These sharp statements were important, because they indicated that the possibility of any kind of "success" in the negotiations was unlikely even leaving aside the street protests by NGOs and other groups that garnered most of the publicity. Of course the post-mortem on the Seattle talks will continue for some time, as different reasons for the failure are put forward by different groups. Some NGOs have seen this as a famous victory, and certainly the public protests were what dominated the headlines and television screens.
 
But this would not have been enough to scuttle negotiations which have been planned for more than a year, if at least one of the major players - the US - had not played along. The US administration behaved like one determined to kill these particular talks, whether in the cavalier and arrogant manner in which it handled the negotiations, or in the way in which Clinton used the street protests to push an agenda - linking trade sanctions with labour and environmental standards - which had already been rejected very clearly by most WTO members. In the process, the US also succeeded in sidelining the demands which had been made by most developing countries for stocktaking and review of the Uruguay Round Agreements and of the mode of functioning of the WTO.
 
But ascribing the failure of the talks to the US stance alone would be too simplistic. In any case, the street protests themselves were far more wide ranging than was projected by the US administration and the western media - they encompassed not just Northern labour and environment issues but also deep concerns of developing country citizens on the negative effects of the functioning of the GATT agreements and the WTO so far. These ranged from the adverse effects of more open economies on employment, work security and labour conditions, to greater exposure and vulnerability to international capital flows and less bargaining power vis-a-vis large multinational companies, to reduced possibilities for autonomous industrialisation and theft and monopoly of knowledge through the TRIPS agreement.
 
In fact, the really significant fact about Seattle may be that, after a very long time, many developing countries actually came together to voice their concern at these processes and displeasure at the manner in which decisions were being forced upon them. The absence of even a semblance of unity among developing countries has been an important reason why they have so far been unable to push through even a minimal common agenda at the WTO. A more active and united approach at least on some basic areas of concern would go a long way towards a more democratic and less unfair agreement.

Thus it could be argued, as Martin Khor of Third World Network has suggested, that "the more basic cause of the Seattle debacle was the untransparent and undemocratic nature of the WTO system, the blatant manipulation of that system by the major powers, and the refusal of many developing countries to continue to be on the receiving end."
 
The seeds of what could therefore be seen as a kind of North-South battle were sown in Geneva in the weeks before Seattle. A large number of developing countries voiced their disillusionment that five years after the WTO's creation they had not seen any benefits. Further, the poorer and smaller countries face potentially enormous dislocation when they attempt to implement their obligations arising from the WTO's many agreements.
 
In Geneva, such developing countries, including many of the Least developed Countries, had put forward dozens of proposals to resolve the "problems of implementation" of the WTO agreements, including changing some of the rules. But most of their demands were summarily dismissed by the major powers like US and EU. Instead, the latter pushed for their own proposals to further empower the WTO through introducing new areas such as investment, competition, government procurement, labour and environmental standards.
 
The developing countries in general had been opposing these new issues which they saw as either opening up their markets further to the rich nations' big companies, or giving the rich nations new protectionist tools to block imports from incipient industrialisers or semi-industrialised countries. The road to Seattle was marked with some trepidation on their part that these issues would be pushed through nonetheless, and indeed that danger still remains once the work starts again in Geneva in January. But the degree of disgust with the process which prompted the protest statements may still work to give impetus to a common stand by many small developing countries.