| Abstract [eng] |
Although the expansion of international trade over the past few decades has brought economic and societal benefits across the globe, it has also at times failed to address the accompanying adverse social, environmental, and even economic impacts (United Nations, 2021). In the post-WWII period world trade agreements were established mainly as free trade agreements and customs unions. In the wake of WWII the European Economic Community became the leading player on the global trade scene. Later, the advent and rapid spread of globalization brought about changes to the nature of trade agreements. It should be stressed that this resulted in much more complex agreements involving the opening of international borders. The nature of international trade has changed in the last decades. “Steadily declining costs of trade and information and telecommunications have permitted firms to geographically splinter their ‘production lines,’ designing international supply chains that allocate different parts of the production process to firms in different countries” (Hoekman, 2014). The EU, along with the WTO, has retained the dominant role in terms of shaping the global order. Trade agreements regulate not only the trade in goods and services, but also aspects of capital flow, labor law, and social or environmental (ecological) objectives. The latter are nowadays regarded as global public goods. |
