* Professor of Law, South Texas College of Law; Chair of the International Economic Law Group of the American Society of International Law (2001–2003). Professor Taylor was also the Chair of the 2002 Conference.
1 Every country devotes itself to development simply by seeking to improve the standard of living of its population. In the international arena, for example, each country seeks to not only manage its own economy but also to attract investors from outside. See generally UNCTAD, World Investment Report 2003: FDI Policies for Development: National and International Perspectives (2003), available at http://www.unctad.org/en/docs//wir
2003_en.pdf. This report addresses the need governments feel to seek out international investment agreements (such as bilateral investment agreements), even though they appear to curtail their ability to control their own policy choices. The report focuses on how such agreements should be written, structured, and implemented in order to focus on countries’ development objectives.
Countries also seek to improve their economic situation by entering into regional trading arrangements. According to the World Trade Organization (WTO), by 2005, there may be 300 regional trade agreements (assuming that those planned and being negotiated come into being). See WTO, Regional Trade Agreements, at http://www.wto.org/
english/tratop_e/region_e/region_e.htm (last visited Apr. 29, 2004).
2 The most obvious examples are the WTO and the World Bank. The WTO is currently in the midst of the Doha Round of negotiations. The Doha Declaration established development as the theme of this set of negotiations. Ministerial Conference, 4th Sess., Ministerial Declaration, WT/MIN(01)/DEC/1 (Nov. 20, 2001), para. 2 (“International trade can play a major role in the promotion of economic development and the alleviation of poverty. We recognize the need for all our peoples to benefit from the increased opportunities and welfare gains that the multilateral trading system generates. The majority of WTO Members are developing countries. We seek to place their needs and interests at the heart of the Work Programme adopted in this Declaration.”).
WTO Members are currently struggling to restart the Doha negotiations after the inconclusive end to the Cancún meeting in late 2003. According to WTO Director General Supachai Panitchpakdi:
Even in Cancun the great debate was whether the multilateral trading system was moving fast and far enough—not whether it should be rolled back. Indeed, it is critically important that we draw the right conclusions from Cancun—which are only now becoming clearer. The disappointment was that ministers were unable to reach agreement. The achievement was that they exposed the risks of failure, highlighted the need for North-South collaboration, and—after a period of introspection—acknowledged the inescapable logic of negotiation. Cancun showed that, if the challenges have increased, it is because the stakes are higher.
Supachai Panitchpakdi, American Leadership and the World Trade Organization: What Is the Alternative? Address before the National Press Club, Washington, D.C. (Feb. 26, 2004), at www.wto.org/english/news_e/spsp_e/spsp22_.htm.
3 The IELG is an interest group of the ASIL. Since 1992 the IELG has devoted itself to studying and reporting on international economic law. It has done this by creating scholarly conferences—always on a different theme—to facilitate discussion in the field. The first IELG Conference was devoted to teaching international economic law. Beginning with the second IELG conference, the IELG has picked a conference theme and arranged to publish its proceedings in a law review. The second IELG Conference, Interdisciplinary Approaches to International Economic Law, was published in 10 Am. J. Int’l L. Pol’y 595 (1995). The third Conference, Institutions for International Economic Integration, was published in 17 Nw. J. Int’l L. & Bus. 351 (1997). The Fourth Conference, Linkage as Phenomenon: An Interdisciplinary Approach, was published in 19 U. Pa. J. Int’l Econ. L. 209 (1998) and 19 U. Pa. J. Int’l Econ. L. 709 (1998) (providing an addendum). The Fifth Conference, Interfaces: From International Trade to International Economic Law, was published in 15 Am. U. Int’l L. Rev. 1231 (2000). The Sixth Conference, International Economic Conflict and Resolution, marked the first time the IELG held a conference outside of Washington (in Houston, Texas) in support of ASIL’s regional outreach program. The 2001 conference proceedings produced two law review volumes, 42 S. Tex. L. Rev. 1187 (2002) (Opening Session) and 22 Nw. J. Int’l L. & Bus. 311 (2002) (Plenary Sessions). 27 B.C. Int’l & Comp. L. Rev. 187 herein presents six out of the sixteen papers presented at the Seventh Conference.
4 The IELG chooses the papers presented at its conferences from those submitted by scholars, lawyers, and government and international organization officials in response to a Call for Papers issued by the conference planning committee. The Call for Papers for this conference on international economic law and developing countries solicited papers for panels focusing on the legal, economic, political, and social aspects of the relationship between international economic law and developing countries.
5 The Opening Session and one of the Plenary Sessions were held at Georgetown University Law Center and co-sponsored (along with the IELG) by that law school’s Program on International Business and Economic Law. The other Plenary Session was held at the Hilton Washington Embassy Row Hotel.
6 These themes came from the Call for Papers for the Conference. The Planning Committee then established sessions and panels built around the themes. The Conference included one additional panel, entitled “Developing Countries and Regionalism.” For a program of the Conference, see 2002 ASIL International Economic Law Annual Conference, at http://www.international-economic-law.org/ASIL%202002%20Conference%20Program.
htm (last visited Apr. 18, 2004).
7 The Opening Session featured presentations by the Deputy General Counsel of the World Bank, W. Paatii Ofosu-Amaah; Ambassador Richard Bernal, Director General of the Caribbean Regional Negotiating Machinery; and Professor Daniel D. Bradlow, Director of the International Legal Studies Program at American University, Washington College of Law. Professor Bradlow’s article appears in this symposium.
8 See generally Daniel D. Bradlow, Development Decision-Making and the Content of International Development Law, 27 B.C. Int’l & Comp. L. Rev. 195 (2004).
9 See generally Inaamul Haque & Ruxandra Burdescu, Monterrey Consensus on Financing for Development: Response Sought from International Economic Law, 27 B.C. Int’l & Comp. L. Rev. 219 (2004).
10 See generally Frank J. Garcia, Beyond Special and Differential Treatment, 27 B.C. Int’l & Comp. L. Rev. 291 (2004).
11 See generally Karen Halverson, China’s WTO Accession: Economic, Legal, and Political Implications, 27 B.C. Int’l & Comp. L. Rev. 319 (2004).
12 See generally Eugenia McGill, Poverty and Social Analysis of Trade Agreements: A More Coherent Approach?, 27 B.C. Int’l & Comp. L. Rev. 371 (2004).
13 See generally Todd Weiler, Balancing Human Rights and Investor Protection: A New Approach for a Different Legal Order, 27 B.C. Int’l & Comp. L. Rev. 429 (2004).
14 See Garcia, supra note 10, at 302–17 (cataloguing the changes that must be made to S&D during the Doha Development Round at the WTO for developing countries to recover from the bad bargain struck during the Uruguay Round); Halverson, supra note 11, at 319–39 (explaining how China’s size and status as a communist country generated large and intrusive commitments for gaining WTO accession); Haque & Burdescu, supra note 9, at 241–83 (presenting a complete outline of the Monterrey Consensus reached in 2002 and its goals and objectives); McGill, supra note 12, at 373–84 (outlining all of the recent progress, and lack thereof, by the WTO and World Bank and critiquing the World Bank/IMF approach to trade).
15 See generally Bradlow, supra note 8; Garcia, supra note 10; Haque & Burdescu, supra note 9; McGill, supra note 12.
16 See generally Bradlow, supra note 8 (development project decision-making should cover environmental and human rights effects as well as economic consequences); Halverson, supra note 11 (WTO accession is linked in China’s case to adoption of the rule of law and will bring greater advantages to the Chinese people); McGill, supra note 12 (poverty and gender effects should be used to analyze trade agreements); Weiler, supra note 13 (human rights should be enforced the same as investment rights).
17 See generally Bradlow, supra note 8 (advocating a shift to the modern view of international development law); Garcia, supra note 10 (developing countries must negotiate for true reform of S&D and a better bargain from the WTO through the Doha Round); Haque & Burdescu, supra note 9 (the governments and international organizations participating in the Monterrey Consensus must achieve all of its goals in order to deal effectively with poverty and development); McGill, supra note 12 (governments and international organizations should analyze impacts of trade agreements on different groups—particularly women and the poor—in order to fully understand trade effects upon societies); Weiler, supra note 13 (advocating for a human rights arbitration system as part of investment agreements).