On The Reform Of Appellate Mechanism Of WTO Dispute Settlement

As the US continues to block the selection process of WTO appellate body members,the appellate body was officially "suspended" in December 2019,and the whole dispute settlement mechanism has encountered unprecedented difficulties.Rule-oriented global trade governance is returning to a power-oriented trend.In order to restart the appellate body as soon as possible,to enable WTO dispute settlement to play a normal role during the "suspension" period,and to further improve the appellate mechanism,it is necessary to study the mechanism and its existing problems in order to put forward practical solutions and reform plans.After extensive reading of existing research literature and related cases,the thesis points out the problems in the first part(except the introduction and conclusion).At present,some members are dissatisfied with the appellate body for failing to strictly abide by the maximum trial limit of "90 days",exceeding its power to examine facts,issuing lengthy appellate reports and relying too much on precedents.So,the appellate mechanism should be reformed quickly.Through the discussion and analysis of the second part of the thesis,we know that the causes of the above problems are various.The reason why the appellate body failed to strictly abide by the provisions on trial time is that the workload is gradually increasing,and the number of members is small and the term of office is short,which makes the provisions on trial time appear obvious lag.In practice,it is difficult to distinguish "factual issues" from "legal issues",and the appellate body lacks the remand authority,so the appellate body sometimes has to dabble in "factual issues" in line with the purpose of effectively resolving disputes.The reason why the lengthy appellate report is issued is that some members define themselves too much as interpreters of trade rules rather than judges,and believe that a large number of "advisory opinions" are conducive to the understanding and implementation of the report.As for relying too much on precedents,it is because of the need to maintain the consistency and predictability of the multilateral trading system,but this behavior has been criticized by individual members for violating relevant regulationsIn the third part,the thesis puts forward some countermeasures and reform plans,such as starting voting,increasing the number and term of appellate body members,modifying the time limit of trial,introducing summary trial procedure,introducing the principle of "exhaustion of local remedy",increasing the review and supervision mechanism,and establishing the guiding position of precedent.The fourth part of the thesis tries to provide suggestions for China to properly solve international trade disputes during the suspension of the appellate body,including signing "non-appeal agreement",invoking article 25 arbitration clause,actively using nonjudicial dispute settlement methods and promoting the reform of WTO dispute settlement mechanism.