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Chapter 7 shows how CAP reform, whilst driven by WTO concerns, feeds back into the WTO negotiations, setting limits to what can be agreed, but also providing enhanced opportunities for agreement. From being defensive within the ‘old’ GATT, attempting to limit the damage that an agricultural agreement could cause to the CAP, the EU became more offensive in its relationship with the WTO. The EU's initial negotiating offer on agriculture in the Uruguay Round was very limited, reflecting its defence of the CAP, but the breakdown of the negotiations in December 1990 convinced EU decision-makers that the CAP had to change, allowing the EU and the United States to agree the Blair House accord. In the run-up to the Doha Development Agenda (Doha Round) the EU tried to establish multifunctionality as one of its non-trade concerns, but without success. In the Doha Round, it was much better placed to mount an offensive negotiation because the Fischler reforms had switched blue box payments into the green box.

This chapter examines the guiding principles of the World Trade Organization (WTO) with respect to regional trade agreements (RTA). It discusses the economic and political reasons behind RTA and describes the rules as applied in practice and in WTO jurisprudence. It attempts to clarify the WTO–RTA relationship in the context of the treaty law framework and provides recommendations for reform developed within the framework of the Doha Development Agenda.

The history of agriculture in developed countries over the past seventy years is first and foremost a political history because of the intense interplay between farming and the state. Indeed, it is difficult to think of any other ‘industry’ which has been so comprehensively regulated by the state, over such a long period of time, as agriculture. Even neo-liberal governments in OECD countries have accepted the political compact between farming and the state on account of the ‘exceptionalism’ of agriculture. The rationale for its exceptional status might vary from country to country, but it invariably has something to do with one major aspect that distinguishes agriculture from all other industries: the fact that we ingest its products. In other words, the centrality of agriculture to human health is far and away the most important reason why many countries have sought to ensure a measure of food security by protecting their national farm sectors through permutations of production subsidies, price supports, and import controls—the origins of which stretch back to the 1930s in the case of the US and as far back as the nineteenth-century Corn Laws in the case, for example, of the UK. Agricultural history can be read in a number of different ways. The most polarized readings are the productivist and the ecological interpretations. The productivist discourse, which emphasizes the phenomenal productivity gains that have been achieved since the Second World War, is essentially a story of unalloyed economic success due to a tripartite alliance of state, science, and farmers. The ecological discourse, by contrast, points not to the economic benefits of the post-war productivity miracle, but to the social and environmental costs of agricultural intensification. In the US, where intensive farming practices are most advanced, such problems as soil erosion and animal welfare were attributed to the regulatory regime operated by the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA), which actively encouraged unsustainable farming practices. Similar connections have been made in Europe, where the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) was deemed to be the main culprit.

This chapter analyzes international harmonization of rules on trade remedies, comprising anti-dumping duties, countervailing duties and safeguards. Originating in domestic law in the US in the late 19th and early 20th century, these rules were subsequently established as international trade rules under the GATT and further elaborated under the WTO. Persistent conflicts between harmonized rules and the domestic laws of some states, notably the US and the so-called “new users”, are analyzed in conjunction with mechanisms for monitoring domestic implementation under the GATT/WTO (dispute settlement mechanisms and committee review).

This chapter begins with discussions on the state of sustainable development in the World Trade Organization (WTO), noting that progress on integrating social and environmental considerations into WTO law and policy remains poor. It then discusses the WTO’s Trade Policy Review Mechanism (TPRM), and how its role has evolved from being a WTO review mechanism focused on economic policies alone, to providing a platform for discussions on trade and sustainable development. These discussions have revealed that WTO member States belong to one of three main schools of thought; First, some WTO members remain adamant that sustainable development is purely a domestic policy issue, or argue that all social and environmental considerations, including the potential impacts of trade, should remain only in the domestic law and policy arena; Second, several WTO members such as Canada and the US recognize openly that sustainable development is an objective of the WTO Agreements, and note that as such, it is relevant to the interpretation of the treaties; Third, further WTO members such as the European Commission also recognize that trade will not automatically deliver on a sustainable development objective, and link their commitment to the objective with the need for better integration of environmental and social considerations into trade and development policy.