Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of contributors
- Preface
- Biographical note
- List of abbreviations
- PART I Reflections on the contributions of Florentino Feliciano to international law
- PART II Insights into the World Trade Organization
- 5 Justice Feliciano and the WTO environmental cases: laying the foundations of a ‘constitutional jurisprudence’ with implications for developing countries
- 6 International trade law, human rights and theories of justice
- 7 Developing countries and the international trading system
- 8 North–South issues of foreign direct investments in the WTO: is there a middle-of-the-road approach?
- 9 The participation of developing countries in WTO dispute settlement and the role of the Advisory Centre on WTO Law
- 10 Reform of the WTO dispute settlement system: what to expect from the Doha Development Round?
- 11 Interpretation and Application of WTO Rules: Florentino Feliciano and the First Seven
- 12 Dispute settlement in the WTO: on the trail of a court
- 13 A proposal to introduce an Advocate General's position into WTO dispute settlement
- 14 Arbitration at the WTO: a terra incognita to be further explored
- 15 The challenges to the legitimacy of the WTO
- 16 The World Trade Organization after Cancún
- PART III The changing landscape of investment arbitration
- PART IV New challenges in international adjudication
- Bibliography of works by Florentino Feliciano
- Index
15 - The challenges to the legitimacy of the WTO
from PART II - Insights into the World Trade Organization
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 29 July 2009
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of contributors
- Preface
- Biographical note
- List of abbreviations
- PART I Reflections on the contributions of Florentino Feliciano to international law
- PART II Insights into the World Trade Organization
- 5 Justice Feliciano and the WTO environmental cases: laying the foundations of a ‘constitutional jurisprudence’ with implications for developing countries
- 6 International trade law, human rights and theories of justice
- 7 Developing countries and the international trading system
- 8 North–South issues of foreign direct investments in the WTO: is there a middle-of-the-road approach?
- 9 The participation of developing countries in WTO dispute settlement and the role of the Advisory Centre on WTO Law
- 10 Reform of the WTO dispute settlement system: what to expect from the Doha Development Round?
- 11 Interpretation and Application of WTO Rules: Florentino Feliciano and the First Seven
- 12 Dispute settlement in the WTO: on the trail of a court
- 13 A proposal to introduce an Advocate General's position into WTO dispute settlement
- 14 Arbitration at the WTO: a terra incognita to be further explored
- 15 The challenges to the legitimacy of the WTO
- 16 The World Trade Organization after Cancún
- PART III The changing landscape of investment arbitration
- PART IV New challenges in international adjudication
- Bibliography of works by Florentino Feliciano
- Index
Summary
Introduction
The World Trade Organization (WTO) faces two major challenges to its legitimacy and credibility as an international organization. The first is to make its internal decision-making system more transparent and inclusive, especially for the developing and least developed countries (which now represent the majority of its 147 members). This is the challenge of ‘internal legitimacy’. The second is to respond to external critics – mainly non-governmental organizations (NGOs) and non-state actors – who maintain that the WTO is a closed, non-democratic, bureaucratic, supranational entity. This is the issue of ‘external legitimacy’.
The external legitimacy challenge arises, in part, because the WTO administers a complex set of agreements that reach deeply into subjects formerly the exclusive province of national and subnational levels of government, for example, intellectual property, health and safety standards, regulation of services, and subsidies. In addition, the dispute settlement system, with its compulsory jurisdiction and binding decisions, more closely resembles domestic judicial systems than the normal, voluntary, international arbitration mechanisms.
With respect to the issue of internal legitimacy, the difficulty with the decision-making procedures in the WTO does not result from defects in the rules, per se, but rather from the inflexible determination of WTO members to take all decisions by consensus. Changing the decision-making rules is not likely to change the attitudes of WTO members. Moreover, it would increase the perceptions of developing countries that they are not included in the important decision-making processes.
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- Law in the Service of Human DignityEssays in Honour of Florentino Feliciano, pp. 202 - 221Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2005