Concluding the Uruguay Round—Creating the New Architecture of Trade for the Global Economy

This Essay is an attempt to go back to some of the principles and factors which lay behind the launching of the Uruguay Round and the package which resulted, to look at some of the current unease about the WTO, and to see where the institution may need to go to reassert its role to command fully public and political confidence once again. CONCLUDING THE URUGUAY ROUNDCREATING THE NEW ARCHITECTURE OF TRADE FOR THE GLOBAL ECONOMY Peter D. Sutherland* Just a few days before Christmas 1993, I had the privilege to gavel a final decision to conclude seven years of negotiations to create a new world trading system. The Uruguay Round of the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade1 ("GATT") had come to an end. There was no doubting the huge satisfaction with this accomplishment. The unprecedented package of new trade rules and market concessions, along with the basic principles on which a new world trade body would be constituted, were welcomed by negotiators, the media, governments, and business leaders everywhere. It was seen as a triumph of multilateralism over the laws of the jungle, a means to help ensure a new economic stimulus in the wealthy industrialized countries and the opportunity for successful growth and development among poorer nations. It is as well to remember that sense of achievement and hope seven short years ago. It took a little over a further year to finally establish the World Trade Organization2 ("WTO"), which took over for GATT, as the authority and framework for global trading conditions. It did so at what seemed a propitious moment in twentieth century history. The Cold War had ended; many nations were making the transition from centrally-controlled to free-market economies; China was emerging as a powerful commercial force; many developing countries were undertaking their own much-needed economic reforms; and we were all beginning to understand the central elements of growing * Former Director-General of GATI and the first Director-General of the WTO. Chairman BP Amoco and Chairman Goldman Sachs International. 1. Final Act Embodying the Results of the Uruguay Round of Multilateral Trade Negotiations, Apr. 15, 1994, LEGAL INSTRUMENTS-REsuLTS OF THE URUGUAY ROUND vol. 1 (1994), 33 I.L.M. 1125 (1994) [hereinafter Final Act]. 2. Marrakesh Agreement Establishing the World Trade Organization, LEGAL INSTRUMENTs-REsuLTS OF THE URUGUAY ROUND VOL. 1, 33 I.L.M. 1144 (1994) [hereinaf-