Democracy and the GATT/WTO Accession Duration

Abstract

Recent studies have suggested that accession to GATT/WTO is a complex, difficult, and lengthy process, and such process has lengthened in recent years. Using survival analysis, we find that the applicant's political regime has a significant impact on the time it takes to accede to GATT/WTO. In particular, the accession duration is likely shorter for an applicant whose political regime is more democratic. Such a finding is also robust regardless of different econometric methods and data sets adopted. Our finding is surprising because political regime is never to be considered as a mandate of the GATT/WTO before.

Keywords: GATT/WTO, Accession duration, Democracy

JEL Classification: F13, P51