Working Paper: CEPR ID: DP5624
Authors: Felix Eschenbach; Bernard Hoekman
Abstract: We analyze the extent to which the EU-15 and 16 transition economies used the WTO General Agreement on Trade in Services (GATS) to commit to service sector policy reforms. GATS commitments are compared with the evolution of actual policy stances over time. While there is substantial variance across transition economies on both actual policies and GATS commitments, we find an inverse relationship between the depth of GATS commitments and the 'quality' of actual services policies as assessed by the private sector. In part this can be explained by the fact that the prospect of EU accession makes GATS less relevant as a commitment device for a subset of transition economies. However, for many of the non-EU accession candidates the WTO seems to be a weak commitment device. One explanation is that the small size of the markets concerned generates weak external enforcement incentives. Our findings suggest greater collective investment by WTO members in monitoring and transparency is needed to increase the benefits of WTO membership to small countries.
Keywords: Accession; EU; Services; Liberalization; Trade Agreements; WTO; Transition Economies
JEL Codes: F13
Edges that are evidenced by causal inference methods are in orange, and the rest are in light blue.
| Cause | Effect |
|---|---|
| Depth of GATS commitments (F13) | Quality of actual service policies (L15) |
| EU accession process (F15) | GATS commitments (F13) |
| GATS commitments (F13) | Effectiveness of commitment mechanism (D79) |
| Market size (L25) | Weak external enforcement incentives (P14) |
| Timing of WTO accession (F13) | Level of GATS commitments (F13) |
| Applied policies (J18) | GATS commitment indices (F13) |