The World Trade Organization: A Citizen's Guide Book

Since the aborted WTO meeting in Seattle in 1999, whenever politicians and government officials gather to negotiate new trade deals, ordinary citizens gather to protest. Why? Is the WTO really a threat to Canadians and the population of other countries? And why is it at the heart of other trade deals like NAFTA and the proposed free trade agreement for the Americas?

This book offers a rare independent but informed account of what the WTO is and how it is using its extraordinary powers to supervise and overrule the actions of national governments.

Canadians have already felt the sting of WTO policies and decisions in the successful United States challenge to Canada's powers to maintain cultural protection for magazines. So have many other countries, in decisions touching on labour rights, environmental protection, and public health.

Steven Shrybman offers an authoritative view of the WTO and its growing dominance in areas ranging from agriculture and the environment to labour, culture, health care, and water. He shows how effectively the WTO promotes the interests of global corporations at the expense of people in countries everywhere and offers ideas for mounting effective challenges to its power. - Maude Barlow

About the Author:
Steven Shrybman is an Ottawa-based lawyer who practises international trade law with the firm of Sack Goldblatt Mitchell. The former Executive Director of the West Coast Environmental Law Association, he has written extensively on a variety of legal and environmental subjects.