Binational panels of arbitration: Impartial adjudicators or spawning ground of new ideas? The Mexican experience under the mechanism for dispute resolution of Chapter 19 of the NAFTA

This thesis analyzes Mexico's experience under the dispute resolution mechanism of Chapter 19 of the NAFTA. It provides an overview of the main issues evidenced in the work of the Binational Panels that have applied Mexican law in antidumping and countervailing duty cases. The analysis deals with three main issues: (1) A study of specific elements of the Mexican Unfair Trade Regime in comparison with the regimes of Canada and the United States with a special emphasis given to the standard of judicial review. This thesis seeks to demonstrate that the Binational Panels reviewing a Mexican agency determination should apply an international standard of review, i.e. the GATT/WTO standard, rather than the Mexican domestic standard. (2) An analysis of the NAFTA's Binational Panel system in comparison with the GATT/WTO Dispute Resolution mechanism. This thesis seeks to demonstrate, from the Mexican perspective, that some improvements to the NAFTA's Chapter 19 mechanism should be made. (3) Finally, this thesis analyzes the most important inconsistencies between the NAFTA's Chapter 19 mechanism and the Mexican Constitution. According to this thesis, despite the discrepancies, Mexican courts would be highly unlikely to find a constitutional conflict.