A Normative Model For Global Trade Negotiations

While the world sees increasing transnational activity with its attendant cross-border social and economic dependencies, we continue to cling to an aging Westphalian model of international relations. Free Trade Agreements are negotiated and struck between sovereign states with little regard to further-reaching implications. When we consider a proposed Agreement between the EU and India, and what that could potentially mean for Least Developed Countries dependent on Indian-produced pharmaceuticals, we become acutely aware of the need for a moral framework to guide such transnational interactions. Moving away from a state-centred approach to normative concerns on the global field, I propose that the morally relevant units be functionally delineated based on the spheres of influence of global institutional structures, such as the international trade regime. With this shift in focus, I argue that the existing dependency of impoverished nations on Indian pharmaceuticals places morally significant constraints on the EU-India Trade negotiations.