Negotiating Membership in the WTO and EU
With the accession of Afghanistan in 2016, the World Trade Organization (WTO) numbered 164 members with nineteen other states in line to join. The WTO is certainly not alone in its growth though; the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), and the European Union (EU) are all expanding with dozens of states continuing to negotiate their potential membership. What impact does membership in international organizations really have? Why do some states have a seemingly easy path to joining international organizations while others find the process nearly impossible? What implications do these difficult accession processes have on the domestic and international politics of the acceding states? The author presents the two-level theory of accession, which highlights factors at the domestic level and international organization level, to explain how accession processes in the WTO and EU vary from state to state and the impact of these variations. In so doing, this book provides a unique perspective on the topic of membership in international organizations.
Dr Jamie Elizabeth Scalera is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Political Science and International Studies at Georgia Southern University. She received her PhD in Political Science from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign in 2012. She holds an MA from the University of Florida and a BA from Stetson University. Dr Scalera teaches and researches in the field of International Relations, with a focus on international organizations and international political economy. Dr Scalera’s research has been presented at annual conferences for organizations such as the American Political Science Association, the International Studies Association, and the European Union Studies Association. Dr Scalera’s research has been published in International Organization, European Politics and Society, and Papers & Publications: Interdisciplinary Journal of Undergraduate Research.