Das Subventionsrecht der WTO: Ordnung des Welthandels und Schutz des Wettbewerbs

Abstract

The Subsidies Rules of the World Trade Organization (WTO): Regulating Trade and Safeguarding Competition

So far, international economic law has apparently not much to offer in terms of competition rules. Indeed, the world is still struggling with achieving something more than the mere cooperation of competition authorities. However, the picture may be more friendly when looking at subsidies. Disciplines on subsidies can be seen as a complementary element to the rules on restrictive business practices in a larger and more ambitious concept of competition law. EU law reflects this approach by addressing these issues next to each other in one chapter, whose title reads „rules on competition“. At international level, the Agreement on Subsidies and Countervailing Measures of the World Trade Organization (WTO) governs subsidy issues with a whole set of rules and procedures. When considering its potential contribution to the safeguarding of competition, it should, however, not be forgotten, that it operates from quite different grounds. Rather than focusing on markets and businesses in their own right, it is concerned with trade relations as WTO members see them in their capacity as the only actors in international trade law. Thus, the rules at hand focus on the potential implications of subsidization on the interests of WTO members in trade and provide for remedies to address such implications. Consequently, the agreement takes a firm stand on subsidies which affect trade directly: export subsidies and those, which promote import substitution are subjected to a clear verdict and can be remedied by any member. The agreement is less outspoken on less trade-distorting subsidization, which are merely considered „actionable“ and thus left to members for consideration and eventual action. Having this in mind, a short overview on the rules at hand and the amazingly large number of cases indicates, that the subsidies rules of the WTO make a good contribution to the protection of competition in spite of their peculiar conceptual setting. What is more, they may also be seen to work as a backing for internal controls of subsidies at national or EU level.