The Domestic Politics Of Negotiating International Trade

The Domestic Politics of International Trade considers the issues surrounding intellectual property rights in international trade negotiations in order to examine the challenges posed to domestic policy-makers by the increasingly broad nature of Free Trade Agreements (FTAs). Throughout the book the author demonstrates the importance of domestic politics in understanding the nature and outcome of international negotiations, particularly as they relate to international economic diplomacy. The book looks in detail at the intellectual property negotiations which formed part of the US-Peru and US-Colombia Free Trade Agreements and analyses the extent to which public health authorities and other parties affected by the increased levels of intellectual property protection were integrated into the negotiation process. The book then juxtaposes these findings with an analysis of the domestic origins of US negotiation objectives in the field of intellectual property, paying particular attention to the role of the private sector in the development of these objectives. Based on a substantial amount of empirical research, including approximately 100 interviews with negotiators, capital based policy-makers, private sector representatives, and civil society organisations in Lima, Bogotá and Washington, DC, this book offers a rare account of different stakeholders’ perceptions of the FTA negotiation process. Ultimately, the book succeeds in integrating the study of domestic politics with that of international negotiations. This book will be of particular interest to academics as well as practitioners and students in the fields of international law, economic law, intellectual property, political economy, international relations, comparative politics and government.

In spite of many years of negotiation on trade liberalization, progress seems to have stalled. This book explores why resistance to further market liberalization seems so strong, given that the benefits are seen to outweigh the costs. This volume argues that in order to understand the slow progress of World Trade Organization negotiations, we need to take into consideration the ‘intermestic’ character of trade politics, that is, the way in which international and domestic aspects of politics and policies have been woven together and become inextricably related to each other. This is a general trend in our globalizing world, and one that is most pronounced in the case of trade politics and policy. International Trade Negotiations and Domestic Politics therefore presents an in-depth analysis of institutions, ideas, interests and actors in the interplay between international trade negotiations and national negotiating positions. At the international level the authors focus on the multilateral negotiations within the World Trade Organization, together with the plurilateral and bilateral negotiations on free trade agreements. At the regional and domestic level they analyze the trade politics and policies of two established powers, the European Union and the USA; two rising powers, China and India; and a small industrialized country with an open economy, Norway.

Looking in detail at US-Peru and US-Colombia FTA negotiations and more specifically at the issues surrounding intellectual property rights, this book seeks to demonstrate the importance of domestic politics in understanding the nature and outcome of international negotiations, in particular as they relate to international economic diplomacy. The book draws on a substantial amount of empirical research including interviews with individuals in Peru, Colombia and the US who were directly or indirectly involved in the negotiation process, focusing on the conflict between giving way to the pressure from the USA to increase intellectual property rights on the one hand, and maintaining public health safeguards on the other. The book demonstrates how the respective structural and institutional characteristics in Peru, Columbia and the USA affected the process and outcome of the respective FTA negotiations, exploring issues such as domestic policy-structures, the centrality of government and the influence of interest groups and industry's lobbying. The book goes on to consider whether including public policy objectives in bilateral trade negotiations can ever be successful given the economic imperatives that provide the basis of such negotiations, or whether such objectives should instead be pursued through multilateral fora such as the World Health Organization.

This book shows how domestic political institutions and the lack of time pressure have an impact on negotiations at the WTO. It provides detailed information on WTO ministerial meetings as well as on the political economy of trade policy in the EU, U.S., Brazil, and Australia.

How do international negotiations affect domestic politics? Starting in the 1990s, countries throughout Latin America embarked on many and simultaneous negotiations. On the shifting ground of widening and deepening trade agendas and diverse arenas, what factors determined trade politics? This book examines the domestic political dynamics triggered by South-South, North-South and multilateral agendas in Argentina and Chile between 1990 and 2005. Using a much-needed cross-negotiation and cross-country comparative perspectives, and through detailed empirical analyses of several key negotiations, it proposes an explanation that emphasizes the interplay between international negotiations and domestic trade politics, taken as the result of the complex and dynamic interdependencies and interrelations between state and society. Informed by interviews with public officials, businesses and civil society, the analysis reveals that variation in the depth of agendas, the distributional effects and the uncertainty of political outcomes all have important consequences for domestic preference formation, collective action strategies and types of relationships. Given this, the variety of negotiations, when considered separately and comparatively, show that South-South, North-South and multilateral processes promote different patterns of trade politics. In sum, although national specificities and historical legacies are important, the book argues that trade policy comes first in creating domestic politics in Latin America.

It is often said economics has become as important as security in international relations, yet we work with much less than full understanding of what goes on when government negotiators bargain over trade, finance, and the rules of international economic organizations. The process of economic negotiation shapes the world political economy, John S. Odell says, and this essential process can be understood and practiced better than it is now.His absorbing book compares ten major economic negotiations since 1944 that have involved the United States. Odell gives the inside stories, targeting the strategies used by the negotiators, and explaining strategy choice as well as why the same strategy gains more in some situations and less in others. He identifies three broad factors—changing market conditions, negotiator beliefs, and domestic politics—as key influences on strategies and outcomes. The author develops an insightful mid-range theory premised on bounded rationality, setting it apart from the most common form of rational choice as well as from views that reject rationality. Negotiating the World Economy reveals a rich set of future research paths, and closes with guidelines for improving negotiation performance today. The main ideas are relevant for any country and for all who may be affected by economic bargaining.

Since the 1970s global rule-making with respect to international trade has increased in importance. Political and academic attention has been focused either on global institutions like the IMF, the World Bank, the WTO and UN organisations, or on regional blocs like the EU or NAFTA. As negotiations take place in different international arenas, these arenas themselves take on added strategic significance, with agendas pursued and switched from one arena to another, should one route be blocked. While dominant actors have sought to use arena switching to their advantage, subordinate actors have begun to reactivate alternative arenas of negotiation in order to pursue their different agendas. This book employs a multi-level and multi-arena perspective to analyze global rule-making in international trade. It explains why actors - both state and non-state actors - prefer particular arenas. It also addresses the question of which institutional designs serve the aims of specific groups best and how the rules of the different arenas are related.

Negotiations between governments shape the world political economy and in turn the lives of people everywhere. Developing countries have become far more influential in talks in the World Trade Organization, including infamous stalemates in Seattle in 1999 and Cancún in 2003, as well as bilateral and regional talks like those that created NAFTA. Yet social science does not understand well enough the process of negotiation, and least of all the roles of developing countries, in these situations. This 2006 book sheds light on three aspects of this otherwise opaque process: the strategies developing countries use; coalition formation; and how they learn and influence other participants' beliefs. This book will be valuable for many readers interested in negotiation, international political economy, trade, development, global governance, or international law. Developing country negotiators and those who train them will find practical insights on how to avoid pitfalls and negotiate better.