Multiple Regimes, Issue Linkage, and International Cooperation: Exploring the Role of the Wto

The World Trade Organization ("WTO") has been heavily criticized since its inception for its potentially destructive influence on other policy domains, particularly environmental and labor policies. The public debate with respect to the WTO was structured, to a large extent, by this negative stance. "Linkage" emerged over the last decade as an alternative framework for thinking about the relationship between the WTO and other international regimes. The narrative of linkage replaces the themes of conflict and animosity which have dominated the "trade and -" debate, with a tale of synergy and mutual support. The linkage literature highlights the potential positive role that the WTO can play in the facilitation of cooperation in other policy domains (e.g., environmental protection). This Article questions the validity of this emerging discourse, setting it against the complex reality of the contemporary international system. The Article starts with an exposition of the linkage thesis, exploring its theoretical underpinnings. The idea of linkage emerged as a response to the problem of managing global dilemmas in an anarchic world that is governed by weak and fragmented international institutions. Linkage can help in coping with this governance "deficit" by unleashing hidden synergies between regimes, thereby creating more effective governance structures. While the idea that cross-regime linkage may yield synergistic benefits is intuitively compelling, it suffers from several blind spots, which make its actual feasibility doubtful. The Article exposes these blind spots by situating the "linkage" hypothesis in a richer theo-