Sauvé, Pierre --- "A plurilateral agenda for services? Assessing the case for a Trade in Services Agreement (TISA)" [2014] ELECD 342; in Sauvé, Pierre; Shingal, Anirudh (eds), "The Preferential Liberalization of Trade in Services" (Edward Elgar Publishing, 2014) 413

Book Title: The Preferential Liberalization of Trade in Services

Editor(s): Sauvé, Pierre; Shingal, Anirudh

Publisher: Edward Elgar Publishing

ISBN (hard cover): 9781782548959

Section: Chapter 11

Section Title: A plurilateral agenda for services? Assessing the case for a Trade in Services Agreement (TISA)

Author(s): Sauvé, Pierre

Number of pages: 20

Abstract/Description:

On 15 February 2013, the European Commission formally proposed (in a submission to the European Council) opening negotiations on a new international agreement on trade in services. Initially called the International Services Agreement (ISA), the proposed plurilateral treaty currently involves a self-selected coalition of 23 WTO Members belonging to the so-called Really Good Friends of Services (RGFS) grouping. It has since been re-named the Trade in Services Agreement (TISA). The RGFS aims for the agreement to comply with WTO rules so it can be "multilateralized" at a later stage. The Commission's initiative came on the heels of a similar process launched a few weeks earlier by the Obama administration in the United States.