Donald Trump’s trade negotiator-in-chief, Robert Lighthizer, has openly been in favour of curbing the jurisdiction of supranational courts over his country’s trade policy. In the past weeks, as the US and China seem to be on the verge of a deal to end their tit-tat tariffs war, Mr Lighthizer’s vision of trade agreement enforcement has emerged — and it has a 1980s feel.
Mr Lighthizer, a longtime trade lawyer, has outlined a model where Washington complaints over Chinese compliance with the deal would be negotiated between officials from each side. If the US were to be unhappy with the outcome, it would unilaterally impose sanctions deemed proportionate.
This diplomatic discretionary model is in sharp contrast to the standard quasi-judicial systems in most trade agreements, in which an independent panel of arbiters typically rules on infringements and authorises responses, usually in the form of retaliatory tariffs.