China's government procurement negotiations in the electric energy sector with WTO members

Purpose - – Throughout negotiations to access the Government Procurement Agreement (GPA) of the WTO, China maintained the position of excluding the electric energy sector (EES) from its offers, despite the urging of several GPA members. The purpose of this paper is to raise a question regarding what these countries have to offer in exchange for their own requirements. Can they offer reciprocal conditions, one of the fundamental negotiation principles of the GPA? If not, could this help explain China's position? Design/methodology/approach - – This paper addresses this negotiation problem by proposing a new theoretical model that emerges from the case of China. The suggested model is tested through a multiple case study comparative analysis of EES openness of 32 members of GPA: Canada, the 28 countries of the European Union, Japan, Korea and the USA within the context of the GPA. Findings - – The findings not only suggest that the examined countries cannot offer reciprocity in regards to their requirements of China, but that their openness among each other is also marginal. Therefore, reciprocity is a condition of success in GPAs among countries and the suggested theoretical model is corroborated and grounded in multiple cases. Research limitations/implications - – The suggested theoretical model provides an approach to better equilibrate parties’ openness among international agreements on government procurement (GP). Nevertheless, these negotiations expose the problematic nature of information accessibility, as well as the comparability of specific data that are available, and that the real equilibrium rests on companies that are awarded contracts after an agreement is signed. Practical implications - – This exploratory research addresses actual negotiation problems with a new theoretical model that can be useful for negotiators and policy makers as well as for foreign multinational companies to better understand whether or not a given country will liberalize their GP. Originality/value - – The suggested theoretical model can be generalized to other sectors of activity or similar agreements to better understand the strategic stakes of a country within the realm of such negotiations.