Korea Trade Review (무역학회지)

Korea Trade Research Association (한국무역학회)
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Is the U.S. Trade Expansion Act Section 232 Consistent with GATT/WTO Rules?

미국 무역확장법 제232조 조치는 GATT/WTO 규정에 타당한가?

  • Received : 2019.01.20
  • Accepted : 2019.02.26
  • Published : 2019.02.28
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Abstract

Global trade protectionism has increased further and U.S. priorities and protectionism have strengthened since Trump took office in 2017. Trump administration is actively implementing tariff measures based on U.S. domestic trade laws rather than the WTO rules and regulations. In particular, the American government has recently been imposing high tariffs due to national security and imposing economic sanctions on other countries' imports. According to the U.S. Trade Expansion Act Section 232, the American government imposed additional tariffs on steel and aluminum imports to WTO member countries such as China, India, and EU etc. on march 15, 2018. Thus, this study aims to investigate whether the U.S. Trade Expansion Act Section 232 is consistent with GATT/WTO rules by comparing the legal basis of US / China / WTO regulations related to Section 232 of the U.S. Trade Expansion Act, and gives some suggestions for responding to the Section 232 measure. As the Section 232 measure exceeded the scope of GATT's Security Exceptions regulation and is very likely to be understood as a safeguard measure. If so, the American government is deemed to be in breach of WTO's regulations, such as the most-favored-nation treatment obligations and the duty reduction obligations. In addition, American government is deemed to be failed to meet the conditions of initiation of safeguard measure and violated the procedural requirements such as notification and consultation. In order to respond to these U.S. protection trade measures, all affected countries should actively use the WTO multilateral system to prevent unfair measures. Also, it is necessary to revise the standard jurisdiction of the dispute settlement body and to explore the balance of the WTO Exception clause so that it can be applied strictly. Finally, it would be necessary for Chinese exporters to take a counter-strategy under such trade pressure.

Keywords

References

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