International Business Law and Its Environment 9th Edition by Richard Schaffer,Filiberto Agusti,Lucien Dhooge

Exercise 7

The WTO comprises many nations from all regions of the world. As such, the GATT/WTO system takes a global view of trade liberalization based on nondiscrimination, unconditional MFN, national treatment, tariffication, and multilateral trade negotiations. The GATT agreements recognize that nations may form bilateral or regional free trade areas and customs unions. Yet a free trade area only has free trade between the countries that belong to it. How does the conceptof a free trade area, such as the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), fit into the GATT/WTO global framework? Do bilateral or regional free trade areas violate the principles of nondiscrimination and MFN trade? Evaluate these arguments.