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This draft article is forthcoming in the Journal of World Investment & Trade. The article examines the historical experience with and understanding of plurilateral trade agreements throughout the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT) and World Trade Organization (WTO) to better contextualise assessments of the continued viability of the single undertaking and the recent resurgence of plurilateralism in international trade law. Plurilateral agreements have been playing a significant role in international trade relations for the past fifty years. As such, the current wave of plurilateral agreements does not represent a seachange in approach to trade liberalisation, but rather a continuation of a process that originated many decades ago. Further, while the WTO agreements are multilateral in thatthey apply to all members, they can also l be seen as plurilateral in that not all WTO members have identical responsibilities under such agreements. The article concludes that plurilateralism and multilateralism have much in common, and hence may be mutually supportive rather than binary choices.

This chapter explores the concept of the prisoner’s dilemma in the context of compliance with international law. It examines the prisoner’s dilemma in a variety of international law contexts, from which international law can be seen as explanandum in that a prisoner’s dilemma sometimes leads to the creation of international law. International law can also serve as explanans in the context of the prisoner’s dilemma, in that international law has consequences and effects for prisoner’s dilemmas while not always resolving them. The chapter also identifies some limitations of the prisoner’s dilemma, in particular by highlighting examples of political economy factors that confound the assumptions inherent to a prisoner’s dilemma analysis.

This draft chapter examines the embedded liberalism compromise in the context of the GATT and Uruguay Round agreements. It also briefly addresses possible examples of embedded liberalism in the current international economic law environment. The term “embedded liberalism” was coined by John Gerard Ruggie in his seminal 1982 article, “International Regimes, Transactions and Change: Embedded Liberalism in the Postwar Economic Order.” Ruggie revisits his phrase in later work, and others have also adopted the “embedded liberalism” concept, sometimes in ways that may not match Ruggie’s conception. Part I of the chapter discusses the concept as expressed by Ruggie in his original article. The question then arises whether the “embedded liberalism compromise” continued beyond the time period Ruggie discusses, and if so in what form or forms. This necessitates consideration of whether we should view the embedded liberalism compromise as having a fixed meaning based on Ruggie’s original concept, or whether we should instead see the possibility for a variety of iterations of embedded liberalism compromises, depending on the social, economic and political concerns of a given time. These issues are addressed in Part II. Part III considers whether a range of GATT and Uruguay Round Agreement provisions fit within Ruggie’s conception of embedded liberalism, and if not, whether they should nonetheless be considered to be new forms of an embedded liberalism compromise or whether they should be viewed as something other than embedded liberalism. Part IV considers embedded liberalism in the present-day context and Part V concludes.

During the first twenty years of the World Trade Organization’s history, the multilateral trading system has increasingly been accompanied by (1) free trade agreements (FTAs) and (2) preferential trade arrangements (PTAs). Such agreements have proliferated steadily, with several hundred having been notified to the WTO as of early 2016. However, there have been some significant changes in the types of trade agreements being negotiated outside the WTO in recent years. Since 2010, there has been a continued proliferation of “traditional” FTAs, but there have also been notable new developments. These include: an increase in multi-party FTAs; an increase in FTAs featuring more than one major economy; FTA coverage extending beyond the scope of the WTO Agreements; and subject-specific plurilateral negotiations being conducted outside the WTO negotiating structure. This chapter documents the rapid ascendancy of mega-FTAs and plurilateral trade agreements and explores the implications of these larger, more complicated and arguably more powerful trade agreements, with an emphasis on the Asia-Pacific region.

The political economy of international trade decision-making within the United States is ever-changing and complex. The recent debates over the merits of the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP,) and the associated efforts of the Obama Administration to obtain Trade Promotion Authority (TPA), highlight these complexities. This short article is an attempt to clarify the political economy dynamics in the United States with respect to the TPP. It first explains what Trade Promotion Authority (TPA) is and why President Obama needed to have TPA as a precursor to concluding the TPP negotiations. Second, it discusses some of the internal political dynamics impacting support for, or opposition to, the TPP, as well as the Administration’s previous failures to obtain TPA for the TPP negotiations. Third, the piece addresses Trade Adjustment Assistance (TAA) and its interplay with TPA. The article concludes with an assessment of the ramifications for the TPP of the House and Senate having passed both the TPA and TAA bills.

Introduction The ASEAN–Australia–New Zealand FTA (AANZFTA) combines two different pre-existing country groupings of long-standing. The first of these is ASEAN, the Association of Southeast Asian Nations, which was founded in 1967 by Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore and Thailand. This grouping has expanded over the years, with Brunei Darussalam joining in 1984, followed by Vietnam in 1995, Laos and Myanmar in 1997, and Cambodia in 1999. While ASEAN has existed for nearly 50 years, for most of that period it has served as an alliance based on economic and political cooperation rather than as a free trade agreement. However, the original members of ASEAN launched a free trade initiative, the ASEAN Free Trade Area (AFTA), in 1992. In 2003, after the expansion of ASEAN to its current membership, ASEAN announced plans to create an ASEAN Community comprising three pillars, one of which would be a free trade agreement to be called the ASEAN Economic Community. In 2007, this intention was memorialized in writing with a timetable to form the Community by 2015. The other pre-existing alliance was that between Australia and New Zealand, which have a long history of formal trade agreements. In 1965, close in time to the creation of ASEAN, these Oceania neighbours formed a free trade agreement known as the New Zealand–Australia Free Trade Agreement. This FTA was eclipsed in 1983 by the highly ambitious Australia–New Zealand Closer Economic Relations Trade Agreement (ANZCERTA), most commonly referred to as Closer Economic Relations (CER). Given the linkages already in place between the ASEAN countries on the one hand, and Australia and New Zealand on the other, the primary trade gains to be had pursuant to AANZFTA lie in new linkages between Australia and New Zealand and specific ASEAN members. Indeed, pursuant to an exchange of letters bearing treaty status, Australia and New Zealand have agreed that AANZFTA obligations only apply between them to a limited extent, including the tariff and Rules of Origin (ROO) commitments and the General Exceptions chapter. Following several years of negotiations, these two groupings formed the ASEAN–Australia–New Zealand Free Trade Agreement (AANZFTA), which came into force on 1 January 2010 for most of its participants. AANZFTA has been in effect for all participants since January 2012.

This article analyses in detail the fact that there has been almost no dissent in World Trade Organization (WTO) dispute settlement reports. Only a handful of articles have noted this phenomenon, even in passing. The article first examines the empirical data with respect to dissenting and concurring opinions at both the panel and Appellate Body levels. Fewer than 5% of panel reports and 2% of Appellate Body reports contain separate opinions of any kind. Second, it shows that the WTO is in fact actively discouraging dissents and discusses why this might be the case. The article argues that dissents are valuable in general and assesses whether more dissents would be a positive for the WTO. It then reviews the few dissents that have been published and demonstrates that 50% of the arguments raised in dissents at the panel level were adopted in whole or in part on appeal by the Appellate Body, thus illustrating dissents can and do make a difference. The article concludes that keeping the lid on dissents may ultimately erode the strength of the dispute settlement system and hinder the ability of the WTO Members to make appropriate changes to the Agreements. Copyright 2006, Oxford University Press.

The author comments on Luke Nottage's paper found in this volume (Luke Nottage "Who's Afraid of the Vienna Sales Convention (CISG)? A New Zealander's View from Australia and Japan" (2005) 36 VUWLR 815). The author first identifies additional factors as to why the Convention on Contracts for the International Sale of Goods ('CISG') may be opted out of in the United States: its lack of a duty of good faith, its narrow scope, and its uncertainty of outcome. However, the author argues that we should be more optimistic about the use of the CISG in the US. First, the US is an original signatory. Secondly, Americans may come to accept the CISG more as their exposure to it grows. Thirdly, a lack of reported US cases involving the CISG does not necessarily mean it is not being used – it purely indicates a lack of litigation. Fourthly, the CISG not being used may speak more about who the US are doing business with. Finally, the numbers show that the CISG is being used frequently. The author therefore concludes that we should be optimistic about the use of the CISG in the United States, and expects its use will increase over time.

Part I: Trade Agreements and Dispute Settlement 1. What to Do When Disagreement Strikes?: The Complexity of Dispute Settlement under Trade Agreements 2. Expanding the Trade Litigator's Toolkit: Developing Tools to Achieve Effective and Legitimate Resolution of Disputes under PACER Plus and Other Trade Agreements 3. Exploring the Differences Between WTO and Investment Treaty Dispute Resolution 4. The WTO Standard of Review: A Means to Strengthen the Trading System Part II Trade Agreements in the Modern Era: A Focus on the Asia-Pacific 5. Market Access: An Institutional Challenge to China 6. China's Regionalism: Working Towards a Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership? 7. Asia-Pacific Product Safety Regulation in an FTA Era Part III: Evolving Trade Agreement Dynamics: Challenging Established Concepts 8. Regulatory Cooperation and Free Trade Agreements 9. Implementation and Monitoring of Process and Production Methods 10. The International Law Commission Work on MFN Clauses - A Worthwhile Venture 11. The TRIPS Agreement and Cross-Retaliation

INTRODUCTION The World Trade Organization (WTO) has been, and continues to be, shaped in its agreements and institutional foci in significant part by political pressures emanating from its members, particularly those able to wield the most influence. Rather than being an institution with the singular focus of achieving free trade among all members, the WTO comprises a complex set of agreements, many of which represent a politically driven compromise among members as to how to manage trade rather than to liberalize it. Although the state of WTO liberalization reflects positions agreed to in part as a result of political realities, the reach of politics is more significant in the context of bilateral trade negotiations. Indeed, what members cannot accomplish through the WTO they may try to achieve through free trade agreements (FTAs), particularly with politically or economically weaker trade partners. In the case of the United States, FTAs have been used as an opportunity to impose provisions favored by domestic constituents – such as strengthened intellectual property provisions and labor and environment clauses – that it has not been able to get WTO members to agree to collectively in the multilateral forum. A similar phenomenon has occurred with respect to the European Union (EU) and its FTA partners. For countries with less bargaining power, the WTO's multilateral setting provides some buffer from power politics in the form of the consensus decision-making practice and the disproportionate number of developing and least-developed countries.

This foreword introduces four articles featured in this volume of the Victoria University of Wellington Law Review, all of which address trade law from diverse angles: Oliver Delvos "WTO Disciplines and Fisheries Subsidies – Should the SCM Agreement Be Modified?" (2005) 37 VUWLR 341; Thomas A Faunce, Kellie Johnston, and Hilary Bambrick "Trans-Tasman Therapeutic Products Authority: Potential AUSFTA Impacts on Safety and Cost-Effectiveness Regulation for Medicines and Medical Devices in New Zealand" (2005) 37 VUWLR 365; Jane Kelsey "Free Trade Agreements – Boon or Bane: Through the Lens of PACER" (2005) 37 VUWLR 391; and Nicholas Whittington "Reconsidering Domestic Sale of Goods Remedies in Light of CISG" (2005) 37 VUWLR 421.

At midnight of 10 December 2019, the WTO Appellate Body ceased to be operational, as the US has been vetoing since May 2016 the selection of the members of the World Trade Court. The WTO dispute settlement system hence risks paralysis - a scenario occurring in case the losing party of a panel report appeals the latter “into the void,” i.e. before an Appellate Body with less than three judges. In response to this event, the European Union is developing an articulated approach to guarantee a rules-based international trade system and the principle of cooperation as the pillars of the governance of the global economy. One element of the EU approach is an initiative for an interim appeal arbitration procedure based on Article 25 of the DSU. The present work is devoted to the analysis of such a contingency measure, which may represent a bridge between the renovation of the existing multilateral dispute settlement mechanism and the innovation of a new two-level international judgment mechanism for settling trade controversies.