GATT, the WTO, and Multilateral Trade

After the Second World War, an attempt to create a full International Trade Organization failed to win approval from the United States Congress, and in its place twenty-three countries signed the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT) in Geneva in 1947 as a more limited, provisional framework for reducing tariffs and settling trade disputes. Over the following decades, GATT operated through a series of negotiating "rounds," including Geneva (1947), Annecy (1949), Torquay (1950-51), the Dillon Round (1960-61), the Kennedy Round (1964-67), and the Tokyo Round (1973-79), each progressively lowering industrial tariffs among an expanding roster of member countries and gradually extending disciplines to non-tariff barriers as well.