Intellectual Property Law at the Crossroads of Trade focuses on the elements of intellectual property that impact on trade and competition. The book comprises thoughtful contributions on varying commercial aspects of IP, from parallel imports of pharmaceuticals to exhaustion of rights, and from trade in goods of cultural heritage to regulation of goods in transit. There is detailed discussion of licensing, including cross-border elements, online licensing, and the potential for harmonisation in Europe. This precedes a multi-layered analysis of the Anti-counterfeiting Trade Agreement. This stimulating collection of work will have strong appeal to academics and researchers interested in some of the most pressing issues in intellectual property law, as well as all those with an interest in the intersection of trade and IP.

The book examines trade agreements in the context of the current world economic crisis and the uncompleted World Trade Organization (WTO) Doha Round of trade negotiations. With economies shrinking and protectionism on the rise, many fear a protracted global recession. This raises important questions as to what role trade agreements – multilateral, plurilateral, and bilateral – should be playing in the current climate of uncertainty, and how best to plan for a more stable economic future. Previous assumptions are now being questioned, making this an opportune time to critically examine the WTO, free trade agreements, bilateral investment treaties, and other international economic law instruments. Furthermore, participants in international agreements are concerned with emerging issues that have the potential to strengthen or weaken the global trading system, including matters of treaty interpretation; terms of new agreements; and effects of existing provisions. This book provides a timely addition to the international economic law literature, as its submissions have been prepared during a time of unusual uncertainty and economic change; individuals interested in international economic law will seek scholarship that recognizes the current international economic climate. This book should be of interest to a wide range of academics and student researchers, as well as policymakers and practitioners.

This volume contains a collection of studies examining trade-related issues negotiated in regional trade agreements (RTAs) and how RTAs are related to the WTO's rules. While previous work has focused on subsets of RTAs, these studies are based on what is probably the largest dataset used to date, and highlight key issues that have been negotiated in all RTAs notified to the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT) and the World Trade Organization (WTO). New rules within RTAs are compared to rules agreed upon by WTO members. The extent of their divergences and the potential implications for parties to RTAs, as well as for WTO members that are not parties to RTAs, are examined. This volume makes an important contribution to the current debate on the role of the WTO in regulating international trade and how WTO rules relate to new rules being developed by RTAs.

The rise of cross-regional trade agreements is a defining trend of the current international trade system as shown by the signing of the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) in 2015, the negotiations for the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP) between the USA and the EU as well as the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP) between countries in Asia and Oceania. These differ from previous agreements in their economic significance and large geographic scale, and the wide scope of trade-related issues. The current rise of nationalist and isolationist ideologies across Europe and the USA has raised questions on the future of cross-regional trade deals and made the need to understand their implications for economic and political governance ever more urgent. Two main forms of governance that are central to this volume are the democratic tensions over new generation trade deals on the one hand, and their geopolitical ramifications on the other, which have come into collision to herald the advent of a highly uncertain period of world politics. Many of the questions tackled in this volume, surrounding the democratic governance of trade agreements – whether long-held debates on the inclusion of workers’ voices, controversies on intrusive "behind the border" provisions undermining national sovereignty and local autonomy or new questions on digital rights – are crucial to understand the ebbing popular support for far-reaching trade agreements. This book will be a useful learning tool for students and scholars in a wide range of fields, including Globalisation, Global Governance, International Political Economy, International Trade and Investment and International Law, and should also be of interest to EU trade negotiators, international policymakers and business associations.

Crossroads and Cultures: A History of the World’s Peoples incorporates the best current cultural history into a fresh and original narrative that connects global patterns of development with life on the ground. As the title, “Crossroads,” suggests, this new synthesis highlights the places and times where people exchanged goods and commodities, shared innovations and ideas, waged war and spread disease, and in doing so joined their lives to the broad sweep of global history. Students benefit from a strong pedagogical design, abundant maps and images, and special features that heighten the narrative’s attention to the lives and voices of the world’s peoples. Test drive a chapter today. Find out how.

This book explores interactions between the new generation EU FTA and the WTO dispute settlement mechanisms, adopting an innovative, comprehensive approach. It investigates how the mechanisms potentially could and actually do compete, conflict, and cooperate, focusing not only on the potential negative consequences of fragmentation, but also on how synergies could be enhanced. Thus, unlike the existing literature, which chiefly focuses on conflicting interactions, it considers positive and negative interactions alike. Moreover, the book explores the topic in light of the most recent changes in and challenges to the international trade law regime. Particular attention is paid to how the multilateral and bilateral mechanisms studied interact with regard to the current WTO dispute settlement crisis and the EU-backed multi-party interim appeal arbitration arrangement. Thus, the book provides up-to-date answers to compelling questions. It also examines in detail the new generation EU FTA dispute settlement mechanisms, an aspect which has not been the subject of thorough research to date.The book pursues an interdisciplinary approach, combining legal methodology, international relations and political science theories with interviews. Given its scope, the book will appeal to researchers and scholars whose work involves international trade law issues. However, it will also be of interest to general international law academics, as it touches upon such issues as fragmentation, forum shopping, and general rules of interpretation. Furthermore, by analysing and presenting proposals with regard to the new generation EU FTAs, it will also be pertinent to the work of EU policymakers and researchers studying EU trade law.