The current impasse in the appointment of new members to the World Trade Organization Appellate Body risks leading to a dysfunctional dispute settlement system. This post argues that it is a long-standing collective governance failure that has provided the US with the pretext and the opportunity to cripple the system, and that it is still possible to reach some collective accommodation of the diverging expectations of the scope of adjudication in the WTO. The Ministerial Conference of the World Trade Organization (WTO) took place in Buenos Aires in December 2017, but made little progress on updating multilateral trade rules . One subject not on the formal agenda, but hotly debated in the corridors, was the US block on the appointment of new members to the WTO Appellate Body — the tribunal with the final word in resolving trade disputes between the organisation’s members. A third seat on the seven-member body became vacant while trade ministers were in Argentina, and if the nine-month-old impasse is not resolved soon, the entire dispute settlement system will become increasingly dysfunctional at a time of renewed trade tension. It is tempting to consider the standoff as a manifestation of the Trump administration’s professed preference for...
Written by Robert McDougall