The WTO after Hong Kong: Progress in, and Prospects for, the Doha Development Agenda

After the World Trade Organization’s (WTO) critical December 2005 Hong Kong ministerial meeting, negotiations to implement the Doha Development Agenda (DDA) broke down completely in the summer of 2006. This book offers a detailed and critical evaluation of how and why the negotiations arrived at this point and what the future holds for the WTO. It brings together leading scholars in the field of trade from across the social sciences who address the key issues at stake, the principal players in the negotiations, the role of fairness and legitimacy in the Doha Round, and the prospects for the DDA’s conclusion. The WTO after Hong Kong is the most comprehensive account of the current state of the World Trade Organization and will be of enormous interest to students of trade politics, international organizations, development and international political economy.

Table of Contents:
Setting the Scene 1. The WTO after Hong Kong: Setting the Scene for Understanding the Round Rorden Wilkinson and Donna Lee 2. Trade, Development and the Doha Development Agenda Sylvia Ostry Key Issues 3. WTO Agriculture Negotiations and the Global South Jennifer Clapp 4. Intellectual Property and the Doha Development Agenda Susan Sell 5. Services, Economic Development and the Doha Round Bernard Hoekman and Aaditya Mattoo Principal Players 6. How the Poor Pay for the US Trade Deficit and Why it Matters for the DDA James Scott 7. Negotiating with Diminished Expectations: The EU and the Doha Development Round Alasdair R. Young 8. The Cotton Club: The Africa Group in the Doha Development Agenda Donna Lee 9. The Periphery Strikes Back?: The G20 at the WTO Ian Taylor 10. The Shift from Duopoly to Oligopoly in Agricultural Trade Wyn Grant Fairness and Legitimacy 11. All’s Fair in Love and Trade?: Emerging Powers in the DDA Negotiations Amrita Narlikar 12. Democracy, Development and the WTO’s Legitimacy Challenge: Assessing the Doha Development Round Elizabeth Smythe Concluding the Round 13. The Doha Round and its Impact on the WTO Gilbert Winham 14. Building Asymmetry: Concluding the DDA Rorden Wilkinson

About the Author :
Donna Lee is Senior Lecturer at the University of Birmingham, UK and author of Middle Powers and Commercial Diplomacy: British Influence at the Kennedy Trade Round (Palgrave, 1999), The New Multilateralism in South African Diplomacy (edited with Ian Taylor and Paul D. Williams) (Palgrave 2006), Africa in the WTO (forthcoming, Routledge), and International Organisation: Global Governance, (with Rorden Wilkinson) (Oxford University Press, forthcoming). Rorden Wilkinson is Professor of Global Political Economy and Head-elect Department of International Relations, University of Sussex, UK He is author of Multilateralism and the World Trade Organisation (Routledge, 2000), editor of The Global Governance Reader (Routledge, 2005), and co-editor of Global Governance: Critical Perspectives (Routledge, 2002). He also co-edits the RIPE Series in Global Political Economy and the Global Institutions series (both Routledge).

Review :
Bringing together key scholars in a wide range of fields, Donna Lee and Rorden Wilkinson have constructed a valuable resource for those thinking about the immediate future of the multilateral trading regime. Examining the Doha Development Round from a number of perspectives, the negotiation's difficulties are both contextualised and clearly explained; this is a valuable corrective to the usual myopic presentation of the current 'crisis' at the WTO. - Christopher May, Lancaster University, UK Lee and Wilkinson have put together a classic edited volume on where the Doha Development Agenda stands after Hong Kong. The authors are eminent; the material is up-to-date; the range of coverage is wide; the analysis is serious. The result is an indispensable account of important events for all who struggle to follow what is going on within the WTO. - Anthony Payne, University of Sheffield, UK This book is well written and accessible, and it will give readers a better understanding of the Doha Round negotiations, in terms of both substance and dynamics. The increasing assertiveness of the "Global South" -- an important new feature of this Round -- is particularly well documented. The expert contributions also contain many useful suggestions on how the DDA might deliver greater gains to poor members of the WTO. - Supachai Panitchpakdi, Secretary-General of UNCTAD, Director-General of the WTO 2002-2005 With the apparent collapse of the Doha development round, even those who follow the WTO reasonably closely find themselves in need of information and analysis. This excellent collection should be the first stop. The essays, written by major experts in the field, cover all the main topics and cover them well. Given the amount of political heat in the immediate aftermath of the breakdown, most of the essays are refreshingly free from special pleading and seem focused on providing a practical understanding of the barriers to forward movement and potentialities (limited though they are) for finding ways to move forward. I heartily recommend this book to economists, political scientists, and interested observers in general. - Douglas R. Nelson, Tulane University, New Orleans, USA