Trade in the Service of Sustainable Development: Linking Trade to Labour Rights and Environmental Standards

by Olivier De Schutter

Overview

In the Bretton Woods era, trade liberalization, the improvement of labour rights and working conditions, and the strengthening of environmental policies, were seen as mutually supportive. But is this always true? Can we continue to pretend to protect the rights of workers and to improve environmental protection, particularly through climate change mitigation strategies, within an agenda focused on trade liberalization? Is it credible to pursue trade policies that aim to expand the volumes of trade, without linking such policies to labour and environmental standards, seen as 'non-trade' concerns? This book asks these questions, offering a detailed analysis of whether linkage is desirable and legally acceptable under the disciplines of the World Trade Organization (WTO). It concludes that trade can work for sustainable development, but only if we see it as a means for social and environmental progress, including climate change mitigation, and if we avoid fetichizing it as an end to be pursued for its own sake.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781509918348
Publisher:	Bloomsbury Academic
Publication date:	12/28/2017
Pages:	224
Product dimensions:	6.14(w) x 9.21(h) x 0.46(d)

About the Author

Olivier De Schutter was the UN Special Rapporteur on the Right to Food (2008-14) and is now a Member of the UN Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights. He teaches at the University of Louvain (UCL) and at SciencesPo (Paris). He has been a visiting Professor at Columbia University and at UC Berkeley.

Table of Contents

Foreword v

Acknowledgements xvii

List of Boxes xxi

List of Figures xxiii

List of Tables xxv

Introduction 1

1 Setting the Stage: The Limits of Fragmentation 7

I Trade and Labour Rights 7

II Trade and Environmental Standards 14

III The Use of Environmental and Labour Conditionalities in Trade Policies 26

2 Sanctions Against Goods or Services that do not Comply: WTO Disciplines 45

I The Core Disciplines of the WTO Regime 46

II The 'Likeness' of Goods and Services and the Product/Process Distinction 48

III The 'General Exceptions' Clauses of Article XX GATT and Article XIV GATS 57

IV Conclusion 75

3 The Special Regime of Border Tax Adjustments: Levelling the Playing Field 85

I The Notion of Border Tax Adjustments 85

II Border Tax Adjustments under WTO Law 92

III Determining the Level of the Compensatory Tax 98

IV Conclusion 101

4 Generalized Systems of Preferences: The 'Conditional Preferences' Approach 102

I The Origins of the Generalized System of Preferences 102

II The Emergence of 'Special Incentives' within the EU GSP Scheme 103

III The Three Layers of the Current EU GSP Scheme 110

5 Labelling Schemes: Supporting Ethical Consumerism 124

I The Rise of the Debate on Labelling Schemes 124

II Compatibility with WTO Law 131

6 Public Procurement: The Power of the Purse 153

7 Conclusions 165

I 'Sanctions' for Non-compliance with Labour Rights or Environmental Standards 165

II 'Carbon Equalization' through Border Tax Adjustments: Levelling the Playing Field 168

III The EU Generalized System of Preferences: Making Preferences Conditional 169

IV Labelling Schemes: Supporting Ethical Consumerism 170

V Government Procurement: The Power of the Purse 171

Afterword 174

Index 187