ABSTRACT
Scholars and practitioners have often considered the ‘global trade regime’ to be synonymous with the principles and rules of the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT) and, since January 1995, the World Trade Organization (WTO). When 23 governments signed the GATT in 1947 to begin lowering tariffs, they assumed it would only be a temporary agreement. However, the GATT became the permanent global trade oiganisation by default when the United States Congress failed to approve the creation of an international trade organisation. Although the GATT functioned effectively for almost five decades, its informal origins proved to be a source of weakness. Its members could bypass many of its regulations, and some trade sectors such as textiles and agriculture were largely excluded from the agreement. In the Uruguay Round, the negotiators decided to replace the GATT with a more formal international organisation, the WTO.1 The GATT/WTO, the International Monetary Fund (IMF), and the World Bank are keystone international economic organisations (KIEOs), because of their role in managing global monetary relations, finance, and trade.2
