Jain: Interpreting the 'Removal' Obligation in Article 7.8 of the WTO SCM Agreement

Abhimanyu George Jain (High Court of Delhi; Georgetown Univ. - Law) has posted Interpreting the 'Removal' Obligation in Article 7.8 of the WTO SCM Agreement (Manchester Journal of International Economic Law, Vol. 10, No. 3, 2013). Here's the abstract:

The meaning of the phrase ‘remove the adverse effects’ as used in Art. 7.8 of the WTO Subsidies and Countervailing Measures Agreement (SCM Agreement) is unclear; it has been explored neither in the jurisprudence of the DSM, nor in academic literature. There are three fundamental principles underlying the interpretation of the SCM agreement – avoidance of economic analyses, proscription of retrospective remedies and interpretation of ‘withdrawal’ in Art. 4.7 as prospective cessation. Based on these fundamental interpretive principles, there are several possible meanings of the removal obligation, including equivalent subsidisation, price controls and quantitative restrictions. In the absence of decisive reasons to prefer one over the other, the removal obligation should be construed as a result rather than process obligation. This analytical inquiry demonstrates the problems engendered and perpetuated by the avoidance of economic analyses in interpretation of the SCM Agreement.

Gantz: Liberalizing International Trade after Doha: Multilateral, Plurilateral, Regional, and Unilateral Initiatives

David A. Gantz (Univ. of Arizona - Law) has published Liberalizing International Trade after Doha: Multilateral, Plurilateral, Regional, and Unilateral Initiatives (Cambridge Univ. Press 2013). Here's the abstract:

After ten years the Doha Development Round is effectively dead. Although some have suggested that Doha's demise threatens the continued existence of the GATT/WTO system, even with some risks of increasing protectionism, the United States, the European Union, Japan, Brazil, China and India, among others, have too much to lose to make abandoning the WTO a rational option. There are alternatives to a comprehensive package of new or amended multilateral agreements, including existing and future 'plurilateral' trade agreements, new or revised regional trade agreements covering both goods and services, and liberalized national trade laws and regulations in the WTO member nations. This book discusses these alternatives, which although less than ideal, may provide an impetus for continuing trade liberalization both among willing members and in some instances worldwide.

Epps & Trebilcock: Research Handbook on the WTO and Technical Barriers to Trade

Tracey Epps (New Zealand Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade) & Michael J. Trebilcock (Univ. of Toronto - Law) have published Research Handbook on the WTO and Technical Barriers to Trade (Edward Elgar Publishing 2013). The table of contents is here. Here's the abstract:

A relatively new frontier for legal and policy analysis, technical barriers to trade (TBT’s) have become more common as traditional border barriers have been reduced. This comprehensive Handbook comprises original essays by eminent trade scholars exploring the implications of the WTO’s TBT Agreement. The TBT Agreement imposes disciplines on the manner in which WTO member countries adopt and maintain technical measures, recognizing the importance of such measures to advance legitimate domestic policy goals such as health, safety and environmental objectives, but also the potential for technical measures to constitute barriers to trade. The contributors to this volume provide an in-depth examination of the text of the Agreement and how the WTO’s dispute settlement system, the TBT Committee, WTO members, and other international organizations have engaged with and been affected by it.