Outlook for the Global Trading System and the WTO

Alan Wm. Wolff, deputy director-general of the World Trade Organization, addressed the current status and outlook for the global trading system and the World Trade Organization (WTO) at the Peterson Institute for International Economics (PIIE) on December 17, 2018. PIIE Senior Fellow and Director Emeritus C. Fred Bergsten moderated the discussion session.

Wolff became deputy director-general on October 1, 2017, following a distinguished career in the US government and the private bar. He was deputy special representative for trade negotiations in the Carter administration, during which time he was a key architect of the Tokyo Round of multilateral trade negotiations in the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT) and first chairman of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) Steel Committee. He served as general counsel to the US Trade Representative in the Ford administration. He subsequently practiced trade law and resolved some of the largest trade disputes on record. He was chairman of the National Foreign Trade Council from 2011 to 2017.