The strict distributive strategy for a bargaining coalition: the Like Minded Group in the World Trade Organization, 1998–2001

Abstract

Developing country delegates in multilateral trade negotiations have become quite active in forming bargaining coalitions. But there has been little research concerning how this has been done, what the results have been, or what influences these results. In tackling these questions, this chapter identifies strategy choices made by weak-state coalitions as possible influences on their outcomes, the outcome being the primary dependent variable. Our method is to learn more about the multilateral negotiation process through a single case study and attempt to generate a potential generalization for further investigation in other cases. The Like Minded Group of countries (LMG) in the World Trade Organization illustrated what we call the strict distributive strategy in WTO negotiations from 1998 through the November 2001 ministerial conference in Doha, Qatar. This coalition put forward a number of detailed proposals that would have shifted value from North to South and denied any negotiating gain to the North until the North had first granted the group's demands. Despite a great deal of organized professional effort in Geneva, however, the group had by the time of the Doha conference, as we read the record, sustained a major loss and collected relatively small gains especially on their leading issue compared with the status quo. The LMG did play a leading role in delaying what they regarded as another serious loss. But this coalition gained less at Doha than others such as the coalition concerned with TRIPS and public health, which used the mixed-distributive strategy, as shown chaper 3.

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