This article argues that the Appellate Body should interpret the WTO agreements narrowly as a self-contained, contractual regime limited to interstitial interpretations. Claims that the trade regime is subject to modifications by controversial customary international legal norms or should be...

The Article proposes new interpretations of GATT Article XX to minimize the harmful effects of recent WTO jurisprudence that threaten to undermine the goals of the trading system and diminish the role of states in policymaking. In the Shrimp/Turtle cases the WTO's Appellate Body (AB) utilized an...