The World Trade Organization - Jan Wouters

The World Trade Organization, set up in 1995, has become a centrepiece of global economic governance in a fragmented international legal and institutional system. The WTO oversees an extensive body of international trade rules. But it has also become a widely contested organization, as its trade rules affect a great variety of rules and policies on environmental protection, public health, technical standards, cultural diversity, financial stability and professional qualifications. Whether it likes it or not, the WTO is put at the centre of global economic governance and no internationally oriented legal practitioner, government official, academic or student can afford to neglect this swiftly developing body of law. This book introduces the institutional and substantive legal aspects of the WTO. It thereby addresses both the vertical interactions of WTO law with domestic legal systems and the horizontal interactions between WTO rules and other areas of international regulation. Starting from the history and theory of international trade law, the book discusses the content and application of the basic principles in the different WTO agreements. Furthermore, it also clarifies the decision-making processes and dispute settlement system of the WTO.