Skip to content
Licensed Unlicensed Requires Authentication Published by De Gruyter November 8, 2018

Making Offers They Can’t Refuse: Consensus and Domination in the WTO

  • Tadhg Ó Laoghaire EMAIL logo

Abstract

The World Trade Organisation (WTO), and the international trade regime within which it operates, is regularly evaluated in terms of distributive outcomes or opportunities. A less-established concern is the extent to which the institutional structure of the trade regime enables agents to exert control over the economic forces to which they’re subject. This oversight is surprising, as trade negotiations amongst states have profound impacts upon what options remain open to those states and their citizens in regulating their economies. This article contributes to filling this lacuna in the literature. Following on from recent neo-republican work on global and international justice, it argues that a major problem with the WTO is that it fails to effectively mitigate the domination of some states by others within its negotiations. Such domination prevails despite the employment of negative consensus as a decision-making procedure.

References

Ahlstrom-Vij, K. (2012). ‘‘Review of Frank Lovett,’A General Theory of Domination and Justice”’, Philosophical Quarterly 62 (246): 190–192.10.1111/j.1467-9213.2011.00003.xSearch in Google Scholar

Arnold, S. and Harris, J.R. (2017). ‘What Is Arbitrary Power?’, Journal of Political Power 10 (1): 55–70.10.1080/2158379X.2017.1287473Search in Google Scholar

Bachvarova, M. (2013). ‘Non-Domination’s Role in the Theorizing of Global Justice’, Journal of Global Ethics 9 (2): 173–185.10.1080/17449626.2013.818434Search in Google Scholar

Bagwell, K. and Staiger, R.W. (2004). The Economics of the World Trading System (Cambridge, Massachusetts: MIT Press).Search in Google Scholar

Baldwin, R.E. (2012). ‘The Case for a Multilateral Trade Organization’, in M. Daunton, A. Narlikar and R.M. Stern (eds.). The Oxford Handbook on the World Trade Organization (Oxford: Oxford University Press), pp. 29–39.10.1093/oxfordhb/9780199586103.013.0002Search in Google Scholar

Blustein, P. (2009). Misadventures of the Most Favored Nations (New York: Public Affairs).Search in Google Scholar

Bohman, J. (2015). ‘Domination, Global Harms, and the Priority of Injustice: Expanding Transnational Republicanism’, in B. Bucknix, J. Trejo-Mathys and T. Waligore (eds.). Domination and Global Political Justice: Conceptual, Historical, and Institutional Perspectives (New York: Routledge), pp. 83–99.Search in Google Scholar

Brandi, C. (2017). ‘The Trade Regime Complex and Megaregionals – An Exploration from the Perspective of International Domination’, Global Justice: Theory Practice Rhetoric 10 (1): 24–42.10.21248/gjn.10.1.109Search in Google Scholar

Brock, G. (2009). Global Justice: A Cosmopolitan Account (Oxford: Oxford University Press).10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199230938.001.0001Search in Google Scholar

Brown, A.G. and Stern, R.M. (2012). ‘Fairness in the WTO Trading System’, in M. Daunton, A. Narlikar and R.M. Stern (eds.). The Oxford Handbook on the World Trade Organization (Oxford: Oxford University Press), pp. 677–696.10.1093/oxfordhb/9780199586103.013.0031Search in Google Scholar

Cavallero, E. (2010). ‘Coercion, Inequality and the International Property Regime’, Journal of Political Philosophy 18 (1): 16–31.10.1111/j.1467-9760.2009.00343.xSearch in Google Scholar

Chang, H.-J. (2002). Kicking Away the Ladder: Development Strategy in Historical Perspective (London: Anthem Press).Search in Google Scholar

Chayes, A. and Chayes, A.H. (1995). The New Sovereignty: Compliance with International Regulatory Agreements (Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press).10.4159/9780674029453Search in Google Scholar

Christensen, J. (2018). Trade Justice (Oxford: Oxford University Press).10.1093/oso/9780198810353.001.0001Search in Google Scholar

Christiano, T. (2015). ‘Legitimacy and the International Trade Regime’, San Diego Law Review 52 (5): 981–1012.Search in Google Scholar

Clark, S. (2007). Living without Domination: The Possibility of an Anarchist Utopia (Burlington, Vermont: Ashgate Publishing Company).Search in Google Scholar

Collier, P. (2008). The Bottom Billion: Why the Poorest Countries are Failing and What Can Be Done about It (Oxford: Oxford University Press).Search in Google Scholar

Drake, W.J. and Nicolaidis, K. (1992). ‘Ideas, Interests, and institutionalization:“Trade in Services” and the Uruguay Round’, International Organization 46 (1): 37–100.10.4324/9781315085463-1Search in Google Scholar

Eagleton-Pierce, M. (2013). Symbolic Power in the World Trade Organization (Oxford: Oxford University Press).10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199662647.001.0001Search in Google Scholar

Filling, J. (2017). ‘What’s Wrong with Republican Liberty?’ the Future of Republicanism: Liberal, Critical, Radical? University of York, July 26th, 2017.Search in Google Scholar

Finger, J.M., Reincke, U., and Castro, A. (1999). Market Access Bargaining in the Uruguay Round: Rigid or Relaxed Reciprocity? (Washington, DC: World Bank Publications).10.1596/1813-9450-2258Search in Google Scholar

Gädeke, D. (2016). ‘The Domination of States: Towards an Inclusive Republican Law of Peoples’, Global Justice: Theory Practice Rhetoric 9 (1): 1–27.10.21248/gjn.9.1.99Search in Google Scholar

Gordon, U. (2007a). ‘Anarchism Reloaded’, Journal of Political Ideologies 12 (1): 29–48.10.2307/j.ctt18fsb5d.6Search in Google Scholar

Gordon, U. (2007b). Anarchy Alive! Anti-Authoritarian Politics from Practice to Theory (London: Pluto Press).Search in Google Scholar

Gourevitch, A. (2013). ‘Labor Republicanism and the Transformation of Work’, Political Theory 41 (4): 591–617.10.1177/0090591713485370Search in Google Scholar

Guzman, A.T. (1998). ‘Why LDCs Sign Treaties that Hurt Them: Explaining the Popularity of Bilateral Investment Treaties’, Virginia Journal of International Law 38 (4): 639–688.Search in Google Scholar

Hoekman, B.M. and Mavroidis, P.C. (2015). World Trade Organization (WTO) Law, Economics, and Politics: Second Edition (New York: Routledge).10.4324/9781315742212Search in Google Scholar

Hopewell, K. (2016). Breaking the WTO: How Emerging Powers Disrupted the Neoliberal Project (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press).Search in Google Scholar

James, A. (2012). Fairness in Practice: A Social Contract for A Global Economy (Oxford: Oxford University Press).10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199846153.001.0001Search in Google Scholar

Jones, K. (2009). ‘Green Room Politics and the WTO’s Crisis of Representation’, Progress in Development Studies 9 (4): 349–357.10.1177/146499340900900408Search in Google Scholar

Julius, A.J. (2014). ‘Practice Independence’, Canadian Journal of Philosophy 44 (2): 239–254.10.1080/00455091.2014.942142Search in Google Scholar

Kelsey, J. (2008). Serving Whose Interests? the Political Economy of Trade in Services Agreements (New York, NY: Routledge-Cavendish).Search in Google Scholar

Khor, M. (2000). ‘How the South Is Getting a Raw Deal at the WTO’, in S. Anderson (eds.). Views from the South: The Effects of Globalization and the WTO on Third World Countries (Chicago, IL: Food First Books), pp. 7–53.Search in Google Scholar

Krueger, A.O. (1998). The WTO as an International Organization (Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press).Search in Google Scholar

Krugman, P. (1997). ‘What Should Trade Negotiators Negotiate About?’, Journal of Economic Literature 35 (1): 113–120.Search in Google Scholar

Laborde, C. and Ronzoni, M. (2016). ‘What Is a Free State? Republican Internationalism and Globalisation’, Political Studies 64 (2): 279–296.10.1111/1467-9248.12190Search in Google Scholar

Lovett, F. (2009). ‘Domination and Distributive Justice’, The Journal of Politics 71 (3): 817–830.10.1017/S0022381609090732Search in Google Scholar

Lovett, F. (2010). A General Theory of Domination and Justice (Oxford: Oxford University Press).10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199579419.001.0001Search in Google Scholar

Lovett, F. (2012). ‘What Counts as Arbitrary Power?’, Journal of Political Power 5 (1): 137–152.10.1080/2158379X.2012.660026Search in Google Scholar

Lovett, F. (2016). ‘Should Republicans Be Cosmopolitans?’, Global Justice: Theory Practice Rhetoric 9 (1): 28–46.10.21248/gjn.9.1.100Search in Google Scholar

Lovett, F. and Pettit, P. (2009). ‘Neorepublicanism: A Normative and Institutional Research Program’, Annual Review of Political Science 12: 11–29.10.1146/annurev.polisci.12.040907.120952Search in Google Scholar

Macdonald, T. (2015). ‘Antipower, Agency, and the Republican Case for Global Institutional Pluralism’, in B. Buckinx, J. Trejo-Mathys and T. Waligore (eds.). Domination and Global Political Justice: Conceptual, Historical, and Institutional Perspectives (New York: Routledge), pp. 291–312.Search in Google Scholar

Martí, J.L. (2010). ‘A Global Republic to Prevent Global Domination’, Diacritica 24 (2): 31–72.Search in Google Scholar

Maynor, J. (2015). ‘Should Republican Liberty as Non-Domination Be Outsourced?’, in B. Buckinx, J. Trejo-Mathys and T. Waligore (eds.). Domination and Global Political Justice: Conceptual, Historical, and Institutional Perspectives (New York: Routledge), pp. 227–250.Search in Google Scholar

Miller, R.W. (2010). Globalizing Justice: The Ethics of Poverty and Power (Oxford: Oxford University Press).10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199581986.001.0001Search in Google Scholar

Moellendorf, D. (2005). ‘The World Trade Organization and Egalitarian Justice’, Metaphilosophy 36 (1–2): 145–162.10.1111/j.1467-9973.2005.00360.xSearch in Google Scholar

Nail, T. (2013). ‘Zapatismo and the Global Origins of Occupy’, Journal for Cultural and Religious Theory 12 (3): 20–35.Search in Google Scholar

Narlikar, A. (2005). The World Trade Organization: A Very Short Introduction (Oxford: Oxford University Press).10.1093/actrade/9780192806086.001.0001Search in Google Scholar

Narlikar, A. (2012). ‘Collective Agency, Systemic Consequences: Bargaining Coalitions in the WTO.’, in M. Daunton, A. Narlikar and R.M. Stern (eds.). The Oxford Handbook on the World Trade Organization (Oxford: Oxford University Press), pp. 184–209.10.1093/oxfordhb/9780199586103.001.0001Search in Google Scholar

Pettit, P. (1996). ‘Freedom as Antipower’, Ethics 106 (3): 576–604.10.4135/9781446215272.n18Search in Google Scholar

Pettit, P. (1997). Republicanism: A Theory of Freedom and Government (Oxford: Oxford University Press).Search in Google Scholar

Pettit, P. (2008). ‘Republican Freedom: Three Axioms, Four Theorems’, in C. Laborde and J. Maynor (eds.). Republicanism and Political Theory (Oxford: Blackwell Publishing), pp. 102–130.Search in Google Scholar

Pettit, P. (2010). ‘A Republican Law of Peoples’, European Journal of Political Theory 9 (1): 70–94.10.1177/1474885109349406Search in Google Scholar

Pettit, P. (2012). On the People’s Terms: A Republican Theory and Model of Democracy (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press).10.1017/CBO9781139017428Search in Google Scholar

Pettit, P. (2014). Just Freedom: A Moral Compass for A Complex World (New York: W.W. Norton & Company).Search in Google Scholar

Pettit, P. (2015). ‘The Republican Law of Peoples: A Restatement’, in B. Buckinx, J. Trejo-Mathys and T. Waligore (eds.). Domination and Global Political Justice: Conceptual, Historical, and Institutional Perspectives (New York: Routledge), pp. 49–82.Search in Google Scholar

Pettit, P. (2016). ‘The Globalized Republican Ideal’, Global Justice: Theory Practice Rhetoric 9 (1): 47–68.10.21248/gjn.9.1.101Search in Google Scholar

Pogge, T.W. (2008). World Poverty and Human Rights: Second Edition (Cambridge, UK: Polity Press).Search in Google Scholar

Risse, M. (2017). ‘Realizing Justice in Trade: Multilateralism and Mega-Regionalism’, Global Justice: Theory Practice Rhetoric 10 (1): 1–23.Search in Google Scholar

Shaffer, G. (2015). ‘How the World Trade Organization Shapes Regulatory Governance’, Regulation & Governance 9 (1): 1–15.10.1111/rego.12057Search in Google Scholar

Steinberg, R.H. (2002). ‘In the Shadow of Law or Power? Consensus-Based Bargaining and Outcomes in the GATT/WTO’, International Organization 56 (2): 339–374.10.1162/002081802320005504Search in Google Scholar

Suttle, O. (2017). Distributive Justice and World Trade Law: A Political Theory of International Trade Regulation (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press).10.1017/9781108235235Search in Google Scholar

Taylor, R.S. (forthcoming). ‘Donation without Domination: Private Charity and Republican Liberty’, The Journal of Political Philosophy.Search in Google Scholar

Thompson, M.J. (2013). ‘Reconstructing Republican Freedom: A Critique of the Neo-Republican Concept of Freedom as Non-Domination’, Philosophy & Social Criticism 39 (3): 277–298.10.1177/0191453712473081Search in Google Scholar

Thompson, M.J. (2018). ‘The Two Faces of Domination in Republican Political Theory’, European Journal of Political Theory 17 (1): 44–64.10.1177/1474885115580352Search in Google Scholar

Vrousalis, N. (2013). ‘Exploitation, Vulnerability, and Social Domination’, Philosophy & Public Affairs 41 (2): 131–157.10.1111/papa.12013Search in Google Scholar

Vrousalis, N. (2016a). ‘Exploitation as Domination: A Response to Arneson’, The Southern Journal of Philosophy 54 (4): 527–538.10.1111/sjp.12199Search in Google Scholar

Vrousalis, N. (2016b). ‘Imperialism, Globalization and Resistance’, Global Justice: Theory Practice Rhetoric 9 (1): 69–92.10.21248/gjn.9.1.102Search in Google Scholar

Wade, R.H. (2003). ‘‘What Strategies are Viable for Developing Countries Today? the World Trade Organization and the Shrinking of ‘Development Space”’, Review of International Political Economy 10 (4): 621–644.10.1080/09692290310001601902Search in Google Scholar

Wilkinson, R. (2000). Multilateralism and the World Trade Organisation: The Architecture and Extension of International Trade Regulation (London: Routledge).Search in Google Scholar

Wilkinson, R. (2006). The WTO: Crisis and the Governance of Global Trade (Oxon, OX: Routledge).Search in Google Scholar

Wilkinson, R. (2014). What’s Wrong with the WTO and How to Fix It (Cambridge: Polity Press).Search in Google Scholar

Wolf, M. (2004). Why Globalization Works (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press).Search in Google Scholar

WorldBank. (2016). ’World Bank Open Datahttps://data.worldbank.org/ (accessed on September 14th, 2018).Search in Google Scholar

WTO. (1994a). Agreement Establishing the World Trade Organization (Gevena: GATT).Search in Google Scholar

WTO. (1994b). General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade 1994 (Geneva: GATT).Search in Google Scholar

WTO. (2013). ’USTR Froman Warns Poor Countries Would Be the Biggest Losers if Bali Fails’ https://www.wto.org/english/news_e/news13_e/pfor_01oct13_e.htm (accessed on September 13th, 2018).Search in Google Scholar

WTO. (2018a). ’Sub-Committee on Least-Developed Countries’ https://www.wto.org/english/tratop_e/devel_e/dev_sub_committee_ldc_e.htm (accessed September 13th, 2018).Search in Google Scholar

WTO. (2018b). ’Regional Trade Agreements’ https://www.wto.org/english/tratop_e/region_e/region_e.htm#rules_ita (accessed on June 11th, 2018).Search in Google Scholar

WTO. (2018c). ’What Is the WTO? Overview’ https://www.wto.org/english/thewto_e/whatis_e/wto_dg_stat_e.htm (accessed May 18th, 2018).Search in Google Scholar

Published Online: 2018-11-08
Published in Print: 2018-11-27

© 2018 Walter de Gruyter GmbH, Berlin/Boston

Downloaded on 5.12.2023 from https://www.degruyter.com/document/doi/10.1515/mopp-2018-0061/html
Scroll to top button