The International Technical Standards and their Legal Effects in the Light of the TBT Agreements

In recent times, international technical standards have come to the fore as one of the most pervasive expressions of globalization and of international private governance. Because of their deep impact on international trade, the WTO Agreement on Technical Barriers to Trade has tried to regulate the way standards are utilized, demanding that Member States adopt international technical standards in their regulations in order to avoid hidden regulatory protectionism. However, the TBT Agreement does not specify which standards must be used and to what extent technical regulations should conform to standards. The recent case law of the Appellate Body seems to cast light on these problems, dictating parameters that should guide these choices especially in contexts characterized by numerous competing standards regulating the same field. In the light of this jurisprudence, the manner through which international technical standards become part of the administrative laws of the United States and the European Union and the differences that exist between the American and the European systems of standardization are of great significance with regard to the negotiation of the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership.