This book presents the views of an international group of trade experts, who analyses the policies of the United States, Japan, and the European Community vis-a-vis the GATT. It is based on an October 1988 conference on GATT issues held at the Peace Research Institute Frankfurt, Germany.

Agricultural trade, always a source of international friction, will remain a contentious issue in the years to come. The GATT agreement achieved only partial trade liberalization; recognizing this, the agreement calls for a continuation of the negotiation process to achieve the long-run goal of a “substantial reduction in agricultural support and protection.†In any case, it is clear that U.S.-European Union (EU) agricultural trade relations will remain central to any future negotiation. In this volume, leading experts present a comprehensive set of analyses of the U.S.-EU agricultural trade conflict. The discussions provide a unique perspective on the U.S.-EU agricultural trade confrontation in recent years and offer insights into both the final GATT agreement and forthcoming agricultural issues. Presenting a broad historical context, the book focuses on changes in U.S. and European trade and agricultural policies, looking at the implications of these changes for bilateral relations and global agricultural markets. Providing U.S., EU, and third-party perspectives, the contributors analyze the negotiation process in the Uruguay Round of the GATT. Finally, the book explores several additional dimensions of the U.S.-EU agricultural trade conflict, including the consequences of the EU integration and enlargement processes, the environmental impact of the Union’s agricultural policies, and the mechanisms and forces that determine agricultural policy formation in both the United States and in Europe.

In The Right to Food and the World Trade Organization’s Rules on Agriculture: Conflicting, Compatible, or Complementary?, Rhonda Ferguson explores the relationship between the human right to food and agricultural trade rules. She questions whether States can adhere to their obligations under both regimes simultaneously. These two regimes are frequently portrayed to be in tension with one another. The content and contours of the right to food under international human rights law and WTO rules on domestic supports, export subsidies, and market access are considered through the lens of norm conflict theories. The analysis is situated within the context of the debate surrounding the fragmentation of international law.

This book presents a series of essays by I. William Zartman outlining the evolution of the key concepts required for the study of negotiation and conflict management, such as formula, ripeness, pre-negotiation, mediation, power, process, intractability, escalation, and order. Responding to a lack of useful conceptualization for the analysis of international negotiation, Zartman has developed an analytical framework and specific concepts that can serve as a basis for both study and practice. Negotiation is analyzed as a process, and is linked to other major themes in political science such as decision, structure, justice and order. This analysis is then applied to negotiations to manage particular types of conflicts and cooperation, including ethnic conflicts, civil wars and regime-building. It also develops typologies and strategies of mediation, dealing with such aspects as leverage, bias, interest, and roles. Written by the leading exponent of negotiation and mediation, Negotiation and Conflict Management will be of great interest to all students of negotiation, mediation and conflict studies in general.

The international order is constituted by a plurality of international regimes - institutionalized arrangements in different issue areas that possess their own norms and procedures. The present book examines how conflict among regimes may arise and probes the role that international law can play in managing such conflict. Throughout the book, the example of trade in cultural products is used to illustrate the evolution of regime conflict and the potential for its management. Conflicts between the goals of 'free trade' and 'cultural diversity' have notably surfaced within the World Trade Organization (WTO) and the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO). As a result, there is a potential for conflict among WTO law, the UNESCO's Convention on the Protection and Promotion of the Diversity of Cultural Expressions, and human rights. The book posits that three dimensions are characteristic for regime conflict: First, regime conflict is a function of conflict among different social goals or values. Second, such goal conflicts are institutionalized through the interaction of a variety of political actors struggling for influence, often in intergovernmental organizations. Third, regime conflict may manifest itself in conflicts of legal rules. If a state acts in conformity with the rules of one regime, its conduct may trigger a violation of the rules of another regime. The author argues that, while international law cannot be construed as a fully integrated and unified system, it does provide a common language for different regimes to engage with each other. The shared discourse rules of international law enable a degree of coordination of the policies of different regimes, notably through techniques of interpretation and legal priority rules. International law contributes to the management of regime conflict by providing commonly accepted reasons for choosing among competing policy goals.

Regional cooperation is increasingly important as a means to create peaceful relations and improve economic development. The problem today is not to initiate cooperation but rather how to handle disputes and maintain good relations. This is done through conflict management mechanisms (CMMs) in most regional cooperation structures. However, the interaction between such structures and regional conflict management mechanisms is not sufficiently examined and, as a result, no coherent theoretical model that could explain this interaction has been constructed. This has meant that in many cases the interaction is incorrectly assumed, with negative social and economic outcomes.

′The SAGE Handbook of Conflict Resolution demonstrates the range of themes that constitute modern conflict resolution. It brings out its key issues, methods and dilemmas through original contributions by leading scholars in a dynamic and expanding field of inquiry. This handbook is exactly what it sets out to be: an indispensable tool for teaching, research and practice in conflict resolution′ - Peter Wallensteen, Professor of Peace and Conflict Research, Uppsala University and University of Notre Dame ′Bercovitch, Kremenyuk and Zartman are among the most important figures in the conflict resolution field. They have pieced together, with the help of more than 35 colleagues from numerous countries, a state-of-the-art review of the sources of international conflict, available methods of conflict management, and the most difficult challenges facing the individuals and organizations trying to guide us through these conflict-ridden times. The collection is brimming with penetrating insights, trenchant analyses, compelling cases, and disciplined speculation. They help us understand both the promise of as well as the obstacles to theory-building in the new field of conflict resolution′ - Lawrence Susskind, Professor and Director of the MIT - Harvard Public Disputes Program ′The last three sentences of this persuasive book: "We conclude this volume more than ever convinced that conflict resolution is not just possible or desirable in the current international environment. It is absolutely necessary. Resolving conflicts and making peace is no longer an option; it is an intellectual and practical skill that we must all posses." If you are part of that "we," intellectually or professionally, you will find this book a superb companion′ - Thomas C Schelling, Professor Emeritus, Harvard University and University of Maryland Conflict resolution is one of the fastest-growing academic fields in the world today. Although it is a relatively young discipline, having emerged as a specialized field in the 1950′s, it has rapidly grown into a self-contained, vibrant, interdisciplinary field. The SAGE Handbook of Conflict Resolution brings together all the conceptual, methodological and substantive elements of conflict resolution into one volume of over 35 specially commissioned chapters. The Handbook is designed to reflect where the field is today by drawing on the contributions of experts from different fields presenting, in a systematic way, the most recent research and practice. Jacob Bercovitch is Professor of International Relations, and Fellow of the Royal Society, at the University of Canterbury in Christchurch, New Zealand. Victor Kremenyuk is deputy director of the Institute for USA and Canada Studies, Russian Academy of Sciences, Moscow. He is also a research associate at IIASA. I. William Zartman is Jacob Blaustein Professor of Conflict Resolution and International Organization at the Nitze School of Advanced International Studies of Johns Hopkins University