Moore, Mike. 2003. A World Without Walls: Freedom, Development, Free Trade and Global Governance

American Journal of Economics and Sociology, The, July, 2004 by Kent Jones

Moore, Mike. 2003. A World Without Walls: Freedom, Development, Free Trade and Global Governance. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. ISBN 0-521-82701-9

Mike Moore's tumultuous three-year term as Director-General (DG) of the World Trade Organization (WTO) ended in 2002. It began with the disastrous Seattle ministerial summit meeting and culminated more hopefully in the Doha meeting that finally launched the so-called Development Round of trade negotiations and also marked the entry of China and Taiwan into the WTO. This memoir includes his account of these events, as well as his views on globalization, the role of trade in political and social progress, and his vision of global governance. It also provides a useful, if limited, account of recent changes in the conduct of WTO negotiations and the workings of the WTO Secretariat.

Moore's term at the WTO began under a cloud as the member countries were bitterly split between him and Supachai Panitchpakdi of Thailand, finally agreeing to split the DG's six-year term between the two. Moore was unlucky enough to get the front end of the deal, presiding rather helplessly over the final stages of preparation for the Seattle meeting, which foundered, in his account, on the bickering among delegations and the lack of a consensus on the agenda, rather than on the highly publicized protests on the streets. Ironically, one the enduring images of the Seattle debacle is the image of the balding, button-down Moore, in reality a lifelong New Zealand labor activist, caricatured and demonized as the heartless bureaucrat from Geneva, hell-bent on destroying the environment and exploiting cheap labor for multinational corporations. This book is in large part his attempt to correct this image and to address what he views as the wrongheaded opposition to trade liberalization by anti-globalization groups.

The best parts of the book focus on Moore's formative years as a young labor politician in New Zealand and his personal experiences dealing with the bureaucracy and culture of trade policy in the WTO. Readers of this journal will note with interest his political development as a pro-labor, pro-trade globalist, a combination that will baffle many labor union supporters in the United States and Europe. Coming from a small, open economy, he saw that economic opportunity for his working-class constituents lay in access to foreign markets, rather than in insular, protectionist trade policies.

Economists will, however, find Moore's trade theory a little rough around the edges, as he proclaims that the basis of the gains from trade "is the premise of the essential righteousness of universal reciprocity" (p. 50). This passage reveals the approach of the trade diplomat, as opposed to the economist. Economic theory establishes the gains from trade based on specialization and exchange according to comparative advantage, without relying on reciprocity, righteous or otherwise. Yet the work of trade negotiations relies heavily on reciprocal "concessions" of market access, a mercantilist "trick" that gets countries to bargain, promoting mutual economic benefits. Moore thus inadvertently makes the point that reciprocal mercantilism forms the basis for WTO-sponsored trade liberalization.

Moore describes the frustrations of working as a high-profile official within the limits placed on the DG's powers. Unlike the sinister "CEO-of-world-trade" image that many protestors have made of it, the position is strictly circumscribed by the fact that WTO member countries ultimately control the rules and the negotiations. For his predecessors, the role had been to act as the chief public "cheerleader" for trade liberalization and simultaneously to work behind the scenes to keep the trade negotiations on track. Moore inherited a much more demanding job in the expanded WTO, which was to do all that in the context of a much larger, diverse, and unwieldy membership, but also to manage public relations for the WTO itself, and to figure out how to promote a more "democratic" internal process of deliberations. Regarding the last of these problems, one of the most serious challenges to the WTO has been its inability to reform its traditional "green room" consultations on major issues, which were based on negotiations among the larger members and a select group of smaller countries. Moore made significant progress in opening up WTO deliberations and agenda setting to the smaller, previously unrepresented developing countries.

Moore continues his cheerleading for trade liberalization, a role that suits him well. He acknowledges the global concerns over the environment, health, and poverty, and yet maintains that increased trade is consistent with progress in these areas. Above all, he links increased trade with democracy and economic growth for countries that take part in it. He also recognizes the need for increased transparency and accountability in global institutions, but argues for the integrity of the WTO based on representation through sovereign nation-states.