Hostname: page-component-6dbcb7884d-4kfsg Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2025-02-14T07:57:10.522Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

The Politics of Judicial Economy at the World Trade Organization

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  19 April 2010

Marc L. Busch  and
Krzysztof J. Pelc
Marc L. Busch
Affiliation:
Walsh School of Foreign Service, Georgetown University, Washington, D.C. E-mail: mlb66@georgetown.edu
Krzysztof J. Pelc
Affiliation:
Princeton University, N.J., and Department of Political Science at McGill University, Montreal, Canada. E-mail: kpelc@princeton.edu
Get access

Abstract

International institutions often moderate the legal decisions they render. World Trade Organization (WTO) panels do this by exercising judicial economy. This practice, which is evident in 41 percent of all rulings, involves the decision not to rule on some of the litigants' arguments. The constraint is that it can be appealed. We argue that panels exercise judicial economy when the wider membership is ambivalent about the future consequences of a broader ruling. This is proxied by the “mixed” (that is, nonpartisan) third-party submissions, which are informative because they are costly, jeopardizing a more decisive legal victory that would benefit these governments too. We empirically test this hypothesis, and find that mixed third-party submissions increase the odds of judicial economy by upwards of 68 percent. This suggests that panels invoke judicial economy to politically appease the wider WTO membership, and not just to gain the litigants' compliance in the case at hand.

Type
Research Article
Information
International Organization , Volume 64 , Issue 2 , April 2010 , pp. 257 - 279
Copyright
Copyright © The IO Foundation 2010

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

REFERENCES

Bhala, Raj. 1999a. The Myth About Stare Decisis and International Trade Law (Part One of a Trilogy). American University International Law Review 14 (4):845–956.Google Scholar
Bhala, Raj. 1999b. The Precedent Setters: De Facto Stare Decisis in WTO Adjudication (Part Two of a Trilogy). Journal of Transnational Law and Policy 9 (1):1–151.Google Scholar
Bhala, Raj. 2001. The Power of the Past: Towards De Jure Stare Decisis in WTO Adjudication. George Washington International Law Review 33 (3/4):873–978.Google Scholar
Bohanes, Jan, and Sennekamp, Andreas. 2006. Reflections on the Concept of ‘Judicial Economy’ in WTO Dispute Settlement. In The WTO at Ten: The Contribution of the Dispute Settlement System, edited by Sacerdoti, Giorgio, Yanovitch, Alan, and Bohanes, Jan, 424–49. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Busch, Marc L. 2007. Overlapping Institutions, Forum Shopping, and Dispute Settlement in International Trade. International Organization 61 (4):735–61.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Busch, Marc L., and Reinhardt, Eric. 2003a. Transatlantic Trade Conflicts and GATT/WTO Dispute Settlement. In Transatlantic Economic Disputes: The EU, the US, and the WTO, edited by Petersmann, Ernst-Ulrich and Pollack, Mark A., 465–86. Oxford, England: Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Busch, Marc L., and Reinhardt, Eric. 2003b. Developing Countries and GATT/WTO Dispute Settlement. Journal of World Trade 37 (4):719–35.Google Scholar
Busch, Marc L., and Reinhardt, Eric. 2006. Three's a Crowd: Third Parties and WTO Dispute Settlement. World Politics 58 (3):446–77.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Davey, William J. 1998. The WTO/GATT World Trading system: An Overview. In Handbook of WTO/GATT Dispute Settlement, 1, edited by Pescatore, Pierre, Davey, William J., and Lowenfeld, Andreas F., 7–86. Ardsley, N.Y.: Transnational Publishers.Google Scholar
Davey, William J. 2001. Has the WTO Dispute Settlement System Exceeded Its Authority? A Consideration of Deference Shown by the System to Member Government Decisions and Its Use of Issue-Avoidance Techniques. Journal of International Economic Law 4 (1):79–110.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Davis, Christina L. 2003. Food Fights Over Free Trade: How International Institutions Promote Agricultural Trade Liberalization. Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press.Google Scholar
Downs, George, and Rocke, David M.. 1995. Optimal Imperfection? Domestic Uncertainty and Institutions in International Relations. Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Garrett, Geoffrey, Kelemen, R. Daniel, and Schulz, Heiner. 1998. The European Court of Justice, National Governments, and Legal Integration in the European Union. International Organization 52 (1):149–76.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Garrett, Geoffrey, and Smith, James McCall. 2002. The Politics of WTO Dispute Settlement. Unpublished manuscript. Los Angeles: University of California.Google Scholar
Gifis, Steven H. 1998. Barron's Dictionary of Legal Terms. 3d ed.Hauppauge, N.Y.: Barron's Educational.Google Scholar
Helfer, Laurence R., and Slaughter, Anne-Marie. 2005. Why States Create International Tribunals: A Response to Professors Posner and Yoo. California Law Review 93:1–58.Google Scholar
Hudec, Robert E. 1980. GATT Dispute Settlement After the Tokyo Round: An Unfinished Business. Cornell International Law Journal 13 (2):145–203.Google Scholar
Huntington, David S. 1993. Settling Disputes Under the North American Free Trade Agreement. Harvard International Law Journal 34 (2):407–43.Google Scholar
Jackson, John H. 1998. Designing and Implementing Effective Dispute Settlement Procedures: WTO Dispute Settlement, Appraisal and Prospects. In The WTO as an International Organization, edited by Krueger, Anne O., 161–80. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
Jackson, John H. 2004. International Law Status of WTO Dispute Settlement Reports: Obligation to Comply or Option to ‘Buy Out’? American Journal of International Law 98 (1):109–25.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kelemen, R. Daniel. 2001. The Limits of Judicial Power: Trade-Environment Disputes in the GATT/WTO and the EU. Comparative Political Studies 34 (6):622–50.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
King, Gary, and Zeng, Langche. 2001. Logistic Regression and Rare in Events Data. Political Analysis 9 (2):137–63.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Komuro, Norio. 1995. The WTO Dispute Settlement Mechanism: Coverage and Procedures of the WTO Understanding. Journal of World Trade 29 (4):5–95.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Koremenos, Barbara, Lipson, Charles, and Snidal, Duncan. 2001. The Rational Design of International Institutions. International Organization 55 (4):761–99.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Palmeter, David N., and Mavroidis, Petros C.. 2004. Dispute Settlement in the World Trade Organization: Practice and Procedure. 2d ed.New York: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Pauwelyn, Joost. 2001. The Role of Public International Law in the WTO: How Far Can We Go? American Journal of International Law 95 (3):535–78.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Pauwelyn, Joost. 2002. Cross-Agreement Complaints Before the Appellate Body: A Case Study of the EC–Asbestos Dispute. World Trade Review 1 (1):63–87.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Pelc, Krzysztof J. 2009. Seeking Escape: The Use of Escape Clauses in International Trade Agreements. International Studies Quarterly 53 (2):349–68.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Petersmann, Ernst-Ulrich. 1994. The Dispute Settlement System of the World Trade Organization and the Evolution of the GATT Disputes Settlement System Since 1948. Common Market Law Review 31 (6):1157–244.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Porges, Amelia. 2003. Settling WTO Disputes: What Do Litigation Models Tell Us? Ohio State Journal on Dispute Resolution 19 (1):141–84.Google Scholar
Quick, Reinhardt, and Blüthner, Andreas. 1999. Has the Appellate Body Erred? An Appraisal and Criticism of the Ruling in the WTO Hormones Case. Journal of International Economic Law 2 (4):603–39.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Rosendorff, B. Peter, and Milner, Helen V.. 2001. The Optimal Design of International Trade Institutions: Uncertainty and Escape. International Organization 55 (4):829–57.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Smith, James McCall. 2003. WTO Dispute Settlement: The Politics of Procedure in Appellate Body Rulings. World Trade Review 2 (1):65–100.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Steinberg, Richard H. 2004. Judicial Lawmaking at the WTO: Discursive, Constitutional, and Political Constraints. American Journal of International Law 98 (2):247–75.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Tomz, Michael, Wittenberg, Jason, and King, Gary. 2003. Clarify: Software for Interpreting and Presenting Statistical Results. Journal of Statistical Software 8 (1). Available at ⟨http://www.jstatsoft.org/v08/i01⟩. Accessed 2 January 2010.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Van Bael, Ivo. 1988. The GATT Dispute Settlement Procedure. Journal of World Trade 22 (4):67–77.CrossRefGoogle Scholar