In the past few weeks, a series of academic conferences attended by Felipe Mu? oz Navia, a professor at the Institute of International Studies in Chile, seemed to be immersed in an atmosphere of failure in prediction: Will the founder of the World Trade Organization (WTO), the United States, completely abolish this organization in this latest multilateral appearance?
From 12 to 13 local time, the 1 1 Biennial WTO Ministerial Conference was held in Buenos Aires, Argentina. This is why Philip had the opportunity to observe closely and participate in early academic discussions in neighboring countries. The end result was as disappointing as he expected: the meeting failed without any promises or declarations, so it "didn't appear in the media" in Argentina or Chile.
Since 20 17, the Trump team, which constantly released protectionist remarks during the election campaign, not only offered a series of "old-fashioned" trade remedy investigations in a dazzling way, but also affected the bilateral trade of important trading partners, and began to show its edge in the multilateral field.
"I feel that although the meeting is over, the direction of global trade rules is the most concerned issue for everyone." Philip told the First Financial Reporter.
Robert A. Rogovschi, a former trade official of the United States International Trade Commission (ITC) and an associate professor of trade and commercial diplomacy at Georgetown University, told China Business News that after nearly a year's observation, Trump's current way is to say no to all established rules and practices, which has become a new strategy.
When "American priority" meets "erin brockovich" WTO.
Chile, located on the west coast of South America, has a long and narrow coastline and limited land area, which makes the country's economic form very dependent on international trade. Philip's research field focuses on international trade. On his desk, the most common materials are Trans-Pacific Partnership Agreement (TPP), Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership Agreement (RCEP) and WTO.
Philip found that nearly 20 years after the suspension of the Doha negotiations, another efficient appellate body of the WTO was on the verge of stagnation: when several successive justices left office, the United States was preventing new candidates from taking their place.
The Trump administration, which opposed free trade and abolished trans-TPP at the first time, was at odds with the idea of WTO from the beginning. And since then, two related questions have been repeatedly raised in the circle: whether the United States will withdraw from the WTO and how the WTO will be terminated by the United States.
The 1 1 Ministerial Conference of the WTO closed in Argentina last week. (WTO official website map)
This is not only manifested in the fact that the candidate for the US ambassador to the WTO has not yet been determined; Not only did US Trade Representative Wright Heze, who finally attended the meeting, say that the WTO has lost its main focus and become an institution focusing on litigation, which is too lenient to China and other richer developing countries; More importantly, the United States has been preventing appointed judges from entering the WTO Appellate Body, which is called the "World Trade Supreme Court".
65438+February 1 1, the term of office of European judge Peter Vandenbosch of the Appellate Body expired, and the appointment of his successor became the object of deliberate obstruction by the United States for the third time. The Appellate Body should have seven members, but the current three vacancies aggravate the backlog of cases, thus weakening the credibility of the WTO as a trade dispute mediation body.
Looking back, 1994, 15 On April 5, the ministerial meeting of the Uruguay Round of GATT held in Marrakech, Morocco, decided to establish a more global World Trade Organization to replace the GATT established in 1947. The World Trade Organization (WTO) is one of the most important international economic organizations, with about 160 members, and the total trade volume of its members reaches 95% of the world. Its two most important parts: first, promoting the negotiation of global multilateral economic and trade agreements; The other is the dispute settlement mechanism.
The Doha Round of multilateral trade negotiations, which was originally scheduled to be fully concluded before June 5438+1 October12005, was delayed, resulting in the emergence of the most authoritative and effective part of the WTO-the dispute settlement mechanism.
In Philip's view, if this part is paralyzed, the whole WTO will be "living dead" even if it is alive, as if it were "brain dead".
In the first half of this year, in an exclusive interview with China Business News, Charlene Marilynn Dangelo Basevski, a former chief trade representative who witnessed China's entry into the WTO on behalf of the United States and now a senior partner of Will Mohal Law Firm in the United States, gave the answer "Will the United States quit the WTO?"-"No, never." However, by the end of the year, the Trump administration constantly challenged the bottom line of WTO rules in its own way in bilateral economic and trade frictions.
On the eve of the G-20 Hamburg Summit in July, the United States released the rumor that "high and heavy taxes will be imposed on overseas steel and aluminum products", that is, it invoked Chapter 232 of the US Trade Expansion Act 1962 to start the "232 investigation"; In August, the United States tried to investigate the "30 1 clause" initiated by China (the abbreviation of the 30 1 clause of American trade law 1974) ... The action was frequent, and it was proved by the First Financial Reporter in many ways that it was only to gain more benefits in future bilateral negotiations: whether it was unilateral reduction or exemption of automobile tariffs, or
In the eyes of those who witnessed the golden age of trade negotiation, the art of negotiation is not only "the devil is in the details", but also a "compromise" of carrots and sticks.
Newcomers are refreshing the imagination of these old rulemakers.
In the Obama era, the United States walked on two legs. On the one hand, it actively uses the effective operation mechanism of the WTO; On the one hand, it will start a new stove and create regional free trade agreements such as TPP and TTIP to upgrade the existing multilateral negotiations. But now, a "table lifter" who only waved a big stick and completely gave up compromise carrots broke in, turning all parties into shrewd businessmen, trying to figure out how much benefit to the table lifter now, so as to offset the cost after completely lifting the table.
A senior observer close to multilateral negotiations in Geneva told the First Financial Reporter that Americans have paid little attention to multilateralism and only paid attention to bilateral relations. Dispute settlement litigation will also adopt a pragmatic attitude. If it wins, it will be widely publicized. If you lose, you don't even rule out quitting the WTO. At present, they have blocked the election of three vacancies in the Appellate Body of the WTO, which is a challenge to the normal operation of multilateral institutions. It is estimated that it will be difficult for multilateral institutions to make great achievements for a long time to come.
Embarrassed, even without the American spoiler, the WTO's own mechanism continues to affect the credibility of the organization.
As the Buenos Aires meeting showed, when the important negotiations of the organization are difficult to produce results, it also makes all parties reconsider the principle that "all 160 members can reach an agreement before adoption", which leads to "never compromise".
Tu Xinquan, dean of the WTO China Research Institute of the University of International Business and Economics, explained to the First Financial Reporter that the United States has always been pragmatic towards the international system, and this attitude is not new. When the WTO was first established, the United States Senate asked for an evaluation, and if it was unfavorable to itself, it could withdraw. Now, because the United States is the most important user of global trade remedy measures (the core trade protectionism means), it not only becomes the defendant in the WTO, but also often loses the case. Naturally, it is dissatisfied with this mechanism and obstructs the appointment of judges.
"This practice makes countries dissatisfied, but the WTO mechanism is a consensus, so if the United States does not change its attitude, it will be difficult to break through the bottleneck of the mechanism itself." He said.
Gao Feng, spokesman of the Ministry of Commerce, pointed out at the subsequent regular press conference that China does not approve of the practice of completely denying the role of the WTO because the demands of individual members have not been met. China will continue to firmly uphold the multilateral trading system with the WTO as its core and actively promote the development of the WTO. The meeting reached ministerial decisions on fishery subsidies, e-commerce work plan, small economy work plan, non-infringement of intellectual property rights and scenarios. In addition, a considerable number of WTO members have issued joint ministerial statements on investment facilitation and small and medium-sized enterprises, as well as joint statements on domestic regulation of trade in services.
Who will fill the vacuum of trade leadership after "American priority"
When the United States, which once dominated the negotiation of global trade rules, began to lose big because of small things, it withdrew from its leading position and faced the competition from latecomers to fill the vacuum.
At present, except the United States, other big economies do not want to see a broken WTO.
At the end of last year, Nicholas Hope Eminem, director of the China Project Department of the Center for International Development Studies of Stanford University, told China Business News that since TPP was abandoned, China could more actively promote other trade negotiations, such as RCEP. If the United States leaves a vacuum, China can formulate new rules for trade and investment in the Asia-Pacific region.
But obviously, the EU and Japan also started to lay out early.
Cecilia Malmstrm, the EU Trade Commissioner, is one of them. Although she emphasized in language at the ministerial meeting in Argentina that she wanted to be a new multilateral leader, at the end of the meeting, she found that the EU was not strong enough to promote fruitful negotiations.
In fact, as the United States officially announced its withdrawal from TPP in June 5438+ 10 this year, Asia-Pacific countries such as Chile, whose economic structure relies heavily on free trade, have begun to seek free trade alliances in various ways to hedge the risks brought by protectionism to the domestic economy.
Last year1late October (1 1), during the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) leaders' meeting in Lima, Peru, New Zealand, Peru and Chile "showed kindness" to China. After the World Economic Forum held in Davos in late June this year, in June 5438+10, Switzerland and Australia also restarted the joint research on the upgrade negotiations with China on the basis of the existing free trade agreement. Among them, Chile and New Zealand have started negotiations with China.
Facing the future, Philip is very pessimistic. If more bilateral free trade agreements and trade protectionism prevail, the world will enter an era of "the strong will remain strong and the weak will remain weak". Although China is facing challenges from the United States and Europe on economic and trade issues such as "market economy status" and "steel overcapacity", he still believes that China will have more bargaining power than other developing countries in the future due to the weight brought by economic volume.
The only good news is that Philip learned that after being "left behind" by the United States, the remaining 1 1 countries of the TPP will sign a free trade agreement, which is now drawing to a close. As for the pressure that the withdrawal of the United States may bring to TPP 1 1, he also hesitated about the prospect when asked by the reporter of China Business News. "It's just an FTA (Free Trade Agreement). I think the United States should agree. Wait for the news in the next few months. " He said.
165438+1October/1Japanese Minister of Economic Regeneration Xiang Minzhong and Vietnamese Minister of Industry and Trade Chen held a press conference in Da Nang, Vietnam, officially announcing that 1 1 countries except the United States formally reached an agreement on continuing to promote TPP./.
But he may be too optimistic. A number of core people confirmed to the First Financial Reporter that the defection of the United States, the largest player in global trade, not only made the WTO of "erin brockovich" bear the huge risk of eventual paralysis, but also the once surging regional free trade agreements fell into a low tide, including not only TPP and RCEP, but also TPP 1 1 which the remaining members continued to promote after the withdrawal of the United States.
In the past few years, the United States has played a leading role in these international negotiations, large and small. Whenever the negotiations are deadlocked or controversial, it rarely takes the initiative to promote solutions and lead the process of global trade liberalization.
More importantly, Philip is also anxiously waiting for the progress of the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) being renegotiated, which represents the vane of the new route of the United States.
"The North American Free Trade Agreement is about to be re-released, which can probably set the tone for future US economic and trade negotiations." Philip told the first financial reporter, "I think trade remedy measures and service industry are the core issues worthy of attention."