Research On Issues Of International Trade And Human Rights

The relationship of international trade and human rights is not a new topic. Early in ancient Rome, the slave trade had reflected the conflict between international trade and human rights. After the Second World War, the development of international trade and protection of human rights entered into the stage of institutional. The former was regulated under GATT, while the latter was protected under the United Nations. When the era of WTO came, with the effective dispute settlement mechanism and the multilateral negotiation, the international trade expanded rapidly, which causes the conflict more obvious. The issue of coordinating the relationship between them has been a focus. Since entering into WTO ten years ago, China has made prominent achievements in the development of foreign trade and become a major trade nation. However, in a long term, we had to face the trade sanction with the excuse of human rights. It is important to study the relationship of international trade and human rights.This dissertation is divided into five major parts. The first part presents the history of the relationship of trade and human rights, analyzes the trade actions which violated the human rights in early years and introduces the experience of abolishing the slavery and slave trade with the help of trade measures in 19th century and the occurrence of the Second World War to illustrate the history of the conflict between international trade and human rights, the attempt of coordinating, to get the direction.The second part mainly introduces the linkage between international trade and human rights. It carries on the detailed analysis towards the linkage of the aspect in value as the freedom, tells the status of human rights in GATT/WTO system, and further briefly states four major human rights which influence the development of trade, as right to health, labor right, environmental right and right of development.The third part discusses four distinctions between international trade and human rights in the aspects of direct goals, the process and way of law making, details of right and responsibility and the mechanism of enforcement and implementation, and then delves into the nature, the expression and the influence of the differences of the institution.The fourth part dictates the traditional theoretical models put forward by western scholars in resolving the conflicts, i.e., the"Efficiency-Primacy''Model, the"Human Rights-Primacy"Model, the"Exception-Balance"Model as well as the"WTO-Based Constitutionalism"Model. It then investigates the force of human rights and WTO, discusses whether the law of human rights is jus congens, and puts forward the method of coordinating the conflict between international trade and human rights.The fifth part briefly introduces the development of the foreign trade and human rights of China and the problems, and further points out suggestion and solutions.