It’s also a rules-based organisation. China breaks the WTO’s state-owned entity rules, its access around domestic market rules, its freedom of navigation rules, its IP protection rules, et cetera.
China was admitted when it was non-compliant, with the belief that admission would drive opening and compliance [1]. That hypothesis is not sustained by evidence.
[1] https://www.economist.com/leaders/2018/03/01/how-the-west-go...
From the decision, each party can discuss a settlement, and if no agreement is reached the wronged party is free to apply whatever retaliation it judges fair to the wrongdoing party.
The WTO’s decision would serve as a backing of the retaliation, to prove they are not just arbitrary.
In that sense China breaking the rules is a issue with the “victim” country who needs to retaliate if no other means is available, with eventually help from ally countries if they want to make an example.
That’s what is happening. China repeatedly broke rules and ignored international arbitration orders (see: UNCLOS tribunal brought forth by the Philippines). They were given the benefit of doubt (a) under Obama and (b) before they became a dictatorship.
The rules of the World Trade Organization must be set by the world trading countries, not by the US. Maybe China violates so many rules because they are tailored to (made for and by) the US.
Said another way: who says that the western way is the only or the best way? Is our system working so well? We need rules which allow for different economic systems to trade with each other.
Once you have world-wide acceptable rules, you enforce those rules. Breaking the rules is part of being in the system, and exactly the reason why a WTO is needed: to arbitrate.
The rules I described are the rules of the WTO. They are a reasonable precondition for being treated as a free trading nation, a designation which comes with tremendous economic benefits but also risks to other trading nations.
> to arbitrate
The last time China was taken to international arbitration (by the Philippines) it ignored the rulings. China is presently brazenly breaking WTO rules. If you’re playing a board game with someone who continues to break the rules, the solution isn’t to talk about it while continuing play.
It does not need to make value judgement about the internal politics, for those issues we have other international bodies.