Exploring the Link Between Trade and Cultural Protection in the Context of Anti-dumping

Abstract

With the conclusion of the United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) Convention on the Protection and Promotion of the Diversity of Cultural Expressions on 20 October 2005, the complex issue of culture and cultural diversity is gaining a new prominence internationally. Insofar as cultural safeguard instruments are concerned, measures available to domestic cultural industries to respond to the importation of foreign cultural imports are obviously rather limited in the World Trade Organization (WTO). In this article, the author argues that the notion that cultural products are per se unlike is unsuitable for the purpose of the anti-dumping measure. On this point, the conflict arising from the interactions between trade and culture will be particularly identified. In addition, the author also argues that the insertion of public interest clauses into anti-dumping regimes connecting trade and cultural concerns could possibly explore a useful avenue for a society to satisfy its preference for cultural diversity in the anti-dumping action. A case on an ongoing anti-dumping investigation on uncoated printing and writing paper in Taiwan is examined from a cultural perspective.