Negotiating Economic Partnership Agreements With The Eu

Bibliography p. 53-54.

Advancing a constructivist conceptual approach, this book explains the surprising outcome of the Economic Partnership Agreements (EPAs) between the European Union and developing countries in Africa, the Caribbean and the Pacific (the ACP countries). Despite the EU’s huge market power, it had limited success with the EPAs; an outcome that confounds materialist narratives equating trade power with market size. Why was the EU unable to fully realise its prospectus for trade and regulatory liberalisation through the EPA negotiations? Emphasising the role of social legitimacy in asymmetrical North–South trade negotiations, Murray-Evans sets the EPAs within the broader context of an institutionally complex global trade regime and stresses the agency of both weak and strong actors in contesting trade rules and practices across multilateral, regional and bilateral negotiating settings. Empirical chapters approach the EPA process from different institutional angles to explain and map the genesis, design, promotion and ultimately limited impact of the EU’s ambitious prospectus for the EPAs. This volume will be particularly relevant to students and scholars of international trade and development and the EU as an international actor, as well as those researching international political economy, African politics and international trade law.

This book shows how a constructivist account of bargaining sheds new light on the emergence of impasse situations in international trade negotiations. It uncovers the subtle ways in which misperceptions – and the problems of overcoming them – complicate negotiations. It brings to the forefront misperceptions and sticky beliefs that complicate trade talks between the Global South and the Global North. Empirically, the book examines the recent negotiations of Economic Partnership Agreements between the European Union (EU) and West Africa (2002–2014). In doing so, it enriches the study of negotiations of development-oriented trade agreements in the context of a major North-South partnership. By exploring a constructivist perspective on game theory, the author uncovers how the repeated impasse situations followed from the different "games" both sides expected to be playing. The author shows that such misperceptions endured because they reflected deep-seated normative disagreements not only over the effects of neo-liberal trade reforms, but also over how to structure EU – Africa post-colonial trade relations in the 21st century. Comparing and contrasting both sides’ divergent perspectives helps us to see how trade negotiations are never just about economic interests, but also about the (re)negotiation of the values and ideas that structure state interaction. The book draws on a large set of qualitative primary data on EU-West Africa trade negotiations. Negotiating trade in uncertain worlds will be of great interest to students and scholars of international relations, international political economy, international trade, international negotiations, EU external relations, EU-Africa cooperation, economic diplomacy, international relations of the developing world, and North-South cooperation.

This book offers a critical reflection of the North-South regional trade agreements (RTAs), known as the Economic Partnership Agreements, negotiated between the EU and the African, Caribbean, and Pacific countries. Conceiving of regions as legal regimes, Clair Gammage highlights the challenges facing developing countries when negotiating RTAs with developed countries and interrogates the assumption that these agreements will and can promote sustainable development through trade.

The slow pace of the Doha Round has boosted the proliferation of regional and bilateral trade agreements. Paradoxically, the more powerful actors, the US and the European Union, who at the same time have benefited the most from the multilateral system, have also been engaged in bilateral and regional negotiations in order to sign WTO-plus agreements with developing countries. Combining a clear theoretical exposition with systematic cross-regional analysis, 'Asymmetric Trade Negotiations' offers a coherent picture of strategic, design and political economy aspects of North-South trade negotiation processes, from African, Asian and Latin American perspectives. Skilled area specialists gather to provide negotiators and policy makers in the South with recommendations, best practices, and benchmarks and contribute to the understanding of these recent processes.

This book aims at contributing to address some of the challenge that developing countries, especially the least-developing countries, face in the design of trade in service policies and to provide governments with tools to better incorporate services in their export strategies, including negotiations and cooperation with trading partners, and unilateral reforms. This book helps to identify key policy challenges faced by developing country trade negotiators, regulatory policy officials and/or service suppliers. Management of both policy reforms and trade agreements requires investments in sounder regulatory regimes and the establishment of enforcement mechanisms to help countries gradually opening and mitigate any potential downside risks. A successful strategy requires a proper sequencing that through an orderly and transparent process allows to prepare for greater competition. Developing countries face serious resource and administrative constraints to adequately negotiate multiple services agreements that serve their trade interest. For many developing countries, the administrative burden of handling and negotiating multiple trade agreements has become a serious concern and this can hamper their opportunities to obtain adequate market access for their services exports. The book develops in detail the methodological framework for the construction of a database and the core elements that will comprise it, to help countries to organize and manage their services commitments. Little attention has been devoted to the organization/preparation and the development, assessment and conclusion of the negotiation process. The book presents a simulation exercise designed for policymakers, trade negotiators, and trade practitioners working in the area of services. This exercise will help them to better understand the preparatory and negotiating stages of the process leading to liberalization of trade in services.

The CARIFORUM-EU Economic Partnership Agreement is a sui generis North-South trade and development agreement. The C-EPA is a bi-regional agreement, signed in Bridgetown, Barbados in October 2008, with the specific aim of supporting the sustainable development of the Caribbean. As a paradigm changer in the ACP-EU trade relationship, the C-EPA has unsurprisingly attracted considerable attention. The long process of ratification by twenty-seven EU Member States and fifteen Caribbean countries has begun, and implementation is advancing after an initial delay. This book is the first detailed analysis of the Agreement's provisions, including its negotiating history and prognosis of its future potential. It is written by fifteen Caribbean and European practitioners, most of whom actively contributed to the crafting of the Agreement as CARIFORUM or EU negotiators. The contributions cover the following: ; charting a dual approach to CARIFORUM commitments at both regional and national levels; establishing an architecture of commitments that seeks to support CARIFORUM regional integration; safeguarding Caribbean preferential access to the EU market; broadening the ambit of the Caribbean-EU relationship, as reflected in the Cotonou Agreement, into new trade disciplines; highlighting key drivers in the negotiations; addressing the CARICOM-Dominican Republic economic relationship; examining the special treatment of Haiti; and reviewing the C-EPA's compatibility with WTO rules.