Domestic Regulation and the GATS: Challenges for Developing Countries
The GATS, in its preamble, explicitly recognizes the right of Members to regulate, and to introduce new regulation, on the supply of services within their territories in order to meet national policy objectives, and given the asymmetries existing with respect to the degree of development of services regulation, the particular need of developing countries to exercise this right. Furthermore, the process of progressive liberalization of trade in services, as provided by Article XIX.2, has to take place with due respect of national policy objectives; and the right of Members to regulate the supply of services in their territories has been further reaffirmed by the Negotiating Guidelines and Procedures adopted for the GATS 2000 negotiations, endorsed by the Doha Ministerial Declaration.1 Nevertheless, the possible impact of the GATS on the regulatory autonomy of the nation state is perhaps one of the issues that have given rise to greater concern among, negotiators, national policy makers, and civil society institutions alike. The growing interest on domestic regulation in the context of services trade liberalization is also highlighted by the blossoming literature dealing with this topic.