International Economic Law and Policy Blog

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Simon Lester

Donald Trump as U.S. Trade Rep

Dan Drezner critiques Donald Trump's views on trade policy and Iraq: From the Wall Street Journal: As for foreign policy, Mr. Trump said he is "only interested in Libya if we take the oil," and that if he were President, "I would not leave Iraq

More on the New Zeroing

As discussed in a number of posts on this blog, "zeroing" is under attack in various ways at the WTO and in domestic courts. But even if these attacks succeed, as noted here "targeted dumping" may become the new way to use "zeroing" as

Australia, the TPP and Investor-State

As noted in the last post, Australia has announced that it no longer wants any part of investor-state dispute settlement. This is not a total surprise, of course, given its past opposition to investor-state in the U.S.-Australia FTA. Nonetheless, such a strong and formal renouncement of investor-state is

Australia and Investor-State

Via Luke Peterson, I see that Australia, in a recent Trade Policy Statement, has come out firmly against investor-state dispute settlement in trade agreements: Some countries have sought to insert investor-state dispute resolution clauses into trade agreements. Typically these clauses empower businesses from one country to take international legal action

The Airbus AB Report: Perhaps Coming Soon

Reuters reports: The WTO appellate body is expected to issue its decision in the Airbus case in late April, although decision dates frequently slip at the WTO. I haven't seen that from any official source, though.

Measuring the Benefits of Trade Agreements

Writing about why Colombia might want to sign an FTA with the U.S., Phil Levy -- responding to a blog post by Clyde Prestowitz -- says: ... it may seem a bit odd that a country like Colombia would devote so much time and effort to negotiating the agreement and

The Financial Crisis and Protectionist Measures

From the abstract from a new report by Robert Wolfe: Leaders of the G20 promised repeatedly that they would refrain from trade restrictions in response to the global financial crisis that began in 2008, and that they would minimize the negative impact on trade and investment of stimulus measures. They

A Tar Sands Project in the U.S.

Tar sands oil production has been a big deal in the EU-Canada FTA negotiations. This AP story has me thinking that NAFTA might be dragged in to this issue: Beneath the lush, green hills of eastern Utah's Uinta Basin, where elk, bear and bison outnumber people, the soil

More Tobacco Talk under the TBT

More on this when the official minutes are released, but this is from the WTO web site summary of the latest TBT Committee meeting: Brazil has introduced a new draft regulation establishing the maximum permissible levels of tar, nicotine and carbon monoxide in tobacco products, and prohibiting the use of

The Danger of Talking about Competitiveness

From President Obama's State of the Union Speech this past January: nations like China and India realized that with some changes of their own, they could compete in this new world. And so they started educating their children earlier and longer, with greater emphasis on math and science.