WTO目前正在各方面受到挑戰，其多邊貿易談判遭遇許多難解問題，國際政治之角力亦使得整體談判之進展停滯不前。在此情況下，學界及實務界皆轉而提倡WTO應利用軟法機制，以尋思可繼續使WTO推進國際經貿之解方與突破。
在各項軟法機制中，本論文擇選指數（indicators）作為一種軟法工具之應用，對於WTO之可參考之處，以及指數或可對前述WTO目前所遇之難題可有助益之處，並聚焦於WTO在服務貿易上目前所運行中的服務貿易限制性資料庫及指數。
本論文先盤點WTO所遇之難題，接著建立國際管制領域中對指數此一工具之理論基礎與應用，在探討指數之各種正面之可能性、可運用性，及可能之負面影響及技術上之難題後，將前述之發現應用於分析WTO目前所進行之服務貿易限制性指數，並提出相關之觀察與建議。

The WTO is encountering obstacles to further new multilateral trade talks on various issues, and proposals are being raised that it is time for the WTO to shift back to a soft law approach in facilitating any possibilities to continuing the organization’s work on trade liberalization.
Among all the possible soft law approaches as alternatives for the WTO to refer to, this thesis aims at exploring possibilities for WTO to refer to indicators, this new form of governing technologies, to address WTO’s current issues, with the special focus on the updated WTO services trade restrictiveness database and index.
As a useful tool that is gradually gaining popularity in various international regulatory fields, indicators has many functions, such as standard-setting, compliance evaluating, forming consensus on abstract concepts and settling normative standards, can serve as facilitators for WTO to move forward on accumulating more momentum for the multilateral negotiation in the future. With the implications stemming from exploring how previous application of indicators in other issue areas, with cautious about the potential deficits of the application of indicators, and especially the use of ranking, the WTO should utilize indicators more to help in finding and presenting the balance between the pursuit of services trade liberalization and other development-related domestic policy goals.

I. RESEARCH BACKGROUND, OBJECTIVES AND METHODOLOGY 1
A. Research Background and Scope 1
B. Literature Review 5
C. Research Questions 7
D. Research Methods 7
E. Research Outline 8
II. TRADE IN SERVICES IN CONTEXT 9
A. Imperative issues that are jeopardizing the WTO 9
B. Let it go in the frozen status: trade in services 12
1. The lack of real content in trade in services 13
a. Negotiating rounds of trade in services 13
b. Deadlocked negotiation for trade in services 14
2. The Outdated Content of Trade in Services in GATS 16
a. Development Dimension of the GATS Countries 16
b. Transparency requirement in the GATS 17
3. Failure to further the services trade talk in TiSA 19
a. Servicification of World Economy 19
b. Outdated GATS Schedules 20
c. New issues in the Doha Round 21
d. How to Measure Services? The Trade Cost of Regulatory Disparity 22
4. TiSA and other Initiatives to Further Services Trade Rules 23
III. SOFT LAW APPROACH AND GLOBAL GOVERNANCE 26
A. Soft law approach in the WTO 26
1. De-formalization trend in International Law 26
2. Soft law mechanism within WTO 27
3. WTO’s Transparency Provisions 29
a. Trade Policy Review Mechanism 29
b. Disadvantages of the TPRM 30
4. The Need to Develop New Negotiating Structures 30
5. WTO as the leading organization in the regulation of international economic law 32
B. Indicators as a regulatory technology in global governance 33
1. Governance and Regulation 34
2. Global Governance and the regulatory tools 35
3. Indicators as a Global Technology Tool 35
4. Global Governance: Principles and Accountability 37
5. Constructivism 37
6. Constructivism Approach: Indicators in Global Governance 39
7. Sources and Legitimacy of the Norms 40
8. Application of Indicators in the WTO: Constructivism Perspective 41
9. Theories of International Organizations: Orchestration 41
a. Governance: Hierarchy, Delegation, Collaboration and Orchestration 41
b. Governance in WTO 43
c. Orchestration: Soft Law with Indirect Influence that Wield Real Power 44
d. WTO in the context of the orchestration approach 46
e. WTO’s Cooperation with other International Organizations 48
f. OECD: Orchestrator of knowledge production 49
C. Indicators as a regulatory technology in global governance 51
1. Indicators as a technology of global governance 51
2. Critique and doubts to the application of indicators 53
3. Inventory of indicators in the international level 54
IV. LESSONS LEARNED: INDICATORS FOR BUSINESS AND DEVELOPMENT 57
A. Indicators for business or for trade 58
1. World Bank Ease of Doing Business Index 59
a. Why is the DBI so effective? 63
b. Connecting Law and Development 64
c. Lesser regulations bring better business? 64
d. Scandal of the Doing Business in 2018 65
e. Legitimacy to be a governor 66
B. Indicators for development/Narratives indicators/Human rights indicators and WTO Development Index 66
1. Human Rights Indicators 67
a. UN Human Rights 68
b. Definition of Human Rights Indicator 69
c. Human rights and Development 70
d. Functions: Defining the Legal Concepts 70
e. Inventory of Human Rights Indicators 71
f. Monitoring and Evaluating Compliance of human rights protection 72
g. Rank or not to rank? 73
2. Rule of law Index 73
a. Definitional Problem 74
b. As a Platform that unites the Community 75
c. Not meant for comparisons between countries 75
C. The emergence of indicators in international regulatory fields 77
1. A name that implies the embedded ideologies 79
2. Data is ranked in an ordinal manner for comparison 81
3. Data are presented through a simplification process 82
4. Potential to evaluation 82
5. Other features of Indicators 83
D. How indicators influence? 85
E. Implications 88
1. Structural differences 89
2. Indicators and Law 89
3. Downsides of the use of indicators in global governance 90
V. INDICATORS FOR TRADE IN SERVICES: FUTURE STEPS FOR THE WTO 93
A. Initiatives of services trade indicators 93
1. The Services Trade Restrictiveness Database and Index 94
2. APEC STRI/ OECD digital STRI 96
B. Future potential steps for the WTO 99
1. Comments to the WTO Services Trade Index 99
2. The possibility of a WTO development index? 101
3. Role of the WTO Secretariat 104
a. The impact of the WTO Secretariat 104
b. The conflicts between the administrative and the legal branches 106
VI. CONCLUSION 107
BIBLIOGRAPHY 109

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Case Study
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