The WTO’s Dispute Settlement Body is the most powerful appellate court in the world.

1. The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly: WTO’s Dispute Settlement Body Presentation by Nadia B. Ahmad, Esq. Sustainable Development and Trade (Fall 2011) University of Denver Sturm College of Law September 30, 2011

2. WTO Structure

3. The various stages a dispute can go through in the WTO. The Panel Process

4. The Good

5. The Good The WTO's objectives include: Facilitating, implementing and administering WTO agreements, the Multilateral Trade Agreements and the Plurality Trade Agreements; Providing a forum for trade negotiation; Administering the Dispute Settlement Understanding; Administering the Trade Policy Review Mechanism; and Cooperating with the World Bank, IMF, and other international organizations. Unlike the GATT, the WTO possesses legal personality and a much more powerful dispute resolution system with which to accomplish its objectives.Source: Richard Skeen, Will the WTO Turn Green? The Implications of Injecting Environmental Issues into the Multilateral Trading System, 17 Geo. Int'l Envtl. L. Rev. 161, 166-67 (2004).

6. “[T]he dispute settlement procedure [of the WTO dispute settlement system] is the WTO’s most original contribution to the stability of the world economy.” - Gabrielle Marceau of the Legal Affairs Division of the World Trade Organization (WTO) The Good

9. A supranational technocratic perspective, which appraises the WTO's handling of trade and environment matters as a co-optation of policy-making by a technocratic network of trade policymakers with a neoliberalpolicy orientation. The network is composed of national trade officials working with the WTO Secretariat within the structure of the WTO trade regime. National trade officials, in turn, receive support from large, well-organized private businesses.

10. A stakeholder/civil society perspective, which views the creation of the CTE as a response to ongoing systematic pressure from non-governmental advocacy groups before international and domestic fora to change the norms of the world trading system.Source: The World Trade Organization Under Challenge: Democracy and the Law and Politics of the Wto's Treatment of Trade and Environment Matters, 25 Harv. Envtl. L. Rev. 1, 7-8 (2001).

11. The Bad

13. Seattle WTO meeting in 1999

14. Challenging the legitimacy of WTO decision-making

15. Central claim WTO decisions on trade &environment issues =anti-democratic  lack legitimacy Source:The World Trade Organization Under Challenge: Democracy Adn the Law and Politics of the Wto's Treatment of Trade and Environment Matters, 25 Harv. Envtl. L. Rev. 1 (2001)

20. U.S. Corn Use For Export & Fuel Ethanol

22. Sources The World Trade Organization Under Challenge: Democracy And the Law and Politics of the Wto's Treatment of Trade and Environment Matters, 25 Harv. Envtl. L. Rev. 1 (2001). International Tribunal Spotlight: The World Trade Organization Dispute Settlement System, American Society of International Law and the International Judicial Academy, April 2008, http://www.judicialmonitor.org/archive_0408/spotlight.html. WTO/Doha Issues , http://farmpolicy.com/2007/12/17/wto-doha-issues/. Richard Skeen, Will the WTO Turn Green? The Implications of Injecting Environmental Issues into the Multilateral Trading System, 17 Geo. Int'l Envtl. L. Rev. 161, 166-67 (2004). Marcia Merry Baker, To Defeat Famine: Kill the WTO, http://www.schillerinstitute.org/food_for_peace/kill_WTO.html MBF302-Unit-01-International Trade Policy Framework, http://train-srv.manipalu.com/wpress/?p=143233 SeafoodNews, http://www.vietfish.com/en/detail.php?id=6&&actitle=2522. Understanding the WTO: Settling Disputes, http://www.wto.org/english/thewto_e/whatis_e/tif_e/disp2_e.htm.