National Treatment in the GATT

摘要

Two very different perspectives on the virtues and vices of the World Trade Organization (WTO) are pitted against each other in the policy debate. Some view the WTO mainly as a vehicle to reduce border measures, thereby typically yielding aggregate gains. Others see the WTO mainly as a significant constraint on members' ability to determine domestic policies freely, with an unclear or often negative impact. The economic literature on trade agreements is largely consistent with the former view. But with a few exceptions it has not addressed the impact of WTO provisions that seek to influence domestic policymaking. In particular, to the best of our knowledge, there is no analysis of the impact of the central WTO provision with this aim: the nondiscrimination principle of National Treatment (NT), which loosely speaking requires that, once imported, foreign products are given at least as favorable treatment as "like" domestic products. NT is a core undertaking in the WTO. For instance, it appears as Art. Ⅲ in the 1947 General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT), as Art. XVII in the General Agreement on Trade in Services, and as Art. 3 in the Agreement on Trade-Related Intellectual Property Rights.