Interdisciplinary workshop on dispute settlement and conflict resolution in international economic relations

The Institute of International Law of the University of Hanover is pleased to announce an interdisciplinary workshop on dispute settlement and conflict resolution in international economic relations on 2 July 2024 (venue: Otto-Brenner-Straße 1, 30159 Hannover, Room 1930.A001, or online: a Webex link will be provided shortly). 

With this workshop, it intends to respond to a call by the newly appointed facilitator on dispute settlement reform of the WTO, Ambassador Usha Dwarka-Canabady of Mauritius.

At the May session of the General Council of the WTO, the facilitator set out her plans for the launch of formal negotiations on dispute settlement reform following the ministerial mandate at MC13.

The objective of these negotiations, as set out in the Ministerial Declaration at MC12, is:

“to conduct discussions with the view to having a fully and well-functioning dispute settlement system accessible to all Members .”

In her General Council presentation, the Facilitator set out a process comprising engagement by technical experts as well as heads of mission. She noted in particular:

 "During my consultations, I also heard other ideas by Members, such as organizing thematic seminars or workshops on how the dispute settlement system works and on other DS reform-related matters. There was also a proposal to have a stocktaking exercise at the July General Council meeting. I welcome these ideas."

As the first of what we hope will be a series of thematic and substantive engagements, the technical workshop on 2 July intends to tackle one of the two elements of the ministerial mandate: 

Access of all Members to the full spectrum of WTO dispute settlement

To this end, we propose the following topics of conversation for engagement by officials, practitioners, technical experts, and academics in a four-hour session in the morning of 2 July (9am - 1pm):

1. Problem identification
   a. What does access mean?
   b. Past practice at resolving the access issues
   c. Current proposals
2. Overview of the Chair’s Text and how it proposes to address access
3. “Access” to the full spectrum of dispute resolution – including complementary non-adversarial dispute resolution – in other economic fora:
   a. Regional trade agreements
   b. ICSID mediation and conciliation
   c. Experience of private sector arbitration centres
4. Path forward
   a. Interests, positions, and positioning
   b. EU approach

 We look forward to a fruitful exchange that we expect to be an engagement to help in the process of launching the negotiations.

Please let us know whether you would like to attend the event online or in person (contact: LS.Germelmann@jura.uni-hannover.de).