Announcement: New GATS Study

New study from CCPA on GATS "pro-competitive regulation" and public services

Dear Colleagues,

The Trade and Investment Research Project of CCPA has published a new study.

"Return to Sender" by Jim Grieshaber-Otto and Scott Sinclair examines the policy impacts of acceding to corporate proposals to apply the so-called "pro-competitive" rules of the GATS Telecomms Reference Paper (TRP) to other service sectors.

Attached is the executive summary and an announcement (please feel free to circulate it). The full book is available free online at www.policyalternatives.ca. A French translation will be available soon.

The book focuses on the impact that applying "pro-competitive" regulation would have on postal services (especially on Canada's public postal system and the international regulation of postal services by the United Nation's Universal Postal Union). But it is also written for a broader international audience.

It examines the recent experience with "pro-competitive" rules in the U.S. telecommunications sector, and considers the potential impacts of similar rules in other service sectors.

The study is timely because the setback WTO negotiations on competition policy and investment suffered in Cancun will reinvigorate corporate and government proponents' efforts to extend the use of the "pro-competitive" rules already established in the GATS and to incorporate them into other international trade treaties (bilateral FTAs and the FTAA).

Also, the first WTO dispute settlement panel report regarding the GATS Telecomms Reference Paper, in which the US has reportedly successfully challenged Mexico's telecommunications regulation, is soon to be publicly released.

Return to Sender: The impact of GATS "pro-competitive regulation" on postal and other public services

Renvoi à l'expéditeur : L'incidence de la « réglementation favorable à la concurrence » sur les services postaux et d'autres services publics

Table of Contents
Ch. 1 Introduction: The GATS and Canada's Postal System
Ch.2 The Telecommunications Annex and Telecommunications Reference Paper
Ch. 3 Beyond telecommunications: Extending the application of "pro-competitive" regulation
Ch. 4 Implications of "pro-competitive" re-regulation for postal and other service sectors
Ch. 5 Conclusion: Return to Sender

Jim Grieshaber-Otto and Scott Sinclair January 2004 Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives ISBN 0-88627-343-9 219 pages, incl. 7-page summary and 343 endnotes Available free online at www.policyalternatives.ca. A French translation will be available soon.