The Domestic Application Of WTO Rules

There was a warm discussion on the domestic application of WTO rules in Chinabefore its accession to the WTO. After China became a member of the WTO, the commonsense of judicial and theoretical fields is that Chinese courts shall not directly apply WTOrules when hearing relevant cases. However, the simple answer could not clean up allrelevant application issues without the establishment of a completed legal systemregulating the domestic application of WTO rules. Therefore, the author selected thesubject of "The Domestic Application of WTO Rules" as the topic of this paper, and hopethat it will do some work to this urgent and unresolved problem. Comparative study isadopted in most parts of this paper to address different legislations and practices regardingthe application of WTO rules in WTO Members. After the comparative study, the authorproposes an appropriate approach to apply WTO rules in China. Relevant suggestionsconcerning the application are discussed in Chapter 3 and Chapter 4. The whole paper contains 4 chapters and about 37,000 Chinese characters. Themain contents of each chapter are as follows: Chapter One: Overview of the Domestic Application of WTO Rules. Section One 3briefly introduces the theory of the application of treaties in the domestic law and definesthe application of WTO rules in this paper, i.e. the application of WTO rules by Chinesecourts. Section Two analyzes the nature of the application of WTO rules in the domesticlaw, and lists out the factors which may affect this issue. Chapter Two: The Domestic Application of WTO Rules in WTO Members. SectionOne, Section Two and Section Three explain the domestic application of WTO rules in theUS, the EC, the UK, Germany, Switzerland, Japan and Canada. Section Four makes somecomments on the different application practices of those WTO Members. Chapter Three: The Domestic Application of WTO Rules in China. Section Onedescribes the legislation and practice on the application of international treaties in China.Section Two analyzes in detail the existing rules, including laws, judicial interpretations,Report of the Working Party on the Accession of China and views from several seniorjudges, regarding the domestic application of WTO rules in China. Section Three firstlypoints out several aspects in connection with the domestic application issue, and thenprovides with the author's suggestions in respect of the application. Chapter Four: The Application of the Doctrine of Consistent Interpretation.Section One introduces the definition, the legal basis and the development of the Doctrine.Section Two examines the application of the Doctrine of Consistent Interpretation in WTOMembers. In the last section of Chapter Four, the author indicates the need ofimplementing that Doctrine in Chinese judicial practice of handling WTO-rules-relatedcases, and elaborates means to adopt the Doctrine of Consistent Interpretation. 4...