Making offers they can't refuse: Consensus and domination in the WTO

Ó Laoghaire, Tadhg

Abstract

The World Trade Organisation (WTO), and the international trade regime within which it operates, is regularly evaluated in terms of distributive outcomes or opportunities. A less-established concern is the extent to which the institutional structure of the trade regime enables agents to exert control over the economic forces to which they’re subject. This oversight is surprising, as trade negotiations amongst states have profound impacts upon what options remain open to those states and their citizens in regulating their economies. This article contributes to filling this lacuna in the literature. Following on from recent neo-republican work on global and international justice, it argues that a major problem with the WTO is that it fails to effectively mitigate the domination of some states by others within its negotiations. Such domination prevails despite the employment of negative consensus as a decision-making procedure.

Citation

Ó Laoghaire, T. (2018). Making offers they can't refuse: Consensus and domination in the WTO. Moral Philosophy and Politics, 5(2), 227-256. https://doi.org/10.1515/mopp-2018-0061

• Journal Article Type: Article
• Online Publication Date: Nov 8, 2018
• Publication Date: Nov 8, 2018
• Deposit Date: Oct 4, 2024
• Journal: Moral Philosophy and Politics
• Print ISSN: 2194-5616
• Electronic ISSN: 2194-5624
• Publisher: De Gruyter
• Peer Reviewed: Peer Reviewed
• Volume: 5
• Issue: 2
• Pages: 227-256
• DOI: https://doi.org/10.1515/mopp-2018-0061
• Public URL: https://durham-repository.worktribe.com/output/2944406