UCL Discovery
UCL home » Library Services » Electronic resources » UCL Discovery

Untangling the International Responsibility of the European Union and Its Member States in the World Trade Organization Post-Lisbon: A Competence/Remedy Model

Marín-Durán, G; (2017) Untangling the International Responsibility of the European Union and Its Member States in the World Trade Organization Post-Lisbon: A Competence/Remedy Model. European Journal of International Law , 28 (3) pp. 697-729. 10.1093/ejil/chx046. Green open access

[thumbnail of Marin-Duran_EJIL Submission - Accepted Manuscript_12062017.pdf]
Preview
Text
Marin-Duran_EJIL Submission - Accepted Manuscript_12062017.pdf - Accepted Version

Download (623kB) | Preview

Abstract

The aim of this article is to shed light on the legally important and politically sensitive question of the respective responsibility of the European Union (EU) and its member states for the performance of World Trade Organization (WTO) obligations. Specifically, it seeks to challenge two propositions often found in the literature on the basis of a rigorous analysis of WTO dispute settlement practice. First, the claim that the EU’s exclusive responsibility for breaches of WTO law by its member states has been widely accepted by other WTO members and dispute settlement organs is not well grounded in existing WTO jurisprudence nor supported by recent post-Lisbon WTO dispute settlement practice. Second, and contrary to what some EU law scholars appear to suggest, what has been decisive in assigning international responsibility in the WTO is not the division of external (treaty-making) competences between the EU and its member states but, rather, the allocation and exercise of internal (treaty-infringing/treaty-performing) competences. In this sense, the Treaty of Lisbon has not fundamentally changed how the issue of EU/member states international responsibility is to be approached in the WTO, insofar as the EU member states remain members of that organization in their own right. With this in mind, a redefined ‘competence/remedy’ model is put forward to help us untangle ‘who is responsible’ to third parties for breaches of WTO law.

Type: Article
Title: Untangling the International Responsibility of the European Union and Its Member States in the World Trade Organization Post-Lisbon: A Competence/Remedy Model
Open access status: An open access version is available from UCL Discovery
DOI: 10.1093/ejil/chx046
Publisher version: https://doi.org/10.1093/ejil/chx046
Language: English
Additional information: This version is the author accepted manuscript. For information on re-use, please refer to the publisher’s terms and conditions.
UCL classification: UCL
UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > UCL SLASH
UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > UCL SLASH > Faculty of Laws
URI: https://discovery.ucl.ac.uk/id/eprint/10028176
Downloads since deposit
88Downloads
Download activity - last month
Download activity - last 12 months
Downloads by country - last 12 months

Archive Staff Only

View Item View Item