There are diverging views on what the goal of this Ministerial actually is. One possibility, that seems to be the likely one, is that the objective is not to chart a future course for the Doha caravan, but rather to figure out how to get off. Even the much repeated commitments by Ministers in their plenary statements have to be understood as positions on an exit strategy - the subtext being that no one believes that the DDA's original mandate can be completed within a year, but rather one that would include only some of the issues in which relative agreement has been reached.
The options seem to be the following:
- "Keep on keeping on": Persist patiently, until conditions ripen for a comprehensive agreement. Some developing countries say they want this, the poorest actually mean it. The African Group ambassadors insist that given the choice between 'early' and 'succesful' they prefer successful. The 'early harvests' they hoped for - cotton, Duty-Free Quota-Free - have actually been pushed to the backburner. They think that they will lose from a non-comprehensive deal in 2010, and are trying to bring the larger developing countries to back them. But just like these states could never steer the process, they won't be able to prevent it from stopping.
- Doha Light - Just Do It: Cut the losses, consolidate the little that has been agreed upon, because it does have value, get it done in 2010 and move on. This is the view taken by Bernard Hoekman at a ICTSD panel on "Bringing Doha to Closure". He says members should "grasp the bird in the hand", that a limited agreement that would include DFQF for LDCs, some new market access, and above all renewed commitments not to raise protection and support for domestic industries would be worthwhile, and worth having soon. Greater pressure for more market access should be shifted to post-round sectoral agreements, that would involve only the main importers and exporters in each sector, without holding the entire round hostage.
- No deal/formal abandonment: On the same panel, Massimiliano Cali of ODI also advocated an early conclusion, preferrably with a reduced ambition deal but even without one, by comparing the costs and benefits of each scenario. According to him, (1) we haven't yet witnessed a protectionist spiral, and historically states have not tended to use 'water in the tariff' (the gap between ound and applied tariffs) - so a new tariff reduction agreement is not crucial' (2) the benefits of new end-of round tariff reduction would be small; small countries and LDCs would benefit, but progress is blocked by large players; and (3) the opportunity costs of being bogged down in the Doha process without being able to move on other new pressing issues are high.here is something to be said for this approach, but as Simon Evenett said (also on the same panel) there is too much bureaucratic vested interest in the round to let it end that way. It would also be very damaging to the WTO's already damaged reputaion (pointing out that all normative discussion of economic protectionism has effectively shifted from the WTO to the G-20).
- Informal abandonment: According to Evenett, this is a position already taken by many in practice. I agree - although this does not mean that at some level despite the substantive disengagement the round's conclusion is not still on everyone's to do list.
- "Functional UNCTAD": This was Evenett's term, describing the situation in which the WTO's negotation function is "in abeyance", and we are left with the dispute settlement function and perhaps an enhanced (and important) monitoring function.
Lingering under this rather gloomy menu is the question of the reform of WTO decisionmaking processes, reform that is necessary to revive its negotiation function. But unfortunately, such reform is also tied to the Doha round exit strategy.
