Organiser:
Chad P. Bown – World Bank
Professor Petros C. Mavroidis – EUI – RSCAS and LAW

This workshop undertook a yearly analysis of all case law by the adjudicating bodies of the WTO, including un-appealed Panel reports, Appellate Body reports, and other relevant jurisprudence. The studies for 2015 covered a wide range of WTO law including retaliation and compliance, technical barriers to trade, sanitary and phytosanitary standards (over bird flu and foot and mouth disease), antidumping, countervailing duties, and safeguards and it addressed major sectors including agriculture, fisheries, steel, autos, and green technologies. Each of the cases was jointly evaluated by an economist and a lawyer, both well-known experts in the field of trade law and international economics. The scholars critically reviewed the jurisprudence of WTO adjudicating bodies and evaluated whether the ruling ‘made sense’ from an economic as well as legal point of view, and if not, whether the problem lied in the interpretation of the law or the law itself. The studies did not always covered all issues discussed in a case, but they sought to discuss both the procedural and the substantive issues that form the ‘core’ of the dispute.