The Merits of International Trade

Considering all the difficulties faced by developing countries in adapting to the rules-based system, why do they still remain in the WTO? Since the WTO has been careful to maintain a distance from those who wish to categorise it as a development organisation, why do the Member States still drive negotiations on a development platform especially under the Doha Round? One may ask whether indeed there is a correlation between the creation of trade rules and the attainment of increased opportunities, full employment, welfare gains, poverty alleviation, and higher standards of living. Since these issues are essentially those which are relevant in the domestic social and economic arena, how does multilateral co-operation assist the attainment of such objectives? Do trade rules not in fact undermine the ability of an internal government to decide on a trade and development regulatory structure which will respond to the particular needs and concerns of its internal environment?

This final chapter points to the incontrovertible response to all these questions: that indeed trade does offer an opportunity for development but it is an opportunity which can only be obtained by collective responsibility both at the multilateral, and at the domestic level. The arguments go back and forth on the merits of international trade rules. On the one hand, international regulation for the buying and selling of goods and services under the open trade conditions of the WTO system may adversely affect the national industries without domestic governments adopting restrictive measures to safeguard its domestic trade environment.

Understanding the WTO

The WTO is an umbrella organisation established after the Uruguay Round of multilateral trade negotiations. The WTO Agreement states that the Organisation is meant to provide the common institutional frame works for the implementation of those agreements. The basic functions of the WTO are:

• (a) to implement, administer, and carry out the WTO Agreement and its Annexes,

• (b) to act as a forum for ongoing multilateral trade negotiations,

• (c) to serve as a tribunal for resolving disputes, and

• (d) to review the trade policies and practices of member states.

The package of agreements is annexed to the WTO Agreement and is binding on all members of the organisation as a single body of law. Under Article II (2) of the WTO, the Multilateral Trade Agreements under Annex 1, 2, 3 are binding on all the members. Pursuant to Article II (3) however, Annex 4 on the Plurilateral Trade Agreements is binding only on members who have accepted it. These Agreements are geared towards the provision of a common institutional framework for the conduct of trade relations among Members of the WTO in matters related to the agreements and associated legal instruments included in the Annexes to the Agreement.

The reference to the WTO as a ‘rules-based’ system is due to the sophisticated structure of international trade regulation based on various trade agreements and also, by the compulsory dispute settlement system which includes a judicialstyle review mechanism.

The Agreements under the WTO are as follows:

• 1. The Final Act

• 2. Agreement Establishing the WTO

Annex 1A: Agreement on Trade in Goods

• 1. General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (1994)

• 2. Uruguay Round Protocol to the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade

• 3. Agreement on Agriculture

• 4. Agreement on Sanitary and Phytosanitary measures

• 5. Agreement on Textiles and Clothing

• 6. Agreement on Technical Barriers to Trade

• 7. Agreement on Trade-Related Investment Measures

• 8. Agreement on Implementation of Article VI (on antidumping)

• 9. Agreement on Implementation of Article VI (on customs valuation)

• 10. Agreement on Preshipment Inspection

• 11. Agreement on Rules of Origin

• 12. Agreement on Import Licensing Procedures

• 13. Agreement on Subsidies and Countervailing Measures

• 14. Agreement on Safeguards

Annex 1B: General Agreement on Trade in Services

Annex 1C: Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights

Annex 2: Understanding of Rules and Procedures Governing the Settlement of Dispute

Introduction

This chapter examines the circumstances that have encouraged the emergence of a consensus around democratic institutions and values in the Western Hemisphere during the Post-Cold War era. Specifically, this chapter focuses on the role and impact of the Organization of American States (OAS) in promulgating democratic institutions and values in Latin America and the Caribbean. This chapter examines the OAS in an effort to evaluate the degree of effectiveness that its actions and decisions have had in fostering reform in support for democracy as the most appropriate inter-governmental alternative among its member states. The consensus emerging around democratic institutions and norms in the Western Hemisphere is not perfect by any means, yet it is important to note that this consensus has progressively taken hold, and that the interruptions to democratic governments in the region have been increasingly infrequent and subject to punishment.

As a preamble to the chapter, the first section introduces the basic concepts that guide the discussion and identifies the conditions and specific moments in the period encompassed by the end the first Gulf War and the fall of the former Soviet Union in 1991, up to the time of the Fourth Summit of the Americas in Mar del Plata in November, 2005, which have either favored or frustrated the acceptance and internalization of democratic norms and values in the Western Hemisphere.

Addressing the Development Objective in Settling Trade Disputes

In the preceding chapters we have examined development in the context of the rules, the implementation, the challenges, and the initiatives adopted by the WTO. But the issue has not been left out of the dispute settlement process of the WTO. Particularly in the course of judicial review, the concept and how it is interpreted, indeed to what extent it is acknowledged, is fundamental to the perception of the WTO as an Organisation for development through trade.

Some developing country Member States have not been entirely satisfied that the dispute settlement process has furthered the development objective. They are not convinced that the DSB has always interpreted developing country domestic policies from a development perspective. They have expressed the view that ‘the Panels and Appellate Body have displayed an excessively sanitised concern with legalisms, often to the detriment of the evolution of a development-friendly jurisprudence’. To counter this perception, Qureshi first engaged in a careful study of several disputes which have centred on the development question. He subsequently opined that the development question ‘needs to be factored in at the level of drafting WTO Agreements; institutionalised in the very process of interpreting WTO Agreements; engineered in actual interpretations of WTO Agreements; and facilitated through the introduction of development friendly material in the judicial process’.

Some efforts have been undertaken at Secretarial level to facilitate developing country utilisation of the dispute settlement mechanism.

The Merits of International Trade

Considering all the difficulties faced by developing countries in adapting to the rules-based system, why do they still remain in the WTO? Since the WTO has been careful to maintain a distance from those who wish to categorise it as a development organisation, why do the Member States still drive negotiations on a development platform especially under the Doha Round? One may ask whether indeed there is a correlation between the creation of trade rules and the attainment of increased opportunities, full employment, welfare gains, poverty alleviation, and higher standards of living. Since these issues are essentially those which are relevant in the domestic social and economic arena, how does multilateral co-operation assist the attainment of such objectives? Do trade rules not in fact undermine the ability of an internal government to decide on a trade and development regulatory structure which will respond to the particular needs and concerns of its internal environment?

This final chapter points to the incontrovertible response to all these questions: that indeed trade does offer an opportunity for development but it is an opportunity which can only be obtained by collective responsibility both at the multilateral, and at the domestic level. The arguments go back and forth on the merits of international trade rules. On the one hand, international regulation for the buying and selling of goods and services under the open trade conditions of the WTO system may adversely affect the national industries without domestic governments adopting restrictive measures to safeguard its domestic trade environment. Thus from one perspective, it could be considered that ‘under certain conditions, open trade in goods leads to factor price equalisation with reduced returns to factors that are relatively abundant in other nations’. An example would be for instance, that should low-skilled labour be relatively abundant outside the United States, open trade in products intensively utilising such labour will lead to lower income for low-skilled American workers. In recent times, there may be more to this argument considering the resurgence of queries on the benefits of free trade and international rules to America which became a key issue in the 2008 American presidential race.

Brogues and Blarney—The Semeiotics of Language

From its earliest days, tourism has primarily involved the search for difference. Tourists leave home to experience something different, even when they insist on enjoying all the comforts of home. Ironically, however, they may find unpleasant—sometimes even frightening or disgusting—the very the differences they've set out to explore. Nevertheless, they travel to encounter sights and sensations considered unique to the host country. In this respect tourists are, as Dean MacConnell and Jonathan Culler have argued, semioticians, looking for signs of Frenchness, Englishness or Irishness. Inevitably, many such signs derive from and point back to stereotypes visitors hold regarding the host nation and its people. Moreover, this search for signs of foreign difference based on stereotypes manufactured back home may not reflect native realities. As Johathan Culler suggests, a “chanteuse” in Paris singing in English with a French accent may seem more “authentic” to an American tourist than if the woman sang in French. Similarly, tourists scanned the behavior, dress and speech of their Irish hosts for “authentic” signs of Paddy—based on stereotypes of British invention

Speech was one potential source for Irishness. Since many Irish stereotypes had been propagated in the theater, British tourists expected their hosts to sound like the Stage Irishman. However, in crossing the Irish Sea British visitors crossed several linguistic frontiers, taking them beyond Paddy's Stage-Irish drolleries.

Developing Countries and Barriers to Trade

Prior to the adoption of a rules-oriented system, there were barriers or trade restrictive measures which were identified under the GATT as ‘obstacles to international flows’ of goods and services. Such barriers made it impossible for producers and exporters to make meaningful gains from their economic endeavours, and for consumers to have a reasonable choice of goods and services. Davey et al analysed these obstacles on four levels. Generally, these were:

1. Governmental explicit obstacle to imported goods e.g. quantitative restrictions, subsidies, government procurement practices.

2. Governmental internal practice or regulations which have protective effects e.g. regulations requiring a higher standard of safety for imports, requirement that importers be licensed. The authors point out here that there is often a valid domestic governmental purpose such as consumer health or protection addressed by the regulation and that the problem is balancing the application of governmental measures for a legitimate purpose against the requirements of the international trading system to minimise obstacles to imports.

3. Problems which arise due to the importing structure of the importing country e.g. government ‘industrial policy’, the structure of industry.

4. Business practice (non-governmental) e.g. governmentally-induced practices such as directing a private firm to refuse to purchase foreign goods, restrictive business practices of private enterprises such as exclusive dealing arrangements, business practice and structure such as habits and preferences of businesses, cultural barriers including a dislike of certain brand names, or a willingness to pay a premium for certain quality or specialty goods. Here, Davey et al note that these preferences may require marketing expertise on the part of particular companies in order to allow them penetrate the market.

I took another look at five old films recently, films I hadn't seen since they first came out. And I'm sorry I did.

I had seen them for the first time at the Mayfair Theatre, an art-deco house in Miami, Florida, where I grew up (after being transplanted from New York City). And perhaps my once fond memories of the films I'm going to discuss are connected to the place where I first saw them – predictably, a place (1605 Biscayne Boulevard) where only a large mall, the Omni, now stands. The Mayfair was Miami's premiere art-house cinema during the 1960s and 1970s, showing lots of foreign films but also a fair sampling of the so-called New American Cinema. I used to drive there at night, alone, in my Austin-Healey as often as I could during my senior year of high school, as well as during summers and holidays away from college. Much to my parents' dismay, I liked seeing movies alone, and I liked driving my sports car downtown (from suburban, at the time even rural, Hialeah) to the theater where I'd see them.

I especially loved those tense moments just before the movie began, the sense of pure promise and incipience they held. Blissfully holding on to the bottom of my seat or the rails of my chair, I would play a little game with time, a game that had several variants, all of them designed to heighten the mystery of beginnings.

The reign of the English king Edward the Second (1307–1327) has long been a subject of study, discussion, and debate for scholars and artists alike. Indeed, there is much in what has become the legend of this sovereign to draw one's attention. Arguably one of the first clear historical cases of a regularly troubled regime, the reign of Edward has become an ideal subject for the exploration of the nature of power by historians and sociologists, as well as by novelists, poets, and dramatists. Their studies, however, have been regularly subject to complications and distractions due to the many potentially prurient aspects of this reign: multiple murders, a grossly unhappy marriage, revolutions, rebellions, and, especially, Edward's engagement in homosexual activity. While the importance of Edward's sexuality is obvious as a means to explore the nature and treatment of sexuality in early English history, it has almost invariably distracted from or colored discussions of the more central, political issues of his rule.

The most significant artistic examination of Edward's reign has been subject to similarly skewed treatment. So resonant is Christopher Marlowe's play Edward II (1592) that it has become a veritable locus for cultural discourse on sexuality. Both in studies of the text and in performances of the play, the emphasis has been on questions of Edward's sexuality, whether through direct address of the subject or a conscious moral choice to avoid it.

In the preface to his famous Folie et Déraison Michel Foucault suggests:

No such total analysis in the structuralist sense has been attempted here. Nevertheless, the aim has been to reconstruct the history of madness among those treated by the British during ‘John Company's ’ time as completely as surviving sources allow. The treatment of the European and Indian mentally ill in British institutions has been analyzed in relation to colonial ideology, state policy and legislation; the important role of public opinion ‘at home’ and in the colony in the construction of treatment methods and administrative control measures has been highlighted; and the reconcilability of commercial interests, colonial ideology and humanitarian motives has been discussed.

Further, the comparatively early and successful intervention by the colonial state in the ‘lunacy sector’ has been related to the persistent endeavour of Company officials and of the expatriate community more generally to preserve the image of the European elite as formidable and impeccable colonial rulers.

The Search for Fortune and Professional Recognition

In many pre-modern societies the signification of madness encompassed a wide range of conflicting feelings and psychological projections. The mad could be revered or feared as bearers of preternatural powers, they could be despised as monstrous brutes. The apparent ‘simpletons’ among them could be romantically idealized as holy, innocent fools or ‘naturals’, or be ridiculed as village idiots and subjected to atrocities and mean tricks. Those suffering from a more violent strain of madness or melancholic gloominess tended to be approached with the cautious curiosity that is frequently fuelled by admiration and fear – a mixture that might easily find a cathartic release in abuse and brutality, or be converted into veneration. These diverse responses to madness could prevail simultaneously, or one particular attitude might dominate.

Those treating or caring for the mad tended to share the stigma attached to their charges. Just like the mad they were subject to quickly changing perceptions oscillating between respect and suspicion. In the late eighteenth century, this cautious and even hostile attitude can partially be accounted for by the fact that madhouse superintendents rarely possessed any formal medical qualification. They not uncommonly included clergymen and ‘quacks’, as well as the medically qualified. Until the passing of the Lunatics Act of 1845 obliged each county in England to build its own public lunatic asylum, most madhouses were private investments. This did not help to reduce mad-doctors’ ambivalent social image and generally low professional repute.

Proposals for colonization, put forward by interested nations in the seventeenth century, laid the groundwork for exploration through voyages of discovery, and yet, in the first half of the eighteenth century, the fraction of the total area of the antipodes explored was relatively small. Maps featured blank spaces spreading from the western coast of the Americas right across the Pacific to the western coast of the Australian landmass, and the search was on to find the elusive Northwest Passage to the South Seas. Major Pacific island groups such as the Hawaiian, Samoan and Society Islands, New Caledonia and New Zealand, remained unknown or practically unexplored, and the eastern coast of the Australian continent had not yet been discovered. The technical challenges of sea travel were an ongoing obstacle and there were also financial and political barriers to overcome. The extent of uncharted space understandably raised hopes of finding an abundance of natural resources for trade as well as room for colonies on a scale unheard of in the Portuguese, Dutch, British and French empires.

The OAS in Perspective

Since 1824, the newly independent Latin American states continuously tried to advance regional integration projects while constantly and simultaneously reaffirming their own independence from Europe, and the right to define the kind of state that they would become. These projects revolved around Pan-American Conferences that promoted principles that would allow for the eventual achievement of a regional scheme. All through the nineteenth and the first part of the twentieth century; these series of conferences, treaties, doctrines and international law principles, meant to rally states in the Western Hemisphere to joint efforts and advance either common economic interest; enforce collective security and peaceful resolution of disputes; or develop a common social agenda that would allow for the development of a common Pan-American society of states. The successive Pan-American conferences tried and failed to rally multilateral support and advance a regional cooperation framework around either economic, security or social principles, due to the lack of consensus around any of these set of norms. Neither mechanisms such as 1) treaties and doctrines to advance the peaceful resolution of disputes between states; 2) the support for a customs union; or 3) the promotion of the traditional principles of respect for the right of self determination and sovereignty; successfully generated a common set of normative principles that could motivate elites in positions of authority to promote multilateralism.