Foreword

Summary

This is the second volume in the American Law Institute's effort to contribute to the development of the law of world trade.

In 2004 we published The WTO Case Law of 2001, analyses by distinguished economists and law professors of the decisions rendered by the adjudicating bodies of the WTO in 2001. This book contains analyses of the 2002 decisions. As with the earlier year's work, the draft chapters were analyzed at a meeting of all the Reporters in October 2003. They were then further reviewed and criticized by an international group of experts on the law and economics of the world trading system at a two-day invitational conference in February 2004.

We expect to generate and publish one additional set of studies, discussing the WTO decisions of 2003. Our plan is then to attempt to draft general principles of the law of trade. We believe that we can author principles that will contribute to international discussion and assist the development of a sophisticated and coherent body of law in this growing field.

The analyses in the book are the work of the participating Reporters and not of The American Law Institute. We are grateful to the Reporters and to those who have supplied constructive criticism of earlier drafts. We are also grateful for financial support from Jan Wallander's and Tom Hedelius' Research Foundation, Svenska Handelsbanken, Stockholm, and from the Milton and Miriam Handler Foundation.