Abstract

The crisis of the World Trade Organization (WTO) raises a fundamental question: how can the multilateral trading system respond to contemporary global challenges when agreement among all its Members is so difficult to achieve? The demands of sustainable development, the transformation of the economy, the profound changes in global trade, and geopolitical tensions call for new international rules, while persistent negotiating deadlock undermines the WTO’s capacity to fulfill its mandate. In this context, plurilateral tools offer an effective and valuable means of advancing common objectives and contributing to the creation of new rules for international trade in the XXI century, and the WTO system emerges as an essential global platform to promote and facilitate this process. The UNIBO-MAECI project on WTO plurilateral initiatives, global challenges and the new world economic order (“Il sistema multilaterale degli scambi come piattaforma per affrontare le sfide globali: gli Accordi e le Iniziative plurilaterali dell’OMC quali strumenti di governance del nuovo ordine economico mondiale”), co-funded by the Italian Ministry of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation (MAECI), with the support also of the Jean Monnet Chair SustainEUorPlanet, explores the practice of formal and informal plurilateral tools within and outside the multilateral trading system thanks to the work of an international research group composed by senior and junior academics, civil servants and practitioners. The e-book “WTO Plurilateral Initiatives, Global Challenges and the New World Economic Order” gathers all the papers produced during the UNIBO-MAECI project research activities, subsequent to the International Workshop held at the Law School of the University of Bologna on 5 May 2026, to present and discuss the interim results of the international research group.