Definition of World Trade Organization - Report Example

World Trade Organization Name: Course: Tutor: Date: World Trade Organization The world trade organization (WTO) is a trade liberalizing organization. Additionally, it is a governments’ forum for negotiating trade related agreements. It also controls a system of rules related to trade. WTO was born after negotiations among the members, and this became the method to be used in their proceedings. Nothing can be passed in the organization without deep negotiations (Palast, 2004, 14). WTO is helpful to many countries because it is a trade liberalizing union hence in case of a country faces trade barriers and wants them lowered, it has to contact the WTO for assistance. The WTO rules sometimes support maintaining the trade barriers in order to protect some happenings like the spread of diseases and consumer protection (Mullard, 2004, 29). WTO operates with guidance of WTO agreements that are negotiated and signed by the world’s trading countries. The agreements provide the rules and regulations that govern the countries within the ground rules for the commerce internationally. These agreements are proposed to help producers, importers and exporters to do their business as well as allowing the government to meet its environmental and social goals and objectives (Rossi, 2007, 259). The purpose behind the dispute solving process employed by WTO is with neutral procedures that are based on legally agreed foundations. World trade organization began its operations on first January 1995. Its trading system is however, a half-century-older than its launch (Nunes, 2008, 94). WTO operates under certain rules and regulations that make its operations open and fair to all its members. WTO has principals that control the trading system. These principals are legal documents that cover a wide range of happenings and hence they are complex and lengthy. These principles provide the foundation of multilateral systems of the trade. This aids the organization in making decisions that are not biased in its problem solving. In addition, the organization uses the principles that have been made collectively without expecting any resistance from any member country. This makes the organization act in a manner of dictatorship (Cox, 2006, 16). It is evident that once a small number of citizens of a nation taste the fruits of their labors that are brought about by the free trade that is highly recommended by WTO, they tend to support the dictators and the people who suppress the freedom, to remain in power. This is so because they what to continue enjoying the fruits. When the global trade rules are designed, they mostly lie on the side of protecting corporations, not the people’s rights. Corrupt leaders have a high probability of remaining in power as they are strengthened by the trade’s agreements, which is a source of more money into the government (Nunes, 2008, 95). It is also everybody’s knowledge that the trades rules operate in high levels like super-national levels. This means that its rules can only deal with the whole country that affects all the other members. With this, the organization can be viewed as undemocratic because democracy is at its best when done at the lowest level possible (Chilov, 2009, 19). The other most discouraging thing is that WTO is not a democratic organization by its self. This is because it is highly dominated by most developed countries such as US, whose leaderships has been dominated by campaigns that are of particular interests to make money from corporations (Palast, 2004, 29). Thus, the formation of WTO rules is to some extent influenced by the corporations that have inside access during the rules negotiations. It was discovered that the strong nations such as US are believed to be making the most contributions in the rule-making process that are used in the governing of the organization. This is a clear indication that democracy does not exist in the organization (Mullard, 2004, 31). Some people have become extra rich due to the trade organization. This has led to discrimination of the poor from the rich, which also leads to reduction of democracy. This happens because the poor are denied the right to say or chose anything that is not supported by the rich. WTO has ruled that US law protecting the turtles was a main barrier to the free trade and European law that is against the hormone treated meat is illegal (Berg, 2003, 29). The WTO argue that the democratically elected representatives of the public no longer posses the powers to protect public health and the environment. This is a show that the organization does not respect the decisions that are made by the public in their democratic rights (Nunes, 2008, 97). Unlike UN treaties or international organization of labor, world trade organization polices can easily be enforced by sanctions. This gives WTO bigger powers than all the other bodies’ internationally. The WTO’s powers even out do even the national governments authorities. This enables the organization to rule over everything on its own interest without caring the interests of other people in the country (Palast, 2004, 41). The trade organization is also bringing about wars due to its rules that are hindering people’s democratic rights. This led to over 50,000 people protested in November 1999 in a bid to challenge the corporate and to demand a more socially, democratic and environmentally suitable global economy (Rossi, 2007, 250). This occurs when WTO was planning to launch trade talks that were aimed at expanding the organizations privatization agenda into other areas like healthcare and education. The policies produced by WTO have become amply documented. Labor standards have been lowered, job security fades away and wages decline due to the nations fear to be noted by capital investors. This is due to the increasing international industrial prison complex (Mokhiber & Weissman, 2005, 85). WTO is also undemocratic because it has no right to insist on free trade while the members are against the same thing. The member states are against this trade because it will only provide modest gains at the international level approximately the onetime rise of the world’s income (Mullard, 2004, 62). The World Trade Organization members meet in Geneva, an expensive city where negotiations take place on an annual basis. It is obvious that many of the developing nations can never afford permanent stay in the city for that long and hence they are denied the right of participation and the representation while the rich nations negotiate on their behave. This is a clear limitation to democracy (Nunes, 2008, 102). The decisions that the WTO bring about affect many people are mainly unaccountable. This is so because many people do not have the avenue into the decisions that are made by the WTO. The decision-making is mainly left for the unelected trade ministers and bureaucrats. This is against the democratic rights as the decisions are to affect many people and they are just made without the consultation of the ordinary people or the national parliaments (Burnett & Manji, 2007, 37). Issues that affect the WTO in a country are rarely discussed in parliaments as it is done with other issues. This is because there has never been any WTO’s membership referendum and if it exists, it is not popular. Another evidence lack of democracy that is exercised by the organization exists. In Australia the cabinet at all times ratifies WTO and all the other trade agreements before even having to vote or debate on them. This act by the parliament displays that none of the organizations proceedings makes use of democracy (Barfield , 2001, 52). In WTO, there is the process of mini-ministerial. In this process, the richest countries push through their personal based agendas into the world trade organization. Like in the Green room, there are meetings that occur there but they are invitation-only meetings, which are mostly called by EU or US (Mokhiber & Weissman, 2005, 87). This also includes some other chosen countries leaving out the rest in the dark. These meetings show that some countries are not considered in some decision-making processes, and this denies them their democratic rights. The meetings that are attended by particular groups have happened in many occasions before the ministerial meetings in Seattle (1999), Singapore (1996), Doha (2001), and Cancun (2003). The WTO accepts countries to compete with one another’s laws and regulations. This brings about a lot of fights and disputes among the countries and with its powers; the WTO is expected to solve the disputes openly and with no favoritism. This never happens as the process of dispute settlement happens in a lot of secrecy (Leiwei, 2004, 51). Hearing of the documents and briefs are made confidential, as it is only the national government is permitted to participate even when a state or your own country is involved in the disagreements. The national parliament is at times not informed that their nation is facing challenges. All this is a sign that the contribution of many people is never needed in the WTO’s decision-making. This makes the organization remarkably undemocratic because it should be controlled by the people but it acts against them (Nunes, 2008, 100). The organization is also displaying a lack of democracy by choosing the place where the meeting should be held instead of leaving that to the members so that they can know the most appropriate place. This will enable the poor countries, which are the majority to choose a place that would be favorable for them instead of them not participating. It would also lead to considerable socialization between the rich countries and the poor countries and this would be motivation for the poor countries to become rich (Burnett & Manji, 2007, 44). By the poor countries attending the meetings, many problems concerning trade would be brought up as they mainly happen in the poor countries due to poor infrastructure and transportation methods that are normally used in the poor countries. With the poor countries, not attending the meetings due to discrimination and lack of democracy it is true that with their absence a lot of information is lost concerning trade. This is because most of the challenges are normally faced in the poor countries due to difficulties in transportation, lack of money for trade and poor management of the trade (Mokhiber & Weissman, 2005, 94). Disputes solving panel is made up of three unelected trade bureaucrats. The decisions are made in the bases of the trade law. Because of not electing the panel, it means that they are just picked by some people instead of giving the members a chance to elect them (Chilov, 2009, 5). The panelist mainly has little appreciation of the law of the government that is responsible of workers protection or the human rights. Hence, it can happen that all the laws concerning public health and environment challenged in the world trade organization has been ruled to be illegal. There are no appeals from outside hence once a decision has been made, the country that has lost can only change their law to be the same as that of WTO, face trade sanctions or pay compensation of the loses to the winning country (Nunes, 2008, 105). The WTO’s agreement on agriculture is based on promoting the interests of large corporations, which control the world’s agriculture as they destroy the small family farms in the developing world. This is against the expected, which is improving agriculture globally as it would improve the lives of many of the poor people in the world who live in rural areas. If the organization were democratic, many of its members would have voted for the improvement of the small-scale farmers instead of having the interests on the large farms (Cox, 2006, 137). Conclusion It is clear that the world trade organization is not for democracy. From all the evidences provided, it is also clear that most of the decisions that are made it the WTO are not democratic. However, specific people who have their own interests rather than the members’ interests (Wedel, 2009, 25) form them. Lack of democracy in such an organization is a serious drawback of the world’s economy because there are no developments that can take place without first lifting the economic status of the poor in the world. It is unfortunate that most of the world’s population comprises of poor people who need the help of such an organization, but the organization is not ready to offer assistance (Burnett & Manji, 2007, 59). The only way that the world trade organization can be transformed is through the demand of real free trade to replace the existing corrupt agreements that control the developing world but they allow EU and US to act according to their will. Real free trade can be a symbol of end of subsidies to the producers in the developed world and availability of market access by both the rich countries and the poor countries without any discrimination. Additionally, the increasing numbers of exports from the countries that are developing can be of high help in reducing poverty (Barfield , 2001, 149). It is essential to know that democracy is a fundamental aspect of leadership in any organization in order to ensure that everyone benefits from the organization instead of others becoming extra rich while others are dying of poverty. Organizations rules and regulations should also be formulated in mind of the national governments rules in order to avoid collision of the rules in the future this will help reduce conflicts that may arise in the future (Leiwei, 2004, 59). Bibliography Barfield, C. E. (2001). Free trade, sovereignty, democracy: the future of the World Trade Organization. AEI Press Berg, J. C. (2003). Teamsters and Turtles?: U.S. Progressive Political Movements in the 21st Century. Rowman & Littlefield Publishing Burnett, P. & Manji, F. M. (2007). From The Slave Trade to 'Free' Trade: How Trade Undermines Democracy and Justice in Africa. Fahamu/Pambazuka Publishers Chilov, Ô. (2009). The Retreat from Public Education: Global and Israeli Perspectives. Springer Publishing Cox, S. (2006). Economics: Making Sense of the Modern Economy. Bloomberg Press Global Exchange (21/07/09). World Trade Organization. Retrieved on 1 June 2011 from http://www.globalexchange.org/campaigns/wto/ Leiwei L, D. (2004). Globalization and the Humanities. Hong Kong University Press Mokhiber, R. & Weissman, R. (2005). On The Rampage: Corporate Power and the Destruction of Democracy. Common Courage Press. Original from the University of California Mullard, M. (2004). The Politics of Globalization and Polarization. Edward Elgar Publishing Nunes, L. C. (2008). Collateral Damages. Lulu.com Palast, G. (2004). The Best Democracy Money Can Buy: An Investigative Reporter Exposes The Truth About Globalization, Corporate Cons, And High-Finance Fraudsters. Plume Publishers. Original from Indiana University Rossi, I. (2007). Frontiers of Globalization Research: Theoretical and Methodological Approaches. Springer Publishing Wedel, J. R. (2009). Shadow Elite: How The World's New Power Brokers Undermine Democracy, Government, And The Free Market. Basic Books Read More