Mitarbeiter sonstige

Reforming the WTO in an age of power-based trade

Berger, Axel / Clara Brandi
Staff - Other (2026)

in: Anna-Katharina Hornidge / Axel Berger (eds.), Disruption and Reform: sustainable futures at stake? The case for politics of cooperation and perseverance, Bonn: German Institute of Development and Sustainability (IDOS), 16-20

ISBN: 978-3-96021-292-8
DOI: https://doi.org/10.23661/r4.2026

The rules-based trading system has long served as a central pillar of the post–Cold War international order. Predictable economic relations and the reduction of trade barriers supported an unprecedented expansion of global trade and economic integration. Institutions such as the World Trade Organization (WTO) establish a multilateral framework of shared principles designed to prevent protectionism and resolve disputes peacefully (Hoekman & Kostecki, 2009). That system contributed significantly to economic growth and poverty reduction, particularly in emerging and developing economies (e.g. Baldwin, 2016). That same system is now under acute stress (Brandi, Zoryana, & Stender, 2026), but it is not yet broken. The question of how it will be shaped over the coming years remains genuinely open. The WTO’s structural crisis is real: waves of unilateral tariffs, the paralysis of the Appellate Body since 2019, the collapse of the Doha Development Round and the growing use of trade policy as a geopolitical instrument have all eroded the foundations of a rules-based order. The failure of the 14th WTO Ministerial Conference (MC14) in Yaoundé in March 2026 to produce a final declaration or agreed reform work plan offered the most visible confirmation yet that the multilateral trading system cannot be taken for granted. Ahead of MC14, WTO Director-General Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala herself described the system as being under greater pressure than at any point since the end of the Second World War. Yet the story of Yaoundé is not simply one of failure, as plurilateral approaches are gaining importance. Sixty-six WTO members, representing roughly 70 per cent of global trade, moved forward with plans to implement the world’s first baseline E-Commerce Agreement on an interim basis outside the formal WTO framework, with the explicit aim of integrating it at a later stage. The Multi-Party Interim Appeal Arbitration Arrangement (MPIA), now joined by 61 members, continues to function as a working substitute for the blocked Appellate Body of the WTO. In 2021, 72 WTO members adopted an agreement on Service Domestic Regulation, which entered into force in 2024. Another plurilateral agreement on Investment Facilitation for Development (IFD) was concluded after only three years of negotiations. The IFD agreement is supported by 131 members, mainly low- and middle-income countries (LMICs). Although integration into the WTO’s legal structure is being blocked by one member – India – the IFD signatories have already begun assessing member states’ technical-assistance and capacity-building needs for effective implementation of the agreement. Moreover, in the aftermath of MC14, the reform discussions that began under Norwegian facilitator Ambassador Petter Ølberg have returned to Geneva. They have not been abandoned but remain ongoing. Ministers from 48 diverse WTO members reaffirmed their commitment to fossil fuel subsidy reform. The EU and the 12 members of the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership (CPTPP) issued a joint ministerial statement backing WTO reform while agreeing to advance digital trade rules together. Even without a formal declaration, the Yaoundé package remains on the table. This chapter takes that ambiguity seriously. Rather than treating disruption and reform as sequential phases, it reads them as simultaneous developments. Disruption and reform are happening at the same time, often in the same rooms. The question is not whether the multilateral trading system will be reformed, but who will shape that reform, towards what ends, and with what vision for inclusive and sustainable development at its centre.