Is Compliance the Name of the Effectiveness Game? Goal-Shifting and the Dynamics of Judicial Effectiveness at the WTO

Sivan Shlomo Agon

World Trade Review, 2016, vol. 15, issue 4, 671-701

Abstract: In line with current research on the effectiveness of international law and institutions, much of the literature on the effectiveness of the WTO dispute settlement system (DSS) has settled on compliance as its primary effectiveness benchmark. This article challenges this trend. It argues that common models gauging the DSS effectiveness through the narrow lens of compliance disregard many other institutional goals pursued by the system, and the conflicts latent among them. Furthermore, existing models are also static in nature—predicated on problematic assumptions regarding the constant supremacy of the DSS compliance objective—what leads them to overlook important shifts amidst the multiple and conflicting goals of the DSS that take place over time and across disputes. Building on the goal-based approach developed in the social sciences, the article introduces a multidimensional framework for analyzing the DSS effectiveness, using the multiple, conflicting and shifting goals set for the system by WTO Members as key effectiveness benchmarks. The article then turns to closely examine the novel concept of ‘goal-shifting’ – essential for effectiveness assessment – and through interview-based analysis of different categories of WTO disputes shows how the DSS goals change with time and context, as a consequence of the changing modalities in which the system operates.

Date: 2016
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.cambridge.org/core/product/identifier/ ... type/journal_article link to article abstract page (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:cup:wotrrv:v:15:y:2016:i:04:p:671-701_00

Access Statistics for this article

More articles in World Trade Review from Cambridge University Press Cambridge University Press, UPH, Shaftesbury Road, Cambridge CB2 8BS UK.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Kirk Stebbing ().