With the establishment of the WTO, trade in services became part of the world trade order. Volume 6 is dedicated to these rather recent developments. It covers the core agreement, the General Agreement on Trade in Services (GATS) with annexes, as well as the additional instruments , which have been adopted later on to govern the liberalization in specific sectors. Those are the Understanding on Commitments in Financial Services, the Second Protocol on Financial Services, the Third Protocol on the Movement of Natural Persons, the Fourth Protocol on Basic Telecommunications and the Fifth Protocol, which contains further rules for financial services. This volume will be a valuable reference tool for the WTO community as a whole, as well as for professionals and researchers, who deal with one of the sectors concerned, e.g. financial services and telecommunications. Furthermore, it is highly relevant in view of those sectors, which are the subject of ongoing liberalization efforts or earmarked for future negotiations, namely accounting, legal services, transport, tourism, environmental services, legal and educational services.

Studies the GATS prudential carve-out as well as prudential carve-outs in preferential trade agreements.

Trade in services, far more than trade in goods, is affected by a variety of domestic regulations, ranging from qualification and licensing requirements in professional services to pro-competitive regulation in telecommunications services. Experience shows that the quality of regulation strongly influences the consequences of trade liberalization. WTO members have agreed that a central task in the ongoing services negotiations will be to develop a set of rules to ensure that domestic regulations support rather than impede trade liberalization. Since these rules are bound to have a profound impact on the evolution of policy, particularly in developing countries, it is important that they be conducive to economically rational policy-making. This book addresses two central questions: What impact can international trade rules on services have on the exercise of domestic regulatory sovereignty? And how can services negotiations be harnessed to promote and consolidate domestic policy reform across highly diverse sectors? The book, with contributions from several of the world's leading experts in the field, explores a range of rule-making challenges arising at this policy interface, in areas such as transparency, standards and the adoption of a necessity test for services trade. Contributions also provide an in-depth look at these issues in the key areas of accountancy, energy, finance, health, telecommunications and transportation services.

The World Trade Organisation plays the primary role in regulating international trade in goods, services and intellectual property. Traditionally, international trade law and regulation has been analysed primarily from the trade-in-goods perspective. Services are becoming an important competence for the WTO. The institutional, legal and regulatory influence of the General Agreement on Trade in Services (GATS) on domestic economic policymaking is attracting increasing attention in the academic and policymaking literature. The growing importance of services trade to the global economy makes the application of the GATS to trade in services an important concern of international economic policy. The GATS contains important innovations that build on the former GATT and existing WTO/GATT trade regime for goods. This book fills a void in the academic and policymaking literature by examining how the GATS governs international trade in services and its growing impact on the regulatory practice of WTO member states. It offers a unique discussion of the major is-sues confronting WTO member states by analysing the GATS and related international trade issues from a variety of perspectives that include law, political economy, regulation, and business. Moreover, the role of the WTO in promoting liberalised trade and economic development has come under serious strain because of the breakdown of the Doha Development Round negotiations. The book analyses the issues in the Doha services debate with some suggested policy approaches that might help build a more durable GATS framework. The book is a welcomed addition to the WTO literature and will serve as a point of reference for academics, policymakers andpractitioners.

Innovative, interdisciplinary, practitioner-oriented insights into the key challenges faced in addressing the services trade liberalization and domestic regulation interface.

Trade in Higher Education: The role of the General Agreement on Trade in Services (GATS) - Internationalization of higher education has been evolving over the years. Today, trade in education has become an important framework under which cross-border mobility of students, institutions, programs, and teachers takes place. The General Agreement on Trade in Services (GATS) has systematized and formalized the conditions for trade in services including education. This book provides a detailed analysis of various dimensions of the GATS and its implications for development of higher education, especially in developing countries. The analysis also provides a critical assessment of the benefits derived and potential threats posed by trading in education. It is hoped that the study will provide useful insights on the issue for educational policy-makers, planners, and researchers.

Deep trade agreements (DTAs) cover not just trade but additional policy areas, such as international flows of investment and labor and the protection of intellectual property rights and the environment. Their goal is integration beyond trade or deep integration. These agreements matter for economic development. Their rules influence how countries (and hence, the people and firms that live and operate within them) transact, invest, work, and ultimately, develop. Trade and investment regimes determine the extent of economic integration, competition rules affect economic efficiency, intellectual property rights matter for innovation, and environmental and labor rules contribute to environmental and social outcomes. This Handbook provides the tools and data needed to analyze these new dimensions of integration and to assess the content and consequences of DTAs. The Handbook and the accompanying database are the result of collaboration between experts in different policy areas from academia and other international organizations, including the International Trade Centre (ITC), Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD), and World Trade Organization (WTO).

Health ministries around the world face a new challenge: to assess the risks and respond to the opportunities of the increasing openness in health services under the World Trade Organization's (WTO) General Agreement on Trade in Services (GATS). 'International Trade in Health Services and the GATS' addresses this challenge head-on by providing analytical tools to policymakers in health and trade ministries alike who are involved in the liberalization agenda and, specifically, in the GATS negotiations. This book informs and assists policymakers in formulating trade policy and negotiating internationally. There is ongoing and animated international debate about the impact of GATS on public services in general and health in particular. In response, the book offers different perspectives from more than 15 leading experts. Some of the authors stress opportunities linked to trade in health services, others focus more on the risks. The book offers: Detailed legal analysis of the impact of the agreement on health policy An overview of trade commitments in health-related services New empirical evidence from nine country studies A simple 10-step explanation on how to deal with GATS negotiations. 'International Trade in Health Services and the GATS' is a must-have resource for policymakers and other practitioners working in the trade and health sectors.