ABSTRACT
This chapter concentrates on analyzing the Community's role in international trade negotiations. It reviews the role of the Commission in World Trade Organization (WTO) negotiations, as it acts on behalf of the Community without respect to the question of exclusive or mixed competence. The chapter examines the position presented by the Community in Seattle in December 1999. It explains the question of outcome and efficiency given the institutional setting. The chapter attempts to combine level-analysis with new institutionalism to measure the degree to which the agent departs from the principals' mandate at the Seattle Summit. The European Union's mandate for the Seattle summit developed throughout summer/early fall 1999 under the German and the Finnish Presidency. In the case of the Seattle summit, principal-agent theory largely explains the EU position during the Ministerial Conference. At the Seattle summit, private sector pressures were largely countered by pressures from the streets and inside the meeting building by nongovernmental organizations (NGOs).
