Focus on: Non-Trade Concerns in International Trade: Public Health and Labour Standards - 2023 Summer Academy

The COVID-19 pandemic has brought to the fore longstanding concerns about how trade policy and its implementation bear on the fulfilment of public health outcomes. Trade policy settings can enable and facilitate access to vital medicine and medical technologies such as vaccines and personal protective equipment, but can also impede or disrupt production and supply chains. And the intellectual property system has attracted particular scrutiny, given its role in the innovation of new medical technologies and its impact on their equitable and effective diffusion dimension, especially at times when stark inequities in access were evident.

This course provides a comprehensive, multi-disciplinary overview of the legal instruments, international institutions, domestic strategies and practical programs and initiatives involved in the trade policy dimension of the response to global health challenges, as exemplified by the pandemic. 

This module focuses on public approaches to protect labor standards through trade. Specifically, it focuses on the rise, design, determinants and impact of labor clauses in free trade agreements.

By the end of the course, participants will be able to:

• Conceptualize and analyze labor provisions in FTAs using the state-of-the-art LABPTA dataset;
• Explain the rise and design of labor provisions in FTAs;
• Assess the social and economic impact of the inclusion of labor provisions in FTAs;
• Evaluate recent policy reforms in labor / sustainable development chapters of FTAs in Europe and beyond;
• Reflect upon the interlinkages and potential trade-offs between the economic and social objectives of trade-labor linkage strategies.

Lecturers: Antony Taubman and Damian Raess
Dates: 10-14 July 2023
ECTS: 3

Download the full syllabus here

Apply ASAP to secure your place!