Regulation of Digital Trade in US Free Trade Agreements: From Trade Regulation to Digital Regulation
Legal Issues of Economic Integration 45, no. 1 (2018): 47–70.
29 Pages Posted: 16 Nov 2017 Last revised: 12 Feb 2018
Date Written: November 13, 2017
Abstract
This article reviews the evolution of rules on digital trade in US FTAs, and argues that the US approach has shifted from treating it largely as a traditional trade issue to recognizing its unique digital nature and tailoring the rules accordingly, as it has done in the Trans-Pacific Partnership (“TPP”) Agreement. The article starts with a review of the efforts to regulate e-commerce in the WTO, as well as what the pre-TPP US FTAs have achieved so far, followed by a critical appraisal of the achievements and shortcomings of the e-commerce chapter in the TPP. It is hoped that, by reviewing the evolution of the regulation of e-commerce from the WTO to the TPP, we can learn some lessons on how the rules are being shaped, as well as how it might evolve in the future.
Keywords: TPP, e-commerce, digital trade, FTA, WTO, GATS
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