Sven Van Kerckhoven

The tale of a Trojan horse or the quest for market access? China and the World Trade Organization

In 2001, China finally joined the WTO. The accession of China was looked forward to by many WTO members and China itself. However, observers had some fears that the Chinese accession would prove to be a Trojan horse, disrupting the working of the WTO. This paper looks into the Chinese accession and its involvement in the WTO Dispute Settlement and argues that these fears seem so far to be unfounded.

A European Perspective on the G20 and the BRICS

This article considers how the European Union (EU), as the most developed regional organization and as one of the strongest global economic players, deals with the global summitry of club-like entities such as the Group of 20 (G20) and the BRICS grouping of Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa. The EU, the G20 and the BRICS share similar ambitions, namely addressing global (or regional) cross-border challenges by increasing cooperation and coordination at the international level. Even though the EU is a fond supporter of global decision-making bodies, the rise of these informal bodies challenges the EU’s approach to global governance, which relies heavily on effective multilateralism supported by a rules-based approach. Because several of the BRICS and G20 members favour a more relationship-based approach focused on consensus and coordination, these bodies challenge the European approach. While a clear European strategy to deal with informal bodies is thus needed, a coherent and consistent approach is missing. This is evidenced by the lack of any reference to the BRICS and only a cursory reference to the G20 in the EU’s 2016 global strategy, and by the fact that the EU currently has only bilateral strategic partnerships with most of the G20 and BRICS members. This article argues that, given the particular challenges these bodies pose and their remarkable rise in recent years, a fully fledged EU strategy towards the G20 and the BRICS should be developed.

The G20 and the BRICS on Trade and Investment: Trends and Policies

International trade and investments declined sharply in the aftermath of the 2008 financial crisis. To coordinate policy responses in the wake of this crisis, the Group of Twenty (G20) was elevated to the leaders’ level and the BRICS grouping of Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa was founded as a summit to gather leaders from the most important emerging economies. This contribution reviews the work of both fora to restore trade and investment. We show that, despite efforts to stimulate cross-border trade and investments, neither has returned to pre-crisis levels. This is especially the case regarding international investment for the G20 members, although the data show a revival of trade. In general, BRICS members have been able to recover more quickly. Although their decisions have not always been implemented by members, the G20 and BRICS have proven to be effective fora for coordinating efforts and compliance has been rather high. However, this contribution argues that more can be done, especially regarding investments. The future will tell whether these two bodies will continue to be complimentary and whether they will be able to withstand protectionist and nationalist reflexes.

The Dynamics of Federalism: Belgium and Switzerland Compared

In recent years, several countries have moved to a more federal state structure. In particular in Europe, regional decision-making is on the rise. In order to evaluate these dynamics, this paper looks into the cases of Belgium and Switzerland. Both countries share a large number of characteristics, but have witnessed moves in opposite directions regarding the decentralization of decision-making powers. Whereas Belgium has increasingly hollowed out its central decision-making, Switzerland’s regional powers have transferred more competences to the central level. This paper argues that these differing dynamics are the result of socio-economic variables. In particular, the decision to (de)centralize is the result of a trade-off between heterogeneity of preferences, and economics of scale. The former has been increasing in Belgium, resulting in more decentralization, while the latter has pushed the Swiss cantons to centralize more competences.