The Impact of Countries’ Previous Legal Disputes in WTO on Their Current Cases

The dispute resolution mechanism in the World Trade Organization is a way of leveraging in the political and economic relationships. Countries’ legal knowledge plays a substantial role on disputes’ initiation and continuation. This study assesses the effect of previous WTO disputes on the hazard rate of attendance in a new one, using survival analysis. Our dataset encompasses 427 disputes from 1995 to 2011. Results indicate that 1% increase in a country’s number of previous disputes is associated with a 2.40% higher hazard rate of attendance in a new dispute. The highly elastic behavior of hazard rate with regard to past experiences is confirmed for both respondents and complainants. Moreover, we find that developing countries and GATT members are more likely to enter a dispute. Results are robust with respect to variation in model and control variables.