ABSTRACT
The decision to launch negotiations on trade in services, as part of the present Uruguay Round of Multilateral Trade Negotiations, set the aim of establishing "a multilateral framework of principles and rules for trade in services". At stake is what may be compendiously described as the credibility of the multilateral framework, a matter which depends less on the formal adoption of the rules than on the practical implementation of the adopted rules in the trading practices and policies of the contracting parties. While credibility is essential to the survival of any system of rules, ITS achievement in the context of international instruments has been a notoriously difficult and persistent problem. States have traditionally been reluctant to commit themselves to institutional procedures which involve supervisory or enforcement mechanisms, since such procedures involve a commitment to a higher level of international integration.
