Law Commons^™

The Role Of Lawyers In The World Trade Organization, Peter D. Ehrenhaft

Vanderbilt Journal of Transnational Law

The World Trade Organization is a marvelously ambitious effort of now 140 countries to bring the rule of law to international trade. The WTO is a logical extension of the inspired ideas of the draftsmen of the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT), who recognized at the end of World War II that the seeds of that conflagration were sown, in part, by the chaotic condition of international trade following World War I.

During that inter-war period, the United States adopted its Antidumping Act of 1921 and its Smoot-Hawley Tariff Act of 1930. Both survive to this day. By …

The Continued Viability Of Foreign Sales Corporations (Fscs): An Analysis Of The Wto Decision Declaring Fscs Incompatible With Gatt Trading Rules, Brenda O'Leary

San Diego International Law Journal

Most major trading nations have features in their income tax laws that favor exports. The United States has adopted such a scheme of preferential treatment of foreign income in order to provide incentives for the export of U.S.-produced goods. However, such devices that reduce income taxes for U.S. exporters have been openly criticized by the international community as illegal export subsidies which are incompatible with the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT). In fact, the U.S. enacted its current Foreign Sales Corporation (FSC) legislation in the Tax Reform Act of 1984 to conform the Domestic International Sales Corporation (DISC) …

The Public's View Of Foreign Trade: Pragmatic Internationalism, California Research Bureau

California Agencies

The Cold War has ended. The North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), World Trade Organization (WTO), the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT), and the European Union have changed the global political and economic landscape in only a few short years. This review draws together responses from national and California public opinion surveys over the past ten years to paint a broad picture of the public's views on foreign trade.

An Essential Element Of Fair Trade And Sustainable Development In The Ftaa Is An Enforceable Social Clause, Terry Collingsworth

Richmond Journal of Global Law & Business

Multinational companies (“MNCs”) and governments that are fantasizing about a Free Trade Area of the Americas (“FTAA”) should accept the reality that the FTAA is not politically viable for the time being unless the issues of labor rights and other social conditions are addressed in a manner demonstrating that these rights are consistent with commercial rights that are protected in careful detail in many pages of the draft FTAA agreement.

Does Free Trade Cause Hunger? Hidden Implications Of The Ftaa, Jonathan B. Wight

Richmond Journal of Global Law & Business

This division of labour, from which so many advantages are derived, is not originally the effects of any human wisdom, which forsees and intends that general opulence to which it gives occasion. It is the necessary, though very slow and gradual consequence of a certain propensity in human nature which has in view no such extensive utility; the propensity to truck, barter, and exchange one thing for another.

Legitimacy, Globally: The Incoherence Of Free Trade Practice, Global Economics And Their Governing Principles Of Political Economy, Michael Henry Davis, Dana Neacsu

Law Faculty Articles and Essays

In this article, we observe the legalized character of the phenomenon popularly called “globalization.” We first examine what it means to be a legalized phenomenon and observe that an important part of legalization is legitimation. In domestic legal regimes, legitimation is accomplished through the Rule of Law, which makes certain claims about the nature of the society of which the legal regime is a part. Simply stated, the Rule of Law claims that a legal system is legitimate if its rules are definite and predictable and are applied in a general, impartial, and non-retroactive manner. In the international trading system …

Trade In Electronic Commerce Services Under The Wto: The Need To Clearly Classify Electronic Transmissions As Services And Not Tariff-Liable, Ernesto A. Hernandez-Lopez

Ernesto A. Hernandez

Written in 2001, this essay asks: should the World Trade Organization (WTO) classify electronic transmissions as a service, and thus tariff-free under the General Agreement on Trade in Services (GATS), or should the WTO classify electronic transmissions as a good, and thus subject to tariffs under the General Agreement on Trade (GATT)?

First, for the sake of legal certainty, the WTO should take the appropriate steps to definitively classify electronic transmissions as a service and classify them as not tariff liable. Not tariff liable means a good is not subject to custom duties. Electronic transmission refers to "digitalized information transmitted …

Trade In Electronic Commerce Services Under The Wto: The Need To Clearly Classify Electronic Transmissions As Services And Not Tariff-Liable, Ernesto A. Hernandez-Lopez

Ernesto A. Hernandez

Written in 2001, this essay asks: should the World Trade Organization (WTO) classify electronic transmissions as a service, and thus tariff-free under the General Agreement on Trade in Services (GATS), or should the WTO classify electronic transmissions as a good, and thus subject to tariffs under the General Agreement on Trade (GATT)?

First, for the sake of legal certainty, the WTO should take the appropriate steps to definitively classify electronic transmissions as a service and classify them as not tariff liable. Not tariff liable means a good is not subject to custom duties. Electronic transmission refers to "digitalized information transmitted …