1 Jan 2010    Books/ Book Chapters
Cottier, Thomas


Redesigning the World Trade Organization for the twenty-first century, edited by Debra P. Steger

This book explains why an institutional reform of the WTO is needed provides innovative, practical proposals for modernising the WTO to enable it to respond to the challenges of the 21st century.

"Rather than simply analysing the current functioning of the WTO, its problems and challenges, this volume is also a call to action. It lays out proposals that are likely to become a blueprint for reform of the WTO as an institution. Its contents are abundantly worthy of reflection and subsequent action. I recommend it highly to anyone who is concerned about the future of the global economy."
Julio Lacarte Muró (First Chairman of the WTO Appellate Body and Chair of the Uruguay Round negotiations) 

Two high-level commissions — the Sutherland report in 2004 and the Warwick Commission report in 2007 — addressed the future of the World Trade Organization (WTO) and made proposals for incremental reform. This book goes further. It explains why institutional reform of the WTO is needed at this critical juncture in world history and provides innovative, practical proposals for modernising the WTO to enable it to respond to the challenges of the 21st century. Contributors focus on five critical areas: transparency, decision- and rule-making procedures, internal management structures, participation by nongovernmental organisations and civil society, and relationships with regional trade agreements. 


The Editor

Debra P. Steger is a professor in the Faculty of Law at the University of Ottawa, where she teaches international trade, international dispute settlement, and international investment law. She is also the founder and director of the EDGE Network on the emerging, dynamic, global economies — a multidisciplinary research network focused on institutional reform of the World Trade Organization. She served recently as chair of a WTO panel and from 1995 to 2001 and was the first director of the Appellate Body Secretariat of the World Trade Organization in Geneva. Professor Steger is the author of Peace through Trade: Building the World Trade Organization (2004) and co-editor of Law in the Service of Human Dignity: Essays in Honour of Florentino Feliciano (2005). 


Contents

Part I: Why Institutional Reform Is Necessary
1. Why Institutional Reform of the WTO Is Necessary – Debra Steger 2. Reinvigorating Debate on WTO Reform: The Contours of a Functional and Normative Approach to Analysing the WTO System –Carolyn Deere Birkbeck 

Part II. Decision-Making in the WTO
3. A Two-Tier Approach to WTO Decision-Making – Thomas Cottier
4. WTO Decision-Making: Can We Get a Little Help from the Secretariat and the Critical Mass? – Manfred Elsig
5. Improvements to the WTO Decision-Making Process: Lessons from the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank –Alberto Alvarez-Jiménez 

Part III: Internal Management of the WTO
6. Internal Management of the WTO: Room for Improvement – Debra Steger and Natalia Shpilkovskaya 

Part IV. Transparency and Domestic Consultation 
7. From the Periphery to the Centre: The Evolving WTO Jurisprudence on Transparency and Good Governance – Padideh Ala’i
8. Selective Adaptation of WTO Transparency Norms and Local Practices in China and Japan – Ljiljana Biuković
9. Domestic Politics and the Search for a New Social Purpose of Governance for the WTO: A Proposal for a Declaration on Domestic Consultation – Seema Sapra
10. Enhancing Business Participation in Trade Policy-Making: Lessons from China – Heng Wang 

Part V. Public Participation 
11. Options for Public Participation in the WTO: Experience from Regional Trade Agreements – Yves Bonzon 12. Non-Governmental Organizations and the WTO: Limits to Involvement? – Peter Van den Bossche 

Part VI. Regional Trade Agreements and the WTO
13. Accommodating Developing Countries in the WTO: From Mega-Debates to Economic Partnership Agreements – Gerhard Erasmus 14. Saving the WTO from the Risk of Irrelevance: The WTO Dispute Settlement Mechanism as a “Common Good” for RTA Disputes – Henry Gao and Chin Leng Lim 15. Regional Trade Agreements and the WTO: The Gyrating Wheels of Interdependence – Pablo Heidrich and Diana Tussie 
 

Redesigning the World Trade Organization for the twenty-first century, edited by Debra P. Steger