US-China WTO accord

Max Sawicky sawicky at epinet.org
Thu Nov 18 14:53:49 PST 1999


Anyone seen any good urls with analysis of the US-China WTO trade deal.
>>>>>>

Here's something from May, plus a related piece.

at http://epinet.org -- Both can be downloaded free.

mbs

CHINA CAN WAIT

WTO accession deal must include enforceable labor

rights, real commercial benefits

by Robert E. Scott

After rejecting a proposal to bring China into the World Trade

Organization (WTO) in April 1999, the Clinton Administration is working

to negotiate an accession agreement in time for the WTO ministerial

meetings in Seattle later this year. [1] The proposed deal would be

harmful to workers in both the United States and China, primarily for

three reasons . . .

CERTIFYING INTERNATIONAL WORKER RIGHTS

A Practical Alternative

by Jerome Levinson

Free trade among countries with very different domestic

practices requires either a willingness to countenance the

erosion of domestic structures or the acceptance of a

certain degree of harmonization (convergence).

– Dani Rodrik, Has Globalization Gone Too Far? (p. 37)

The effort to incorporate core worker rights into multilateral trade and

investment agreements and thereby achieve, in Rodrik’s words, “a

certain degree of harmonization,” has failed. There are two major

reasons why. First, despite the support for worker rights in U.S.

legislation, the American negotiators of these agreements have not

been willing to give worker rights as high a priority as they do the

protection of investors. Second, sensing that reluctance, domestic and

foreign opponents of worker rights have been able to muster majorities

against them in multilateral negotiations.



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