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EC–Asbestos European Communities – Measures Affecting Asbestos and Asbestos-Containing Products

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  22 June 2004

Abstract

Some cases attain ‘landmark’ status because they constitute a jurisprudential paradigm shift. Others attain such status because in them a decisor, usually a supreme jurisdiction, renders a definitive, ‘canonical’, ruling. Sometimes it is both reasons. Sometimes, rarely, it is neither. EC–Asbestos is such a rare case. It may well qualify as a landmark. It has, justifiably, attracted huge attention and, understandably, considerable controversy. Its reasoning, however, is so decidedly non-definitive that it is not, consequently, possible to say whether it represents a veritable paradigm shift or is just a badly reasoned case by the Appellate Body (AB), albeit with a non-controversial result.

Type
Dispute settlement corner
Copyright
2004 Henrik Horn and Joseph H. H. Weiler

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Footnotes

This study discusses the WTO Dispute Settlement dispute European Communities – Measures Affecting Asbestos and Asbestos-Containing Products (WT/DS135/R, 18 September 2000 and WT/DS135/AB/R, 12 March 2001). We are grateful for helpful discussions with Petros C. Mavroidis and the other Reporters of the project, and the comments provided by participants in the ALI meeting in Philadephia, 6–7 February 2003.