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The WTO in Buenos Aires: The outcome and its significance for the future of the multilateral trading system

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  • Erin Hannah
  • James Scott
  • Rorden Wilkinson

Abstract

The conclusion of the World Trade Organization's (WTO) Buenos Aires ministerial conference (10–13 December 2017) was immediately celebrated and derided in equal measure. For its supporters, Buenos Aires opened the way toward negotiations in e‐commerce, investment facilitation for development, and measures designed to help micro, small and medium sized enterprises (MSMEs). For its detractors, the meeting underscored the gridlock that continues to blight the WTO’s negotiating function and underlined the organisation's declining credibility as a mechanism for governing global trade. In this paper we provide one of the first full length critical evaluations of the Buenos Aires conference and its outcome. In so doing, we offer answers to three questions. What accounts for such dramatically different assessments of the meeting's outcome? How should the outcome be interpreted? What is its significance for the future of the WTO and the multilateral trading system? We argue that the meeting's outcome was indeed significant. It has consolidated the process of reconfiguring the WTO‘s negotiating function; and it enables members to tackle more effectively a range of pressing economic and social issues as well as to navigate blockers and blockages in the negotiations. However, it also poses challenges for the WTO‘s poorest constituents.

Suggested Citation

  • Erin Hannah & James Scott & Rorden Wilkinson, 2018. "The WTO in Buenos Aires: The outcome and its significance for the future of the multilateral trading system," The World Economy, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 41(10), pages 2578-2598, October.
    • Handle: RePEc:bla:worlde:v:41:y:2018:i:10:p:2578-2598
    DOI: 10.1111/twec.12657
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    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Shaffer, Gregory & Winters, L. Alan, 2017. "FTA Law in WTO Dispute Settlement: Peru–Additional Duty and the Fragmentation of Trade Law," World Trade Review, Cambridge University Press, vol. 16(2), pages 303-326, April.
    2. Trommer, Silke, 2017. "The WTO in an Era of Preferential Trade Agreements: Thick and Thin Institutions in Global Trade Governance," World Trade Review, Cambridge University Press, vol. 16(3), pages 501-526, July.
    3. Chad P. Bown, 2017. "Steel, Aluminum, Lumber, Solar: Trump's Stealth Trade Protection," Policy Briefs PB17-21, Peterson Institute for International Economics.
    4. Rorden Wilkinson & Erin Hannah & James Scott, 2014. "The WTO in Bali - What MC9 means for the Doha Development Agenda and why it matters?," Global Development Institute Working Paper Series 19414, GDI, The University of Manchester.
    5. Rorden Wilkinson & Erin Hannah & James Scott, 2016. "The WTO in Nairobi: The Demise of the Doha Development Agenda and the Future of the Multilateral Trading System," Global Policy, London School of Economics and Political Science, vol. 7(2), pages 247-255, May.
    6. Hannah, Erin & Scott, James & Wilkinson, Rorden, 2017. "Reforming WTO-Civil Society Engagement," World Trade Review, Cambridge University Press, vol. 16(3), pages 427-448, July.
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    Cited by:

    1. Pier Luigi Sacco & Alex Arenas & Manlio De Domenico, 2022. "The resilience of the multirelational structure of geopolitical treaties is critically linked to past colonial world order and offshore fiscal havens," Papers 2203.00618, arXiv.org.

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