Prior to 2011, the Agreement on Technical Barriers to Trade had been somewhat neglected as a dispute-settlement mechanism, due in part to the lack of previous interpretation of the Agreement by WTO DSB Panels. In 2012, the Appellate Body adjudicated on three TBT disputes: US–Clove Cigarettes, US–Tuna II, and US–COOL, aiming to officially interpret and clarify Articles 2.1 and 2.2 of the Agreement by creating a distinct test for a measure's consistency with these Articles. This paper explores the relevant decisions of both the Panel and Appellate Body in the three disputes which led to the creation of the ‘legitimate regulatory distinction’ test. The substance behind this phrase, placed in context, is dissected along with the associated idea of ‘even-handedness’. The test attempts to simplify future interpretations regarding what will constitute unjustifiable discrimination, but at the cost of the necessary distinction between the GATT and the TBT Agreement being blurred. The result is a test which is incomplete and which fails to take account of the special circumstances surrounding the TBT Agreement.

This article argues that the inclusion of provisions for the settlement of disputes in regional trade agreements enhances, rather than disrupts, the centrality of the World Trade Organization's dispute settlement system. Using a dataset that organizes exclusion clauses and special provisions for dispute settlement in regional trade agreements, the study develops a thematic typology that is used to examine the ways that disputes may be channelled between regional and multilateral dispute settlement institutions. This comparative empirical dimension offers a more accurate picture of the global contours of regionalization as they relate to the juridical aspects of trade governance, suggesting that the decentralization of dispute settlement inferred by the rapid development of regional bodies has been overstated.

Chapters relating to regulatory coherence or cooperation are likely to be significant features of new preferential trade agreements, including the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP). While the potential for harmonization of standards or institutional cooperation to impact on the regulatory autonomy of treaty parties has been well considered, this article focuses on those elements of regulatory coherence that relate to domestic processes for the development of regulations. It examines whether the adoption of ‘good regulatory practices’ in accordance with the TPP will help to ensure that measures states enact to protect non-economic interests (such as the environment or public health) are consistent with other key obligations of international trade and investment law. Although many elements of good regulatory practice mirror the criteria used to distinguish legitimate regulatory measures from disguised protectionism, there is no guarantee that a tribunal will come to the same conclusions as those reached during a domestic impact assessment.

Climate change poses a grave threat to the international community, thus prompting global action on all fronts. Various ‘green energy programs’ are being adopted by many governments. To the extent that governmental support is indispensable for the initiation and maintenance of these green energy programs, the SCM Agreement is directly implicated in this regard. Unfortunately, the agreement does not include any exceptions to these programs, even if the exceptions are undertaken due to the growing concerns of the global community. Under such circumstances, a practical solution should be found from within the existing framework, and be derived from an interpretation of the present SCM Agreement based on current jurisprudence. The collective jurisprudence of the WTO arguably stands for the proposition that certain renewable energy programs constitute ‘general infrastructure’ projects of a state, and thus are excluded from the financial contributions by the government under Article 1.1(a)(1)(iii) of the SCM Agreement.

This article assesses the regulation of government procurement in the WTO, specifically under the WTO Government Procurement Agreement (WTO GPA), the General Agreement on Tariffs in Trade (GATT), the General Agreement on Trade in Services (GATS), and the Agreement on Subsidies and Countervailing Measures (ASCM). It compares these findings from leading regional trade agreements (RTAs) with government procurement regulation, most notably the North American Free Trade Area (NAFTA) and the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union (TFEU).

In line with current research on the effectiveness of international law and institutions, much of the literature on the effectiveness of the WTO dispute settlement system (DSS) has settled on compliance as its primary effectiveness benchmark. This article challenges this trend. It argues that common models gauging the DSS effectiveness through the narrow lens of compliance disregard many other institutional goals pursued by the system, and the conflicts latent among them. Furthermore, existing models are also static in nature—predicated on problematic assumptions regarding the constant supremacy of the DSS compliance objective—what leads them to overlook important shifts amidst the multiple and conflicting goals of the DSS that take place over time and across disputes. Building on the goal-based approach developed in the social sciences, the article introduces a multidimensional framework for analyzing the DSS effectiveness, using the multiple, conflicting and shifting goals set for the system by WTO Members as key effectiveness benchmarks. The article then turns to closely examine the novel concept of ‘goal-shifting’ – essential for effectiveness assessment – and through interview-based analysis of different categories of WTO disputes shows how the DSS goals change with time and context, as a consequence of the changing modalities in which the system operates.

This compliance proceeding under Article 21.5 of the Dispute Settlement Understanding (DSU) concerned measures taken by the European Union to implement the recommendations and rulings of the Dispute Settlement Body (DSB) in EC–Fasteners (China). In EC–Fasteners (China), the DSB found, inter alia, that a European Communities measure imposing definitive antidumping duties on imports of certain iron or steel fasteners from China was inconsistent with certain aspects of the Anti-Dumping Agreement (ADA). The European Union's measures taken to comply with the recommendations and rulings of the DSB consisted, inter alia, of an anti-dumping review investigation regarding fasteners from China (the Review Investigation) conducted by the Commission of the European Union (the Commission). The conduct of the Commission in the Review Investigation was the focus of this compliance proceeding.

This dispute concerned eight financial, taxation, foreign exchange, and registration measures imposed by Argentina, mostly on services and service suppliers from countries that do not exchange information with Argentina for the purposes of fiscal transparency (non-cooperative countries). In particular, these measures concerned: withholding tax on payments of interest or remuneration (measure 1); presumption of unjustified increase in wealth (measure 2); transaction valuation based on transfer prices (measure 3); payment received rule for the allocation of expenditure (measure 4); requirements relating to reinsurance services (measure 5); requirements for access to the Argentine capital market (measure 6); requirements for the registration of branches (measure 7); and foreign exchange authorization requirement (measure 8).