Trade Politics Ain't What It Used to Be: The European Union in the Doha Round*

The European Union is a key player in the Doha Development Round of multilateral trade negotiations. This article argues that its negotiating position reflects distinctive patterns of politics underlying three aspects of trade policy – traditional trade policy, commercial policy and social trade policy – characterized by different sets of actors and political dynamics. Although there is significant variation in the substance of the EU's position within each aspect of trade policy, their distinctive patterns of politics help to explain why the EU's negotiating position is most liberal in traditional trade policy and least in social trade policy.