Analyzing China's Participation in the World Trade Organization: A Constructivist Approach.

Economic integration and trade liberalization are two issue areas that require constant negotiations and cooperation, for which nation states have to adjust their domestic and foreign policies according to their partners. China's entry into the World Trade Organization (WTO) in 2001 can therefore serve as a good example, which shows the gradual learningprocess of China to embed in global economy and the existing trading regulations. This paper will test Johnston (2008)'s theory on China in international institutions. By applying three important micro processes- mimicking, social influence, and persuasion-the research paper aims at exploring the socialization process of China in the WTO during the recent years. We treat the WTO as an institutional environment where this socialization process occurs. In this study, the legal framework and official documents of the WTO are considered as the structure that interacts with agents in this study. Finally, the socialization processes take place during China's interaction with other actors and with the existing norms. Mimicking, social influence, and persuasion are three important aspects, which will be separately dealt with in later part of this paper. The evaluation of these processes and policy implications about China's participation in WTO will be provided at the end. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]