ABSTRACT
Following the Marrakech Agreements, developed countries exerted pressure for the inclusion of new subjects on the international agenda, including some that were not exclusively within the commercial domain. The WTO is not the ideal forum for raising these issues, no Article in the GATT mentions social standards, and the social clauses could have been treated by the International Labour Office, for example. The United States (and principally the Democratic Party) were the main precursors in establishing a link between market access and the application of social standards, but similar proposals were also advanced by the political parties in the member states of the EU and by the European Parliament. Kim Elliott observed that the increase in exports to the United States by countries with low wages was at the heart of the debate on social standards (2000: 104), since multinationals would move their activities into countries that applied lower social standards. (DCs, however, considered that protectionism was the principal motive and was opposed to the inclusion of these standards in trade negotiations. The inclusion of social standards is based on five principles and fundamental rights of labour: (1) freedom of association; (2) collective bargaining; (3) limitations on child labour; (4) prohibition of forced labour; and (5) nondiscrimination in employment (Wilkinson and Hughes 2000: 261; Dow Jones Newswires, 24 July 2001).
