A Brookings Institution Press and the Center for Business and Government at Harvard University publication With the negotiation of the General Agreement on Trade in Services (GATS), the policies affecting access to, and conditions of competition in, service markets are today firmly rooted in the multilateral trading system. Written with policymakers and practitioners in mind, the essays in this volume address some of the most pressing questions arising in services trade today—some of which were not addressed by the first generation of GATS negotiators.

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.

How has the regulation of business shifted from national to global institutions? What are the mechanisms of globalization? Who are the key actors? What of democratic sovereignty? In which cases has globalization been successfully resisted? These questions are confronted across an amazing sweep of the critical areas of business regulation--from contract, intellectual property and corporations law, to trade, telecommunications, labor standards, drugs, food, transport and environment. This book examines the role played by global institutions such as the World Trade Organization, World Health Organization, the OECD, IMF, Moodys and the World Bank, as well as various NGOs and significant individuals. Incorporating both history and analysis, Global Business Regulation will become the standard reference for readers in business, law, politics, and international relations.

This academically rigorous yet highly accessible book guides the reader through an ocean of literature and interpretative possibilities embodied in GATS. In doing so, it provides a road map of the various interpretative possibilities and dilemmas posed by the treaty. The work advances a legal analysis of GATS, based on its historical and institutional roots, while at the same time taking into account its objectives and prospects, as well as the balance of interests involved. In total, this timely book presents a thorough legal analysis of GATS that will serve as a comprehensive yet highly useful guide to the agreement.

"Surveillance is the ongoing, systematic collection, analysis, and interpretation of health-related data essential to the planning, implementation and evaluation of public health practice. It is closely integrated with the timely determination of data to those responsible for prevention and control. The atlas visualizes a decade of work in establishing the Global Tobacco Surveillance System (GTSS), which has become the largest public health surveillance system ever developed and maintained. The atlas documents the components of the GTSS, which include the monitoring of tobacco use and tobacco control measures among youth, school personnel, health professions students and adults. It maps the coverage of the surveys and provides data on the various elements of a comprehensive tobacco control strategy outlined in the Who- FCTC and MPOWER policy. It illustrates the importance of enhancing country capability to develop, implement and evaluate tobacco control programs though and a systematic framework. This resource will be invaluable to policy makers, public health practitioners, scholars and students interested in tobacco control." - p. 9

In this volume, experts analyze the global governance of electronic networks, emphasizing international power dynamics and the concerns of nondominant actors. Each chapter concludes with a set of policy recommendations for the promotion of an open, dynamic and more equitable networld order.

"The General Agreement on Trade in Services (GATS) extends the multilateral trading system to services. Little is said In the GATS about subsidies, beyond stipulating that subsidies are subject to the existing provisions, including the most-favoured-nation and national-treatment principles, and that Members shall enter into negotiations with a view to developing the disciplines necessary to avoid the trade distorting effects of subsidies." "This timely book provides a comprehensive analysis of services subsidies under the GATS. It begins with a description of services and trade in services, and of the salient characteristics that make regulation of services subsidies more complex than those associated with agricultural and industrial goods. It then analyzes the economic arguments underpinning the need for regulation, as well as the need for governments to retain sufficient latitude to implement non-trade-related policy measures. A description of the information available on services subsidies is followed by a classification of services subsidies according to their distortive effects, and by a detailed analysis of those elements that may form a definition of services subsidies for the purpose of a future regulatory framework." "A key section is devoted to the analysis of those existing provisions of the GATS that may exert a certain measure of discipline on services subsidies, and to the question of the desirability and technical feasibility of countervailing measures. Rules on services subsidies contained in regional trade agreements and the need for special and differential treatment for services subsidies by developing countries are also discussed. Finally, and prior to the conclusion, two sectoral studies deal with the question of subsidies aimed at attracting foreign direct investment and subsidies to the audiovisual sector." "This work represents the first extensive and comprehensive analysis of the issue of services subsidies in the context of the GATS, and includes numerous references to relevant European Union State Aid legislation and jurisprudence." --Book Jacket.