World Trade Organization: Issues in Dispute Settlement

摘要

U.S. participation in the World Trade Organization (WTO) reached the 5-year mark in 2000. The WTO was established through the Uruguay Round of international trade negotiations on January 1, 1995, replacing the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade. Membership in the WTO has grown to 137 members, up from about 90 members in September 1986, at the start of the Uruguay Round. The WTO provides the institutional framework for the multilateral trading system, administers rules of international trade, and provides a forum for conducting trade negotiations. It also establishes a quasi-adjudicative dispute settlement system, which has come to be seen as the linchpin for the rules-based system of international trade. The WTO dispute settlement system has also become a lightning rod for those concerned about the direction of the trading system in an era of accelerating globalization.