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Who Settles Disputes? Treaty Design and Trade Attitudes Toward the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP)

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  30 September 2019

Hyeonho Hahm Open the ORCID record for Hyeonho Hahm [Opens in a new window] ,
Thomas König Open the ORCID record for Thomas König [Opens in a new window] ,
Moritz Osnabrügge  and
Elena Frech Open the ORCID record for Elena Frech [Opens in a new window]
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Abstract

What type of trade agreement is the public willing to accept? Instead of focusing on individual concerns about market access and trade barriers, we argue that specific treaty design and, in particular, the characteristics of the dispute settlement mechanism, play a critical role in shaping public support for trade agreements. To examine this theoretical expectation, we conduct a conjoint experiment that varies diverse treaty-design elements and estimate preferences over multiple dimensions of the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP) based on a nationally representative sample in Germany. We find that compared to other alternatives, private arbitration, known as investor-state dispute settlement (ISDS), generates strong opposition to the trade agreement. As the single most important factor, this effect of dispute settlement characteristic is strikingly large and consistent across individuals’ key attributes, including skill levels, information, and national sentiment, among others.

Keywords

Trade preferencespublic opiniontreaty designdispute settlement mechanismsISDStrade agreementTTIPconjoint analysis
Type
Research Note
Information
International Organization , Volume 73 , Issue 4 , Fall 2019 , pp. 881 - 900
Copyright
Copyright © The IO Foundation 2019 

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