Maritime policy in China after WTO : legal & economic approach

Abstract

It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity. Charles Dickens:Tale of Two Cities Just as what Dickens wrote in the 19th century, it's both fortunate and unfortunate to for us be an academic researcher in the 21st century. We are fortunate for the advanced technology, which make the research resources easy to be accessed; for the completed research system, which set a universal rule for global researchers; for the detailed academic disciplines, which make the research more standardized. But we are also unfortunate for that everything has been said, and we have come too late, now that men have been living and thinking for seven thousand years and more. With the globalization of the world economy, the maritime industry is becoming increasingly important. This research is motivated by the contrast between the importance of the contemporary maritime industry and the sparsity of systematic and in-depth research of legal and economic theories that underpin it. Despite the paramount importance of the maritime industry for globalization and international trade, many fundamental legal and economic issues underpinning maritime policies remain unknown and deserve to be thoroughly investigated. From a theoretical point of view, very few attempts have thus far been made to explore the relation between national economy and the development of maritime industry. This research is also motivated by the vital role of maritime policies in any sort of economies and the shortage of such studies in the era of globalization. Traditional research in this filed is confined to the dispute between protectionism and liberalism in the formulation of maritime policy, and not sophisticated enough to reflect the complicate relation between maritime policy and the development of national maritime industry and to provide insights on the formulating process of maritime policy. In the existent research, the observation on maritime policies of a specific nation is either based on subjective assumption, or has ignored the continuous change of maritime policies. Although quantitive methods have been applied to economic and social research in modern times, it is still in absentia regarding legal research or cross-disciplinary research. Taking above background into consideration, this research contributes to the existing literature in three aspects. First, the legal and economic theories underpinning the maritime industry, such as the formulating process of maritime policy, and the relationship between economic indicators and maritime policy, are not only analyzed by applying legal and economic theory - in particular the analytic jurisprudence and economic sociology, but also examined empirically by applying quantitive methodology. Most work in this aspect is original and, potentially, makes an important contribution to central government upon the formulation of maritime policy against maritime development and governance. Secondly, for the first time, new indicators, i.e. National Carriage Rate (NCR) and National Seafarer Employment Rate (NSER), have been introduced to examine the development of national maritime industry. Index method is then applied for the quantification of maritime policy in the context of the World Trade Organization (WTO). Through these preparations, the relation between three defined indicators, i.e. NCR, NSER and Balance of Payments (BOP) rate, and national maritime policy is established. The empirical results disclose the specific relation between each indicator and maritime policy, which provides an optimum approach to the formulation of national maritime policy. Regarding a specific nation, an optimum maritime policy refers to maritime policies that are the most appropriate to the development of national maritime industry. Finally, this study makes a comprehensive review upon the development of China maritime industry and legal reform in shipping policies, and provides in-depth legislative suggestions for China government to optimize the future development of its maritime industry for the benefit of its wider economy and social welfare maximization.