The Two Noble Kinsmen: Internal and Legal Transparency in the WTO and Their Connection to Preferential and Regional Trade Agreements
| Author | Maria Panezi |
| Position | Post Doctoral Fellow, The Center for International Governance Innovation, Waterloo, ON. LL.B. (2005), Athens University, Greece, LL.M. (2006) NYU, Ph.D. (2015) Osgoode |
| Pages | 539-569 |
The Two Noble KiNsmeN: iNTerNal aNd legal
TraNspareNcy iN The wTo aNd Their coNNecTioN To
prefereNTial aNd regioNal Trade agreemeNTs
Maria Panezi*
Center for International Governance Innovation, ON Canada
ABSTRACT
The proliferation of Preferential Trade Agreements (PTAs) and Regional Trade Agreements
(RTAs) has given rise to signicant debate on the need to measure, understand and
possibly regulate the impact these agreements have on the multilateral trading system
under the umbrella of the World Trade Organization (WTO). This article will discuss
the two Doha Transparency Mechanisms (legal transparency) regarding regional trade
agreements, as they appear in two General Council decisions from 2006 and 2010. I will
argue based on a closer look and a consistent interpretation of Paragraph 10 of the Doha
Ministerial Declaration that there is another type of transparency that is relevant to
the discussion on PTAs/RTAs, namely “internal transparency.” “Internal transparency
stricto sensu” highlights the signicance of trust in the WTO institutional processes,
such as negotiations, decision-making, dispute settlement and trade monitoring that
the representatives of developing member states should have in order for the WTO
system to function productively. “Internal transparency lato sensu” is introduced in
this article as an extension to include any decision-making decits, exclusionary
and asymmetrical outcomes specically in the area of unchecked Preferential Trade
Agreement proliferation. Instead of a conclusion, the article offers some proposals for
more a meaningful progress in the WTO with respect to PTAs/RTAs The proposals aim
at raising the prole of both legal and internal of transparency and posit that raising the
prole of one will inevitably lead in improvements in the other.
CONTENTS
i. iNTroducTioN …………………............................................……………..541
ii. The legal frameworK for pTas/rTas ……....................................…...543
iii. The doha TraNspareNcy mechaNisms ….............................................…549
Br. J. Am. Leg. Studies 5 (2016), DOI: 10.1515/bjals-2016-0019
© 2016 Maria Panezi, published by De Gruyter Open.
This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 License.
* Post Doctoral Fellow, The Center for International Governance Innovation, Waterloo, ON.
LL.B. (2005), Athens University, Greece, LL.M. (2006) NYU, Ph.D. (2015) Osgoode; She
can be reached at mpanezi@cigionline.org. The author would like to thank Peer Zumbansen,
Federico Ortino, Daniel Drache, Robert Wai, Achilles Skordas, Argyri Panezi and the speakers
and participants of the Panel entitled “Transparency and the proliferation of Regional Trade
Agreements: how to ensure developing country market access when the spaghetti bowl keeps
getting bigger?” at the 2016 WTO Public Forum for various discussions, comments and
suggestions. The usual disclaimer applies.
5 Br. J. Am. Leg. Studies (2016)
iV. asymmeTrical aspecTs of pTas/rTas ……..................................…553
V. pTas/rTas aNd Trade liberalizaTioN ………….........................….556
Vi. The suTherlaNd reporT oN pTas/rTas aNd deVelopmeNT .........…559
Vii. expaNdiNg The NoTioN of iNTerNal TraNspareNcy……..............…..563
Viii. The reNewed Nairobi TraNspareNcy commiTmeNT…..................…565
ix. muTual TraNspareNcy spilloVers: Three proposals iN lieu of a
coNclusioN........................................................................................567
540
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