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Free Trade Agreements and Responsible Business: Examples from the EU’s Bilateral Agreements in East and Southeast Asia

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Asian Nations and Multinationals

Abstract

This chapter analyses the impact of free trade agreements on responsible business in Asian emerging economies. We review the origins of the discussion on sustainable development in international negotiations and conventions, and explore the EU’s three FTAs with Asian countries, i.e., South Korea, Singapore and Vietnam with respect to references to corporate social responsibility and sustainable development. Our main finding is the gradual evolution of the EU’s FTAs towards including more explicit clauses on environmental and labour issues. This conforms to the idea of multilateralising regionalism, i.e., that issues may be first agreed in bilateral or regional FTAs and then gradually transferred to the multilateral level. Despite not incurring direct impacts on firms, this may serve as an institutional push for countries to address the need for responsible business in national legislation.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    The agreements, such as the EU-Korea FTA , cover also non-tariff barriers, aim to open trade in services and investments and include provisions in competition policy, government procurement, intellectual property rights (IPR), and transparency in regulation and sustainable development (DG Trade 2018a).

  2. 2.

    Member countries: Indonesia , Malaysia, the Philippines , Singapore , Thailand , Vietnam , Cambodia , Laos , Myanmar , and Brunei.

  3. 3.

    Interviews were conducted with six persons: an official of the EU Delegation in Korea , Seoul; two officials of the Finnish Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Department of External Economic Relations, Helsinki; a representative of the EU Chamber of Commerce in Malaysia, Kuala Lumpur; and two officials of the Finnish Embassy in Korea , Seoul; all took place between December 2015 and May 2017.

  4. 4.

    Interview A.

  5. 5.

    CARIFORUM is the Caribbean subgroup within the African, Caribbean and Pacific (ACP) group.

  6. 6.

    The agreement can be found at http://ec.europa.eu/trade/policy/countries-and-regions/regions/caribbean/.

  7. 7.

    Interview A.

  8. 8.

    The freedom of association and the right to collective bargaining; the elimination of forced labour; the abolition of child labour; and the elimination of discrimination in employment.

  9. 9.

    Interview B.

  10. 10.

    This was the EU’s first ever FTA with an Asian country. Negotiations were launched in 2007 and the FTA signed in October 2010, ratified in May 2011 and provisionally applied in July 2011. The agreement fully entered into force in December 2015.

  11. 11.

    Interview C; Interview A.

  12. 12.

    Interview D.

  13. 13.

    The EU-Singapore negotiations were launched in March 2010 and completed in October 2014. The agreement has been approved by the European Commission and needs to be agreed upon by the Council and the European Parliament before it can be put fully in force (DG Trade 2018b).

  14. 14.

    Interview B.

  15. 15.

    Interview E.

  16. 16.

    The negotiations were launched in June 2012 and concluded in December 2015. The agreement text was published in February 2016, now being under legal review after which it needs to be ratified by the European Parliament (DG Trade 2018c).

  17. 17.

    Interview E.

  18. 18.

    Interview F.

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Turku School of Economics, University of Turku, Turku, Finland

    Erja Kettunen-Matilainen

  2. School of Business, Economics and Law, University of Gothenburg, Gothenburg, Sweden

    Claes G. Alvstam

Authors
  1. Erja Kettunen-Matilainen
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  2. Claes G. Alvstam
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Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. University of Limerick, Limerick, Ireland

    Bernadette Andreosso-O’Callaghan

  2. University of Pau and Pays de l’Adour, Pau, France

    Jacques Jaussaud

  3. Ca Foscari University of Venice, Venice, Italy

    M. Bruna Zolin

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Kettunen-Matilainen, E., Alvstam, C.G. (2018). Free Trade Agreements and Responsible Business: Examples from the EU’s Bilateral Agreements in East and Southeast Asia. In: Andreosso-O’Callaghan, B., Jaussaud, J., Zolin, M. (eds) Asian Nations and Multinationals. Palgrave Pivot, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-00913-7_2

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-00913-7_2

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