their emergence through strengthening of the intellectual property regime. A coalition of
high-tech firms and the motion picture association has pushed forward this trade agenda,
while bipartisan support in Congress has urged the government to negotiate agreements to
remove barriers to e-commerce in legislation, such as the 1998 Internet Tax Freedom Act
(Wunsch-Vincent, 2003, 9). The resistance centers around many WTO members, such as
the EU, Australia, and Canada, that are reluctant to liberalize cultural and audiovisual
services, and argue that digital products are services rather than goods. The United States
has pursued a comprehensive agreement as part of the Doha round, e-commerce and other
issues for the digital agenda received only brief mention in the Doha agenda. The talks
remain stalled at present as hard-liners resist any compromises (ibid., 26). With greater
success, the United States has pursued bilateral agreements with countries that were willing
to forgo any cultural exception clauses. The U.S. FTA agreements with Chile and Singapore
have embraced parts of the digital trade agenda to freeze existing regulations, which meant
granting full market access for new media where no discriminatory regulations currently
existed (ibid., 30). The clear pattern emerges of establishing solid model agreements with
countries that have little resistance, while using the WTO forum to raise the issue with the
strongest opponents.
Conclusion
Deciding where to negotiate a trade dispute is increasingly difficult given the range of
options. Multiple negotiation fora offer different combinations of institutional features that
can apply leverage for liberalization. Each configuration reflects the interests of states at the
time they designed the institution. A specific negotiation, however, involves the contingent
decisions of two governments that face immediate pressure from their respective interest
groups. Along with concern for diplomatic costs, the level of interest group pressure is an
important factor that influences state choice of negotiation forum.
The political pressures on governments regarding forum choice indicate that the hardest
cases are likely to go forward to the formal dispute process. Strong interest group pressure
on the demanding side pushes for initiation while strong interest group resistance on the
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