International Trade Subsidy Rules and Tax and Financial Export Incentives: From Limitations on Fiscal Sovereignty to Development-Inducing Mechanisms

International Trade Subsidy Rules and Tax and Financial Export Incentives is an inquiry into the interrelations between international trade subsidy rules and the use of tax and financial export incentives by developing countries. Its central claim is that developing countries should be allowed to adopt - based on their right to development - certain such incentives without violating the World Trade Organization (WTO) rules concerning subsidies. It advances the idea that the right to development of developing and least-developed countries (LDCs) entitles them to use tax and financial export incentives vis-à-vis comparatively more developed nations. However, in order to actualize this right, the existing WTO regulations must go through a process of revision. This process should craft an exception, available exclusively to developing countries and LDCs, allowing them to apply fiscal and financial export incentives against countries with a higher level of development, without being accused of granting prohibited subsidies. As a result of this policy reform, the WTO itself would incorporate development and fair/just trade concerns into its regulatory framework, providing an exceptional treatment for a patently exceptional situation. In doing so, the WTO would be contributing to a more equal international trade scene and a more developed and freer world.