The trade principles of Western liberal democracies are at the core of international trade law regimes and standards. Are non-Western societies uniformly adopting international standards, or are they adapting them to local norms and cultural values?

This volume presents a new conceptual approach – the paradigm of selective adaptation – to explore and explain the reception of international trade law in the Pacific Rim. Building on a conceptual discussion of the normative and institutional contexts for international law, the contributors draw on examples from China, Japan, Thailand, and North America to show that formal acceptance of international trade standards through accession to the World Trade Organization and the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade does not necessarily translate into uniform enforcement and acceptance at the local level. This book provides compelling evidence that non-uniform compliance will be a legitimate outcome of the globalization of international trade law.