Rightsbased trade policy experiences and perspectives

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Rights-based trade policy experiences and
perspectives

• Christian Friis Bach
• International Director
• DanChurchAid
• Former Associate Professor in International
  Economics.

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Rights-instruments in trade policy
Declarational diplomacy
Trade-/association agreements Preferential
agreements Labelling
Positive conditionalities
Trade sanctions Boycot Conditions in
international trade agreements
Negative conditionalities
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Positive conditionalities have not been effective
Red/green clauses in GSP only few countries
have applied

• Economic effects too small compared to costs (EU
  8,5 - 40 for clothing)
• Political resistance in developing countries
• Legality within WTO? (preferences should be
  applied objectively, non-discriminatory and
  transparent, labels must be voluntary, market
  based and transparent)

Private initiatives Social responsibility,
Labelling schemes (Ethical Trade Initiative)
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Human rights in bilateral trade agreements

• Human rights in most bilateral trade agreements
  negotiated by the EU, especially the Middle-East
  agreements.
• But
• Lack of enforcement
• Lack of dispute settlement
• Carrot too small
• Important signal
• Perhaps new possibilities with the Economic
  Partnership Agreement.
• Possible EU association has been a significant
  tool in promoting human rights a new expansion
  agenda?

EU-Israel Associeringsaftalen Article 2 Relations
between the Parties, as well as all the
provisions of the Agreement itself, shall be
based on respect for human rights and democratic
principles, which guides their internal and
international policy and constitutes an essential
element of this Agreement.
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WTO Who will turn of the light?

• Negotiations stalemate, the deserted deadlines
  no winners in sight, no driving force evident.
• Bilateralism and regionalism on the rise from
  building blocks to stumbling blocks?
• Negotiations on sustainable development issues
  downgraded
• Economic risks expanded, economic gains
  exhausted? ..

Will exploit benefits from multilateralism Develop
ing countries weaker Impossible to solve
cross-cutting issues, eg. Agricultural support.

• We are now in the red zone and not far from the
  red part of this red zone
• Pascal Lamy, Report by the Chariman of the Trade
  Negotiations Committeee, 15th of May 2006

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Human rights in the WTO

• WTO no human rights clause
• South Africa faced sanctions despite GATT
  membership hower changed since the WTO.
• China joining the WTO has weakened the human
  rights focus
• WTO strong dispute settlement system can it be
  used by the human rights regime?

• Principles
• Non-discrimination
• Most-favoured nation
• National treatment
• Like-products
• Exceptions
• Public morale
• Protect life and health for plants, animals and
  people
• Slave labour
• Exhaustible natural ressources
• National security
• Authorised by the Security Council
• Extra-territorial actions
• Least-trade distortive

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Perspectives - human rights in the WTO

• Could the WTO system be used to promote human
  rights?
• Forced trade actions against countries with human
  rights abuses
• Membership conditional on human rights
• Make it legal but not obligatory to introduced
  trade measures based on human rights abuses
  through a link to the international human rights
  conventions- Success for Intellectual Property
  Rights (TRIPS)- Failure for workers rights

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The key to success Rule of the law
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Examples are plentiful Disputes
Beef Hormones
Codex Alimentarius
Shrimp/Turtle
Interamerican Treaty/CITES/
Swordfish
UN Convention on the Law of the Sea

.
the GATT is not to be read in clinical
isolation from public international
law US-Gasoline Dispute, Appellate body, 1996
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Examples are plentiful Negotiations
Agricultural export subsidies/food aid
WFP
Environmental goods and services
Basel, UNEP
Trade-related intellectual property rights
WIPO, WHO, CBD
Fisheries subsidies
FAO
..
..
..negotiations do not any longer take place
clinical isolation from other international
organisations.. Modified from the US-gasoline
dispute
..by pushing new areas into the WTO we
essentially get them out of the WTO.. Modified
from Svend Auken, former Danish Minister of the
Environment
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The widening agenda

• Trade in goods
• Services
• Agriculture
• Technical barriers to trade and food standards
• Environment
• Intellectual Property Rights
• Technology
• Aid and technical assistance
• Public procurement
• Trade facilitation
• Debt
• ..

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The institution is not kicking but surely alive

• Democracy improving Group of a still larger
  number
• Dispute settlement developing Faster and
  facilitated
• Openness and information widening Please keep
  secret and get it settled
• Constituency broadening We are all in this
  together

Free trade
Interdependency
Internationalism
Integrated negotiations

• The WTO is an engine, a motor energizing the
  international legal order
• Pascal Lamy, Intervention devant la Société de
  droit international

The Global EU
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Dilemmas

• Is it a human rights violation not to use trade
  measures against countries with human rights
  violations?
• Are trade measures with negative effects for
  innocent civilians a human rights violation?
• Is there a dilemma between social/economic and
  civil/political human rights (China?)?
• Will you promote human rights most efficiently
  via increased trade/growth and interdependency or
  via trade sanctions/measures?
• Who are you punishing with trade measures those
  who export or those who imports?

• If you like circus, WTO is the only tent in
  town

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Conclusions

• Focus on the political effects of free trade
  From peace to international policies and human
  rights
• There are a number of dilemmas and it is
  difficult to use human rights actively in trade
  policy
• There are some options in preferential agreements
  and in association/free trade agreements
• Focus on injecting sustainable development issues
  and human rights into the WTO by the Codex
  mechanism
• Keep focus on the WTO do not give up, do not
  ease the pressure, do not escape

• If you like circus, WTO is the only tent in
  town

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Economic effects overstated
Source Harrison, Rutherford and Tarr, World Bank
Discussion Paper 307, 1995, samt World Data, 1995
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but political effects understated