door of the public procurement market to countries which do not open their public
procurement market to the EU. This new directive will mainly involve the USA,
China, etc. Trade frictions between China and the EU may further increase.
3.5 The Issue Concerning Full Market Economy Status
The issue concerning China’s“market economy status”was unavoidable in the
decade-long course of the China-EU Comprehensive Strategic Partnership. This
issue was mentioned in all of the China-EU leaders’meetings. China allocated a lot
of diplomatic resources to this aspect. In 2003, China launched a diplomatic action
to seek recognition of China’s market economy status by the EU and the USA;
however, so far success has not yet been achieved.
The issue concerning China’s“full market economy status”in China-EU rela-
tions and the commonly-known market economy status are two concepts. The issue
concerning China’s“full market economy status” in China-EU relations is an
operable legal issue only limited to the area of anti-dumping rather than a debate on
value concepts and a debate on market economy legitimacy.
The market economy status issue is a derivative understanding from the
GATT/WTO anti-dumping rules. Some member countries had developed market
economy status terms in their own anti-dumping regulations in the course of
China’sfiling of an application for rejoining the GATT and negotiations regarding
China’s accession to the WTO. As required by these member countries, according
to the GATT Article VI and its Explanatory Notes, it was further determined that in
anti-dumping investigations against Chinese products, these member countries
could conditionally identify China’s non-market economy status, and based on this,
choose prices from a analogue country to conduct anti-dumping investigations.
However, this practice would be terminated 15 years later; in other words, after
December 23, 2016, prices or costs from the third country cannot be chosen to
determine a dumping margin in anti-dumping investigations against Chinese
products. This negotiation result was written into Article XV of the Protocol on
China’s Accession to the WTO. Except for this, neither the WTO rules nor legal
documents concerning China’s accession to the WTO specify any requirements or
doubts about China’s system of market economy. Except in the anti-dumping
investigation procedure, China is not required to obtain recognition of being a
market economy country from other countries and even if China is recognized as a
market economy country, such recognition will not have any significance.
The WTO does not require the“identity”—market economy country. Therefore, the
so-called market economy status is only limited to the scope of anti-dumping
investigations against Chinese products launched by other member countries; more
precisely, whether the treatment—“market economy status”—is accorded to the
object of investigation during anti-dumping investigation. It is unnecessary to
expand on this issue as to whether China’s economic reform achievements have
been recognized, whether China needs to“enter the market”. Establishing a full
86 C. Xin