Is James O'Brien finally asking the right questions?

James O'Brien has two simple questions to make Brexit-supporters look foolish over their desire for a no-deal Brexit.@mrjamesob | #Brexit pic.twitter.com/ZRAV3SccWJ

— LBC (@LBC) August 8, 2018

The problem with cleverdicks like James O'Brien is they eventually over reach and demonstrate that they're are about as ignorant as those they chastise. Here O'Brien gets cocky asking "Who elected the people who run the WTO?" and "When did we vote to join it?".

I don't know what he thinks these questions prove. The WTO has no direct authority. It is not a supranational entity. It is a framework and an intergovernmental forum. It does not regulate nor can it exert authority. No member is subordinate to it and it does not enjoy legal supremacy. And that is the beef Brexiters have with the EU.

But it's not surprising O'Brien has not grasped the difference. This confusion stems from the fact that we have never really been clear on exactly what the EU is. Some see it as a political alliance, others see it as a trade bloc and others see it as a multilateral forum. Except it isn't. It's a government.

If we'd had an honest referendum the question really should have been "Do you want the UK to remain a subordinate of a supreme government for Europe?" That way there would have been no doubt that we knew what we were voting for.

In 1975 we voted to be part of the EEC but we never got a vote the matter of the EU - and unlike the WTO it does involve the mass transfer of sovereignty. That matter being the reason we didn't seek a public vote on the WTO. It assumes no power over us. But O'Brien is right. It is all about accountability, democracy and transparency. 

There is certainly a question of accountability not just over the WTO but also the entire domain of global governance - much of which is obscured from view by the EU. Insofar as our media bothers to report on anything outside of the Westminster bubble, traditionally very poor at reporting on EU affairs outside of a crisis, there is virtually no public scrutiny of the WTO. Here we find the WTO entering formal associations with e-commerce giants which may not even be legal. 

The WTO has until recently remained a somewhat anonymous entity and most people are barely aware it exists let alone have a coherent idea of what it does. Increasingly, though, it is becoming a pivotal instrument shaping multilateral and bilateral agreements, effectively giving official status to a number of international regulatory organisations and specialised agencies. The WTO is just the tip of a global governance iceberg. 

For all that's been said about the UK becoming a rule taker, the EU itself is a passive recipient of rules from any number of standards bodies where even the Commission is only dimly aware of how lobbyists can subvert the system. In these bodies the EU, having legal personality, gradually replaces member states thanks to the Common Commercial Policy, where the EU dictates our vote and removes our right of initiative. It is entirely possible, therefore, that the UK is obliged to accept standards it would otherwise veto and had no say in. 

On everything from food marketing standards to vehicle safety features, all the way through to fishing net sizes and radio and internet conventions, we find we have inadequate means of veto. Most of the time nobody cares - and there is little here worth going to the barricades over, but recent panics about "chlorinated chicken" and "hormone beef" show that consumers do care about food standards. It is, therefore, entirely unacceptable that these standards could be traded away in secret even if the UK objects. 

One of the immediate benefits of Brexit is that it has reignited a debate about trade and once more we are hearing from consumer groups, environmental groups and the farming lobby where the UK is rapidly acquiring an institutional knowledge of trade issues, and once again trade deals will be front page news rather than EU minutia related to the business pages of the broadsheets. For as long as trade remains an EU competence and outside of our own political culture (or demos) it will continue to be ignored by our politicians and media alike.

And that's really what Brexit is about - putting the decision making back where we can see it, back in our own political arena. The fact that James O'Brien is now starting to ask these questions about the WTO is long overdue. Who is elected at the WTO? Who gains access to our ambassadors and under what circumstances? With the recent IEA tapes scandal it's about time we asked these questions. Can anyone even name our WTO ambassador? I can. I bet James O'Brien can't.

And why stop there? What about the ILO, Codex, UNECE, IMO, ITU, ISO and the WHO? To whom are they accountable? What is the process for adopting the regulations they produce and what scrutiny is given to it? Hitherto, the decision to adopt such rules and standards lies at the Brussels level - which is why our own MPs have never even heard of these bodies. 

Where technical governance is concerned very often the EU is little more then a rubber stamp. There is no possible way MEPs can adequately scrutinise any of this not least because most of them are intellectually subnormal. 

We then get into the much bigger debates. The WTO Agreement on Technical Barriers to Trade is possibly the first building block toward a global single market, essentially putting global standards at the forefront of trade. Along with measures from the World Customs Organisation and International Maritime Organisation, combined with new blockchain technologies, some aspects of the EU single market become obsolete.

As this patchwork of multilateral agreements matures, not least the WTO Government Procurement Agreement and any future deal on services, will the WTO eventually face the same criticisms about eroding sovereignty? If rules on competition and subsidy are locked into the global rules based system then we have effectively legislated against socialism. I certainly won't complain, but this does tend to highlight the dilemma of globalisation. You can have trade liberalisation, regulatory harmonisation, and a level playing field, but in so doing we limit the potency of democracy. 

We are now moving into an age where regional solutions to problems are insufficient. The internet brings entirely new problems that require global solutions, as indeed does tax avoidance and evasion. Should we therefore be looking to replace the EU with a global construct? And how can we democratise it?

There actually isn't much difference between the rabid extremes of leave and remain. They are both forms of identarian nativism - which is particularly prevalent in remainers whose horizons do not extend much further than Brussels. The debate on regulation and standards stubbornly refuses to acknowledge the role of global governance. All of this raises questions as to how we usefully exercise sovereignty and the limitations of it where even outside the EU many of the same questions remain.

For as long as we remain in the EU, Brussels will be the fullest extent of our external engagement and the role of international governance will continue to grow in the shadows - ever more the plaything of giant corporations who make profound decisions affecting all of us without our knowledge. 

James O'Brien asks "who elected the bloke in charge" of the WTO. The real question is whether it would be any more democratic if he were elected. Quite obviously the answer is no, but then if that is true of the WTO then it is also true of the EU. Governance on this scale simply cannot be democratic. If we are moving to a model of distributed technocracy then we must ask what safeguards we have to ensure we can defend our interests and the things we value. 

To even begin to answer that question we must ask "who is we?". In this regard you need a functioning demos. One that shares the same heritage, customs and culture and language. Whatever our international aspirations, the truth is that the nation state is the only effective arena for democratic politics yet discovered.

You will get no argument from me that the WTO option is a non-starter and that the "Brextremist" WTO fetish is bonkers, but the WTO is but one forum among many where the UK needs to be fully engaged in its own right - and as we move into the era of hyper-globalisation, decision making in respect of our global interactions cannot be off-shored to Brussels. We cannot be sleeping passengers of global events.