The MPIA and the Future of WTO Dispute Settlement

As the Appellate Body of the WTO is expected to remain inoperative for years to come, the Multi-Party Interim Appeal Arbitration Arrangement (MPIA) is ‘ever more important as a stop-gap solution to preserve a fully functioning WTO dispute settlement system among the willing Members’. This paper discusses the origins, main features, and the use made to date of the MPIA and explores whether and how it could be further improved. Hopefully, the MPIA will eventually, when the time is ripe, be ‘multilateralized’ to provide appellate review to all WTO Members again. It is therefore important to consider possible further improvements to the MPIA. This paper examines whether the proposals and ideas regarding the reform of appellate review discussed in the WTO dispute settlement reform negotiations could serve as a basis for such improvements. The paper concludes that many of these proposals and ideas would weaken, rather than strengthen, appellate review that ensures the rule of law in international trade.