CHAPTER FIFTEEN: Global Civil Society

Using the Perspectives

Below is a summary from an article written by J. L. Dunoff for the Journal of International Economic Law regarding NGO participation in the WTO process.

"Whether private parties and NGOs should participate in the WTO system has recently become one of the most contentious issues in trade law and policy. However, this debate proceeds from the implicit--but mistaken--assumption that these entities currently do not participate in the system. While, as a formal matter, WTO 'legislative' and dispute resolution systems are open only to state actors, in fact private parties already participate extensively in WTO processes. Through discussion of several WTO disputes, including the Kodak-Fuji dispute, this paper demonstrates how the current debate substantially understates the considerable roles that NGOs already play in disputes submitted to the WTO. The claims here are largely positive and descriptive, rather than normative. By identifying and clarifying the roles that private parties currently play, I hope to close the increasing gulf between academic debate and WTO practice, and move the debate over NGO participation to a more fruitful series of inquiries. To this end, I argue that the controversy over NGO participation at the WTO can be understood as a particular instantiation of a larger debate over the roles of non-state actors in the international legal system."

Dunoff notes that NGO participation is currently done by indirect, unofficial, and ad hoc means and that the question should not be whether they should participate but how.

Opponents of NGO access to the WTO process argue that NGO access may distort NGO decision making and lead to capture by special interest groups. Others argue that NGOs, unlike domestic governments are neither electorally accountable or representative.

1.  Does this mean that NGOs are not accountable or representative?
     

2.  Are all WTO members from countries where leaders are accountable or representative?
     

3.  Do you think this changes the way we should view the NGO participation debate?
     

Dunoff argues that NGOs already have access to the WTO process through a number of formal and informal mechanisms. For example, in a WTO dispute between the United States and Japan over the photo film and paper market, Kodak and Fuji put together massive grassroots lobbying campaigns including U.S. editorial board meetings, other press relations strategies, and direct lobbying campaigns to the U.S. Congress and Trade Representative Office. Noneconomic NGOs engage in similar strategies.

4.  Do you think these strategies designed to influence WTO decisions are adequate in terms of providing NGOs access to the WTO      process?
     

5.  Should interested parties have a more direct role in the process? What are the implications of allowing a more direct role?
     

J. L. Dunoff, "The misguided debate over NGO participation at the WTO," Journal of International Economic Law 1, no. 3 (1998):433-456.