Simon Lester and Bryan Mercurio with Arwel Dawies and Kara Leitner, World Trade Law: Text, Materials and Commentary

Abstract

The growing practical importance of international economic law and the rising scholarly interest in this subdiscipline of public international law – aptly demonstrated by the successful launch of this yearbook – could not have been without impact on academic teaching of the subject. New courses at undergraduate and postgraduate levels have been established at universities worldwide; international economic law is no longer a field only taught to master’s degree students at a few specialized universities in the USA and Europe. The “mainstreaming” of international economic law into law school curricula, i.e. the inclusion of the subject into general undergraduate programmes, is on the rise. Arguably, the number of students studying international economic law, and the law of the Word Trade Organization (WTO) in particular, may have never been as high as in recent years. As a consequence, these are (intellectually and financially) rewarding times to write and publish teaching material on international economic law. Yet, the market is becoming increasingly contested and competition among the leading textbooks is fierce. For those teaching and those studying international economic law, this is good news, because it enables them to select books which serve their respective educational objectives best. From this perspective, the publication of a new textbook on international trade law is always a welcome addition to an already wide and diverse choice of books.