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Trump Ended WTO Dispute Settlement. Trade Remedies are Needed to Fix it

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  22 February 2022

Chad P. Bown
Chad P. Bown*
Affiliation:
Peterson Institute for International Economics & CEPR, 1750 Massachusetts Avenue, NW, Washington, DC 20036, USA
*
*Corresponding author. Email: cbown@piie.com, www.chadpbown.com
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Abstract

Unhappy with the rulings of the WTO dispute settlement system, which disproportionately targeted US use of trade remedies, the United States ended the entire system in 2019. There are multiple hurdles to agreeing to new terms of trade remedy use and thus potentially restoring some form of binding dispute settlement. First, a change would affect access to policy flexibility by the now large number of users of trade remedies. Second, although China's exports are the overwhelming target of trade remedies, exporters in other countries increasingly find themselves caught up in trade remedy actions linked to China. Third, critical differences posed by China's economic model may call for new rules for trade remedies, but no consensus on those rules has emerged. Even some of the most promising reforms have practical limitations, create additional challenges, or may be politically unviable.

Keywords

F13WTOtrade remediesantidumpingcountervailing dutiessafeguardsUSChinadispute settlementappellate body
Type
Original Article
Information
World Trade Review , Volume 21 , Special Issue 3: WTO at a Crossroads: The WTR 20th Anniversary Issue , July 2022 , pp. 312 - 329
Copyright
Copyright © The Author(s), 2022. Published by Cambridge University Press

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Footnotes

For helpful discussions, I thank Douglas Irwin, Soumaya Keynes, Niall Meagher, Julia Nielson, Marcus Noland, Tom Prusa, Robert Staiger, and Alan Wolff. Yilin Wang provided outstanding research assistance. Nia Kitchin, Melina Kolb, and Oliver Ward assisted with graphics; Madona Devasahayam and Barbara Karni provided editorial assistance. All remaining errors are my own.

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