一些传统的非关税壁垒也被纳入了规范管理行列,使得这些壁垒对本国的进口保护作用日趋下降。作为发展中国家的中国是否应该设置技术贸易壁垒（TBT）,从而保护人们的财产安全,是一个亟待解决的问题。     

Merger Policies and Trade Liberalisation

This paper is about the interactions between trade policy and a narrow but important aspect of competition policy, namely merger policy. We focus on links between merger policies and trade liberalisation. We put special emphasis on the topical issue of the role that international agreements such as the GATT play when merger policies are nationally chosen. Of particular concern is the possibility that liberalisation of international trade will induce countries to use competition policies to promote national interests at the expense of others.     

India’s Green Revolution: Economic Gains and Political Costs

Research and development (R&;D) promotion policies are critical for economic development in the sense that they contribute to technical progress. Although it is true that policy space is restricted under the World Trade Organization (WTO) system, there are still some R&;D promotion policy measures made available to developing countries. It is thus necessary for developing countries to utilize such available measures. In addition to explaining the R&;D promotion measures available under the current WTO regulations, I provide suggestions for modifying the Uruguay Round Subsidies Code with respect to the R&;D promotion policies of developing countries from the viewpoint of “distributional fairness” in international trade relations.     

双边自由贸易协定深度异质性及区内全球价值链效应*——基于GVC修正引力模型实证研究

双边自由贸易协定深度嬗变，全球价值链引致贸易形成机制和形式变化，使得自由贸易区理论基础、影响机制和功能效应更替。本文基于对双边自由贸易协定深度演化以及相较于其他区域贸易协定的深度异质性研究，将公司产权理论纳入自由贸易区理论框架，形成双边自由贸易区内全球价值链效应的多维理论机制，并且运用适应全球价值链发展的修正引力模型和世界银行的贸易协定内容数据库对理论机制假设结论进行实证检验。研究发现：双边自由贸易协定总深度对区内成员国之间的全球价值链关联产生正向影响，相较于贸易相关条款深度而言，投资相关条款深度影响更大。此外，自由贸易区对象国差异性也会影响双边自由贸易区全球价值链效应的发挥。根据对象国不同选择差异化的自由贸易区深度在双边自由贸易区构建中重要性凸显。本文将为全球价值链背景下中国构建高标准自由贸易区网络的对象国选择、自由贸易区模式选择等提供政策参考。