Overview

Amid the ongoing crisis surrounding the WTO, China’s role and behaviour in the multilateral trading system has attracted overwhelming attention. This timely monograph provides the first comprehensive and systemic analysis of China’s compliance with the rulings of the WTO’s dispute settlement mechanism (DSM). It covers all the disputes in which China has been a respondent during its 17-year WTO membership and offers a detailed discussion of China’s implementation of adverse WTO rulings, its approaches to settling WTO disputes, the possible explanations for such approaches, and post-compliance issues. The book shows how China has utilised the limitations and flexibilities of WTO rulings to ensure that its implementation of the rulings not only delivers adequate compliance but also maintains its own interests. Overall, this book argues that the issues relating to the quality of China’s compliance and post-compliance practices concern the loopholes within the DSM itself which may be utilised by all WTO Members. However, despite the loopholes, China’s record of compliance suggests that the DSM has been largely effective in inducing compliance and influencing domestic policy-making. It is therefore in the interest of all WTO Members and other stakeholders to protect the DSM as the ‘crown jewel’ of the multilateral trading system.

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9781509952038

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Reviews

The value of Zhou's book is its depth and the framework it provides. With regard to the depth, Zhou goes into great detail on the Chinese measures at issue, the specific WTO dispute settlement rulings, and the response by China. For each element, he offers a guide to how the dispute originated, played out, and ultimately concluded. -- Simon Lester and Huan Zhu, Center for Trade Policy Studies, Cato Institute * Journal of World Investment & Trade * This is a timely and thoughtful study that merits considerable attention by WTO followers, especially at this time when the WTO dispute settlement system is undergoing significant challenges. As one of the most active players in WTO dispute settlement, China's compliance record is an important measure of the strengths of the WTO dispute settlement mechanism more generally. Dr. Zhou's analysis is measured in tone and the discussion is balanced. The descriptions of the disputes are well done and the analytical approach of organizing disputes according to subject matter makes this work an ideal research tool. This book is a highly useful addition to the WTO literature. -- Valerie Hughes, Senior Counsel, Bennett Jones LLP; former Director of the Legal Affairs Division and Director of the Appellate Body Secretariat of the World Trade Organization Dr Weihuan Zhou's excellent and balanced book provides a much needed and long awaited antidote to the largely uninformed attacks on China's compliance with the rulings of the WTO's Dispute Settlement Body. As this book shows, it is only through a comprehensive analysis of China's responses to WTO rulings that one can see the truth of China's compliance - which is not as a scofflaw, but rather, as one would expect from any large and complex economy, as a generally rule abiding participant. This is an important finding given China's stature within the world, for it is critical that China be fully accepted into the international economic legal order but that cannot happen if there are widespread misunderstandings about China's compliance in the WTO. Dr Zhou's excellent and fair analysis of China's WTO ruling compliance should consequently play a vital role in normalising China's role in the world. -- Professor Colin B Picker, Pro Vice Chancellor (South Western Sydney) and Dean, School of Law, Faculty of Law, Humanities and the Arts, the University of Wollongong In the midst of a US-China trade war, one frequent refrain has been that China does not comply with WTO rules, and therefore the WTO cannot deal with China's trade practices. Compliance with the full scope of WTO obligations is difficult to assess, but responses to WTO complaints and compliance with specific WTO panel and Appellate Body rulings can be judged through a careful and rigorous analysis. Weihuan Zhou has provided this analysis in his well-researched book. Academics, students, policy-makers and other observers would all benefit from reading this objective review of China's experience as the subject of WTO complaints. -- Simon Lester, President, WorldTradeLaw.net and Associate Director, Center for Trade Policy Studies, Cato Institute Dr. Weihuan Zhou has written an essential reference work for anyone who is interested in China and international law in general, and the impact of the WTO dispute settlement mechanism on China in particular. -- Professor Julia Ya Qin, Wayne State University Law School, USA

Author Information

Weihuan Zhou is Associate Professor, Director of Research, and an inaugural member of the Herbert Smith Freehills China International Business and Economic Law (CIBEL) Centre at the Faculty of Law and Justice, University of New South Wales (UNSW) Sydney, Australia.

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