Export Controls—International Coordination: Issues for Congress

Export Controls—International Coordination: Issues for Congress

Export Controls—International Coordination:
September 8, 2023
Issues for Congress
Christopher A. Casey
Since the 1940s, the United States has maintained a regime of peacetime controls on exports for
Analyst in International
national security, foreign policy, and economic purposes. During that time, Congress has
Trade and Finance
increasingly emphasized, through both legislation and oversight, the importance of coordinating

export controls with allies and partners. Coordination, Congress asserts, can increase the
effectiveness and decrease the costs of controls by ensuring that (1) controlled goods and

technologies are not widely available from alternative sources; and (2) U.S. exporters are not
disadvantaged vis-à-vis foreign competitors who might be freer to sell their wares.
Since 1949, the United States has coordinated its controls with allies and partners in a variety of fora. During the Cold War,
the United States was a part of the Coordinating Committee for Multilateral Export Controls (CoCom), an exclusive,
informal organization, whose operations were largely hidden from public view, where members of the North Atlantic Treaty
Organization (NATO) and other aligned states coordinated controls on exports to the Soviet Union and its close allies.
Beginning in the 1970s, various governments, including the United States, established other regimes to coordinate export
controls on goods and technologies related to the development of weapons of mass destruction. In contrast to CoCom, the
operations of these regimes were not hidden from public view, they were open to a wider group of states, and did not target
specific countries.
With the end of the Cold War, the United States and its NATO allies dissolved CoCom in 1994. In its place, dozens of
countries came together and established the Wassenaar Arrangement on Export Controls for Conventional Arms and Dual-
Use Goods and Technologies. The Wassenaar Arrangement, like the nonproliferation regimes, is open to virtually any state
and its operations are not hidden from public view. As a result, the Wassenaar Arrangement includes many former members
of the Soviet Union, including Russia. Following the Wassenaar Arrangement’s establishment, some Members of Congress
expressed dissatisfaction and concern with many of the Arrangement’s provisions and its capacity to coordinate controls that
target other countries effectively.
Since the 2010s, some U.S. policymakers have adopted a more expansive view of national security that integrates economic
concerns to a greater degree than at any point since the end of the Cold War. Since the middle of the last decade, multiple
administrations have used a variety of tools to restrict trade for national security purposes. Export controls have arguably
been the most frequently used tool in that effort.
Because of difficulties in reaching consensus among participants in existing export control arrangements, some policymakers
and experts have advocated that the United States coordinate export control policy with smaller groups of likeminded states
to achieve specific national security, foreign policy, and economic goals. The United States has recently adopted export
controls as part of its response to: the Russian Federation’s (Russia) further invasion of Ukraine; the People’s Republic of
China’s (China) efforts to develop advanced semiconductor manufacturing capabilities; and human rights concerns.
This report considers issues related to coordinating export controls internationally. It begins by discussing why governments
control exports, the reasons for coordinating controls, and the different styles of regimes for coordinating controls. It then
discusses the longstanding interest of Congress in coordinating controls and the history of U.S. involvement in post-World
War II export control regimes and recent attempts to coordinate controls with small groups of like-minded states. The report
concludes by identifying potential areas of congressional interest and engagement.

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Contents
Introduction ..................................................................................................................................... 1
A Note on the terms “Multilateral” and “Plurilateral” .................................................................... 3
Why Control Exports? ..................................................................................................................... 4
Why Coordinate Controls? .............................................................................................................. 6
Increase Effectiveness ............................................................................................................... 6
Decrease Cost ............................................................................................................................ 6
Types of International Export Control Coordination ....................................................................... 8
Conditionally Open Institutional Coordination / Multilateral Coordination ............................. 9
Restricted Institutional Coordination / Institutional Plurilateral Coordination ........................ 11
Ad Hoc Coordination / Ad Hoc Plurilateral Coordination ........................................................ 11
Congress and International Coordination of Export Controls ....................................................... 12
Historical Coordination of Export Controls .................................................................................. 14
CoCom and the Cold War ....................................................................................................... 14
CoCom’s Functioning ............................................................................................................. 17
CoCom Challenges.................................................................................................................. 18
The Gradual Shift to Open Institutional Coordination / Multilateral Coordination ................ 18
Warming Relations and Nonproliferation ......................................................................... 18
The End of the Cold War and the Creation of the Wassenaar Arrangement ..................... 19
Criticism of Wassenaar ..................................................................................................... 20
Recent Plurilateral and Bilateral Coordination .............................................................................. 21
Export Control Coordination on Russia and Belarus .............................................................. 23
Export Control Coordination on China ................................................................................... 24
Export Control Coordination on Human Rights ..................................................................... 26
Issues for Congress ........................................................................................................................ 28
The Pace of Technological Development and U.S. Export Control Strategy .......................... 29
A Fifth Export Control Regime ............................................................................................... 31
Legitimacy, Coordination, and Effectiveness .......................................................................... 32
Ethical Trade and Export Control Coordination ..................................................................... 33
Partner Legal and Administrative Capacity ............................................................................ 34
Trade Agreements, Trade Promotion Authority, and Export Controls .................................... 36

Contacts
Author Information ........................................................................................................................ 36

Congressional Research Service

Introduction
The U.S. Constitution authorizes Congress to regulate commerce with foreign nations.1 Congress,
in turn, has periodically delegated authority to the President to regulate exports for a variety of
national security, foreign policy, and economic purposes.2 In 2018, Congress enacted the Export
Control Reform Act (ECRA), which provided the first permanent,3 non-emergency statutory
authority to the executive branch to regulate exports.4 To protect the national security and further
the foreign policy of the United States,5 ECRA authorizes the President to control the export of
dual-use goods and technologies,6 which are defined as items with both “civilian applications and
military, terrorism, weapons of mass destruction, or law-enforcement-related applications.”7
The modern dual-use export control regime emerged in the years following the Second World
War when the United States was the leading (or, in some sectors, the only) supplier of many
goods. As other countries built or rebuilt and expanded their manufacturing capacities and
research and development institutions in the 1950s and 1960s, some U.S. policymakers, industry
interest groups, and other stakeholders expressed concern that, without international coordination,
U.S. export controls would be ineffective and potentially harmful to U.S. interests.8 In response to
such concerns, by 1969 Congress began requiring that the President consider whether goods were
available from other sources before subjecting them to control and, if they were, to coordinate

1 U.S. Constitution, art. I, §8, cl. 1.
2 See, for example, Export Control Act of 1949 (ECA 1949), P.L. 81-11 (February 26, 1949), 63 Stat. 7; Export
Administration Act of 1969 (EAA 1969), P.L. 91-184 (December 30, 1969), 83 Stat. 841; Export Administration Act of
1979 (EAA 1979), P.L. 96-72 (September 29, 1979), 93 Stat. 503; Act of March 3, 1925 (Helium Act of 1925), P.L.
68-544 §4 (1925), 43 Stat. 1110, 1111.
3 Permanent insofar as, unlike all earlier non-emergency export control authorities, ECRA does contain a sunset
provision.
4 The Export Control Reform Act of 2018 (ECRA), Title XVII, Subtitle B of P.L. 115-232 (August 13, 2018), 132 Stat.
2208, codified at 50 U.S.C. §§4801 et seq. includes the Export Controls Act of 2018 (ECA), Title XVII, Subtitle B,
Part I of P.L. 115-232. The legislative history for ECA is lengthier than for ECRA, of which it was a part. However,
throughout this report ECRA will be used because it encompasses the definitions to which ECA refers and because it is
the name most commonly used by the Bureau of Industry and Security (BIS) when citing to statutory authority for
controls. Unlike its predecessors, ECRA does not have an expiration date on the delegated authority to control exports.
See, for example, EAA 1979 §20.
5 ECRA §1755, codified at 50 U.S.C. §4814.
6 The word “technology” as it relates to export control policy has long been tricky. This is mainly because the popular
and technical uses of the word have drifted apart over the past century. As J. Fred Bucy, then-President of Texas
Instruments, member of the Defense Science Board, and Chairman of the Task Force on the Export of U.S. Technology
put it:
Technology is not science and it is not products. Technology is the application of science to the
manufacture of products and services. It is the specific know-how required to define a product that
fulfills a need, to design the product, and to manufacture it. The product is the end result of this
technology, but it is not technology…. This distinction between technology and products is
important to the development of objectives and strategies for strategic controls.
J. Fred Bucy, “On Strategic Technology Transfer to the Soviet Union,” International Security 1, no. 4 (Spring 1977), p.
28; Department of Defense, Defense Science Board Task Force, An Analysis of Export Control of U.S. Technology — A
DOD Perspective (Washington, DC, 1976) (Bucy Report). Export controls apply to both goods and technologies.
However, because it would be tedious to read “goods and technologies” repeatedly, the reader should assume that any
reference to “goods” in this report also refers to “technologies” unless otherwise noted.
7 ECRA §1742(2), codified at 50 U.S.C. §4801(2).
8 CRS Report R46814, The U.S. Export Control System and the Export Control Reform Act of 2018, by Paul K. Kerr
and Christopher A. Casey.
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controls with allies.9 Those concerns have persisted and in ECRA, Congress noted that “[e]xport
controls that are multilateral are most effective”10 and declared that U.S. policy is to “participate
in multilateral organizations and agreements regarding export controls.”11
The United States has participated in several peacetime regimes for coordinating export controls.
The first, the Coordinating Committee for Multilateral Export Controls (CoCom), emerged during
the early years of the Cold War. It served as an informal forum for most of the members of the
North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) along with Japan and Australia to coordinate controls
on the export of a variety of goods to the other Council for Mutual Economic Assistance
(COMECON) members, the People’s Republic of China (PRC or China), and other communist
states.12 CoCom was described as the “economic arm” of NATO and was a component of a broad
U.S. strategy to foster economic integration among close allies and trading partners during the
Cold War that included foreign aid and trade liberalization.13 To encourage participation in the
face of potential domestic political criticism, CoCom’s operations were largely hidden from
public view.14
By the late 1960s, concerns about trade with the Soviet Union gradually became less prominent
as concerns about the proliferation of nuclear, biological, and chemical weapons increased (see
“Warming Relations and Nonproliferation” below). New regimes for coordinating export controls
emerged alongside CoCom that prioritized an expansive membership and targeted behaviors
rather than specific countries, these included the Nuclear Suppliers Group, the Australia Group,
and the Missile Technology Control Regime (see “Conditionally Open Institutional Coordination
/ Multilateral Coordination” below).
With the collapse of the Soviet Union in the early 1990s, CoCom members dissolved the
committee in 1994 (see “The End of the Cold War and the Creation of the Wassenaar
Arrangement” below). In 1996, the former members of CoCom, together with several additional
countries, including former members of the Soviet Union, established the Wassenaar
Arrangement on Export Controls for Conventional Arms and Dual-Use Goods and Technologies
to coordinate controls on dual-use goods.15 In contrast to CoCom, the Wassenaar Arrangement,
like the other nonproliferation regimes, is open to virtually any state and has a broad membership
(however, admission is based on consensus among members) that includes states with conflicting

9 EAA 1969 §4(b): “[W]henever export licenses are required on the ground that considerations of national security
override considerations of foreign availability, the reasons for so doing shall be reported to the Congress in the
quarterly report following the decision…;” EAA 1979 §4(c), §5(i): “The President shall enter into negotiations with the
governments participating in the group known as the Coordinating Committee….”
10 ECRA §1752(5), codified at 50 U.S.C. §4811(5).
11 ECRA §1752(4), codified at 50 U.S.C. §4811(4); ECRA §1754(a)(6), codified at 50 U.S.C. §4813(a)(6).
12 Michael Mastanduno, Economic Containment: CoCom and the Politics of East-West Trade (Ithaca, NY: Cornell
University Press, 1992), chap. 1.
13 “A Report to the National Security Council by the Executive Secretary,” NSC 68, April 14, 1950, Foreign Relations
of the United States, 1950, National Security Affairs; Foreign Economic Policy, Volume I, eds. Neal H. Petersen et al.
(Washington, DC: Government Printing Office, 1977), Document 85, pp. 234-293, 259 (NSC 68). The Soviet Union
and its allies likewise had a strategy to foster economic integration, the Council for Mutual Economic Assistance, also
known as Comecon. Randall W. Stone, Satellites and Commissars: Strategy and Conflict in the Politics of Soviet-Bloc
Trade (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1995); Lorenz M. Lüthi, Cold Wars: Asia, the Middle East, Europe
(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2020), chap. 16.
14 Mastanduno, Economic Containment, chap. 1; U.S. Foreign Operations Administration, World-Wide Enforcement of
Strategic Trade Controls: Mutual Defense Assistance Control Act of 1951 (the Battle Act): Third Report to Congress
(Washington, DC: GPO, 1953), pp. 19-22.
15 Wassenaar Arrangement on Export Controls for Conventional Arms and Dual-Use Goods and Technologies, Public
Documents, Volume I: Founding Documents.
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national security, foreign policy, and economic goals; compliance with restricted lists is
voluntary.16
Because of difficulties in reaching consensus among the memberships of existing export control
arrangements, several policymakers and experts have advocated that the United States coordinate
export control policy with smaller groups of likeminded states to achieve specific national
security, foreign policy, and economic goals (see “A Fifth Export Control Regime” below). The
United States has recently taken several such actions in response to: the Russian Federation’s
(Russia) further invasion of Ukraine; China’s efforts to develop advanced semiconductor
manufacturing capabilities; and human rights concerns (see “Recent Plurilateral and Bilateral
Coordination” below).
This report provides an overview of issues related to coordinating export controls internationally.
It begins by discussing why countries control exports, the reasons for coordinating controls, and
the different styles of regimes for coordinating controls. The report then discusses the
longstanding interest of Congress in coordinating controls, the history of U.S. involvement in
post-World War II export control regimes, and recent attempts to coordinate controls with small
groups of like-minded states. The report concludes by identifying potential areas of congressional
interest and engagement.
A Note on the terms “Multilateral” and
“Plurilateral”
The meaning of “multilateral” has changed over the past few decades. Particularly since the
1990s, its common and specialized meanings have increasingly diverged. Commonly,
“multilateral” is defined broadly as something “[i]nvolving more than two nations or parties.”17
Following the end of the Cold War, however, scholars of international relations and some
policymakers began to define “multilateral” more narrowly, particularly when considering
international institutions and agreements.18 Some commentators on this issue have imported the
more esoteric term “plurilateral” from discussions about World Trade Organization (WTO)
agreements to debates about export control coordination.19

16 Ibid., p. 8 (Initial Elements, VIII): “The new Arrangement will be open, on a global and non-discriminatory basis, to
prospective adherents that comply with the agreed criteria in Appendix 4. Admission of new participants will be based
on consensus.”
17 American Heritage Dictionary, 5th ed., s.v. Multilateral; see also Webster’s Third New International Dictionary, s.v.
Multilateral.
18 See, for example, John Gerard Ruggie, “Multilateralism: The Anatomy of an Institution,” International Organization
46, no. 3 (Summer 1992), p. 571; Walter Goode, Dictionary of Trade Policy Terms, 5th ed., s.v. Plurilateralism; World
Trade Organization, “Agreement on Government Procurement:” “The GPA is a plurilateral agreement within the
framework of the WTO, meaning that not all WTO members are parties to the Agreement.”
19 See, for example, Kevin J. Wolf, Testimony before the U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission
Hearing on “U.S.-China Relations in 2021: Emerging Risks,” Panel III: “Assessing Export Controls and Foreign
Investment Review,” September 8, 2021, p. 5, 9, 10, 11, 15: “Another benefit of such informal and plurilateral efforts is
that core Wassenaar member countries can work together to get alignment on new types of items that should be
multilaterally controlled;” Jeannette Chu, “The New Arms Race: Sanctions, Export Policy, and China,” Center for
Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), March 25, 2022, available at https://www.csis.org/analysis/new-arms-race-
sanctions-export-control-policy-and-china: “The use of export controls and sanctions as unilateral and plurilateral
foreign policy tools has become more frequent and complex.” “Plurilateral” is used far less frequently than
“multilateral” in English language texts and often is only used in specialized contexts.
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In the WTO context, plurilateralism describes “doing things in small groups involving more than
bilateralism (two participants), but less than multilateralism (many participants).”20 In addition to
having more participants, multilateralism describes “an approach to the conduct of international
trade based on cooperation, equal rights and obligations, non-discrimination and the participation
as equals of many countries.”21 As such, “multilateral” increasingly describes regimes that are
relatively open and thus often have many diverse participants, whereas “plurilateral” describes
regimes that are relatively more closed and have participants that generally have closely related
national security and economic interests. To illustrate the difficulty presented by this semantic
shift, CoCom was short for the Coordinating Committee for Multilateral Export Controls. Yet, as
a regime that explicitly was set up in opposition to the Soviet Union and its allies, CoCom would
not be considered a multilateral institution under contemporary specialized definitions; and when
certain scholars and policymakers discuss creating a new regime like CoCom, they describe their
proposals as plurilateral.22 To align with the terms used in recent debates, this report will use
“plurilateral” to describe restrictive institutional coordination involving two or more countries
and “multilateral” to describe “conditionally open” institutional coordination involving many
parties.
Why Control Exports?
Since the end of the Second World War, the United States has maintained peacetime controls on
exports.23 During that time, Congress and the President have controlled exports for a variety of
national security, foreign policy, and economic reasons, many of which changed over time. But
the United States has generally controlled exports to achieve some combination of the following
three practical ends: (1) to prevent foreign actors from acquiring certain goods; (2) to prevent
certain actors from exporting certain goods; or (3) to signal disapproval of some foreign action.
First, and most commonly, the United States has controlled exports to prevent certain foreign
states, organizations, or persons from acquiring certain goods (and technology, including,
importantly, design and manufacturing “know-how”). In doing so, U.S. policymakers have sought
to further a variety of national security, foreign policy, or economic goals. For example, the
United States has attempted to: prevent foreign militaries from acquiring faster planes,24 block
foreign states from acquiring materials to build oil pipelines,25 inhibit foreign terrorist groups

20 Goode, Dictionary of Trade Policy Terms, s.v. Plurilateralism.
21 Ibid., s.v. Multilateralism.
22 See, for example, Kevin Wolf and Emily S. Weinstein, “CoCom’s Daughter,” WorldECR (May 2022); Kevin Wolf,
“Export Controls Will Become More Effective When They Include Plurilateral Controls,” Center for a New American
Security (CNAS), August 13, 2020.
23 The United States had previously imposed controls on exports during periods of declared war. See CRS Report
R46814, The U.S. Export Control System and the Export Control Reform Act of 2018, by Paul K. Kerr and Christopher
A. Casey.
24 U.S. Congress, House Committee on International Relations Subcommittee on International Trade and Commerce,
Export Licensing of Advanced Technology: A Review: Part II, hearing, 94th Cong., 2nd sess., April 12, 1976
(Washington, DC: GPO, 1976), pp. 7, 26.
25 Roberto Cantoni, “What's in a Pipe? NATO's Confrontation on the 1962 Large-Diameter Pipe Embargo,”
Technology and Culture 58, no. 1 (January 2017).
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from acquiring dangerous biological agents,26 and prevent foreign industries from acquiring
machines or software for producing advanced semiconductors,27 among other actions.
Second, the United States has controlled exports to prevent organizations or persons (usually U.S.
entities) from exporting certain goods. Unlike the first practical end, discussed above, the focus
here is the would-be exporter rather than the ultimate end-user. That is, policy has sought to
ensure that U.S. goods are not being exported, even if the goods may still be widely available
from other sources. When implementing such controls, U.S. policymakers have sought to further
a variety of moral or economic goals.28 For example, the United States has attempted to: prevent
U.S. companies from selling voice-print analyzers to foreign governments that imprison political
dissidents,29 prohibit the export of horses destined for slaughter,30 and regulate the export of
petroleum products to blunt the inflationary impact of a domestic shortage,31 among other actions.
Finally, the United States has controlled exports to signal disapproval of certain actions by
foreign states, organizations, or persons.32 The aim of U.S. policymakers may be to signal
disapproval by demonstrating a willingness to make an economic sacrifice in response to an
action as much as (or perhaps more than) prohibit the export of any particular good.33 Such a
signal may also be aimed at encouraging future coordination among likeminded, but otherwise
hesitant, suppliers of the controlled goods.34

26 Department of Commerce, Bureau of Industry and Security, “Revisions and Clarifications to the Export
Administration Regulations-Chemical and Biological Weapons Controls: Australia Group; Chemical Weapons
Convention,” 67 Federal Register 37977, May 31, 2002.
27 Department of Commerce, Bureau of Industry and Security, “Implementation of Additional Export Controls: Certain
Advanced Computing and Semiconductor Manufacturing Items; Supercomputer and Semiconductor End Use; Entity
List Modification,” 87 Federal Register 62186, October 13, 2022.
28 U.S. Congress, Senate Committee on Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs, Use of Export Controls and Export
Credits for Foreign Policy Purposes, 95th Cong., 2nd sess., October 10 and 11, 1978 (Washington, DC: GPO, 1978), p.
9: “There are, it seems to me, four different objectives that inspire people to urge for the use of export controls…. The
first is a desire to satisfy certain moral imperatives.”
29 Department of Commerce, Domestic and International Business Administration, “Exports of Crime Control and
Detection Equipment to U.S.S.R., Eastern Europe, and the People's Republic of China (Country Groups Q, W, and Y),”
39 Federal Register 26719, July 23, 1974; U.S. Congress, Senate Committee on Government Operations, Permanent
Subcommittee on Investigations, Transfer of Technology to the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe, hearing, 93rd Cong.,
2nd sess., July 19, 1974 (Washington, DC: GPO, 1975), p. 16. Although this regulation is concerned with certain end-
users, the wide foreign-availability of crime control and detection equipment means the end-users are likely able to
acquire the goods regardless of U.S. controls and, thus, the purpose of the policy is to prevent U.S. exports from
reaching these end-users rather than preventing these end-users from obtaining the goods at all.
30 15 C.F.R. §754.5 (2023).
31 Department of Commerce, Domestic and International Business Administration, “Commodity Control List;
Statement of Past Participation and Establishment of Monitoring System,”38 Federal Register 3442, December 13,
1973.
32 Homer E. Moyer, Jr. and Linda A Mabry, Export Controls as Instruments of Foreign Policy (Washington, DC:
International Law Institute, 1988), p. 156.
33 Ibid.
34 The United States has been the first mover in placing export controls on goods that other countries later implement.
For example, in October 2022 the United States expanded its controls on exports of certain semiconductors and
semiconductor manufacturing equipment to China. A few months after, it was reported that Japan and the Netherlands
had agreed to similar restrictions. See Alexandra Alper and David Shepardson, “U.S. Official Acknowledges Japan,
Netherlands Deal to Curb Chipmaking Exports to China,” Reuters, January 31, 2023. Similarly, as one pair of scholars
noted:
[I]nternational politics unrelated to the target country may be a factor in the use of export controls.
For example, the sudden decision to impose [controls on pipeline products] had every appearance
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Why Coordinate Controls?
The United States has sought to coordinate its export controls with other governments both to
increase the effectiveness of controls and decrease the controls’ political and economic costs to
the United States.
Increase Effectiveness
Coordination may be critical to the effectiveness of a policy aimed at preventing or delaying the
foreign acquisition of certain goods or technology. Such controls may be less effective if the
goods or technologies are readily available from foreign sources.35 Even in cases where the
products are not readily available from foreign sources, coordination may be needed to prevent
the unauthorized reexport of controlled goods or technologies.36
Coordination may be less important for the success of policies primarily aimed at signaling
disapproval of an action or preventing U.S. persons from exporting a good for moral or economic
reasons. In such cases, coordination may still help prevent circumvention through reexport or
through the activities of U.S. persons or foreign-owned subsidiaries of U.S. companies abroad.
Decrease Cost
Coordination may decrease the economic and political costs of a control. Export controls impact
domestic businesses by restricting where, or with whom, they do business. In 1987, as the modern
export control regime was entering its fifth decade, a panel of the National Academies noted that
there had been “no credible estimate of the economic cost of national security export controls.”37
The panel commissioned a study in which it was determined that the economic impact of the U.S.
export control regime on the United States was substantial.38 This study aside, there continue to
be few empirical studies of the overall economic impact of export controls.39 A CRS assessment
of earlier empirical studies highlighted the ambiguity of the data.40

of being more a response to the failure of the allies to reach a durable consensus at the 1982
economic summit at Versailles…. [T]hus while these controls were clearly directed at the Soviet
Union, the timing of their announcement was unquestionably also intended to be a signal to our
allies.
Moyer and Mabry, Export Controls, 1988, pp. 162-163.
35 The controls are less effective rather than ineffective because limiting the supply of a good or technology that is
available elsewhere may still theoretically increase the cost of the transaction for the target of the controls by reducing
the available supply.
36 However, tight coordination that is too narrowly focused may also present strategic challenges by heightening the
importance of malignant suppliers.
37 National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine, Balancing the National Interest: U.S. National Security
Export Controls and Global Economic Competition (Washington, DC: The National Academies Press, 1987), p. 120.
38 National Academies, Balancing the National Interest, pp. 121, 254-267.
39 The studies that do exist tend to be sector specific. For example, Antonio Varas and Raj Varadarajan, How
Restricting Trade with China Could End US Semiconductor Leadership, Boston Consulting Group, March 9, 2020;
National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine, Finding Common Ground: U.S. Export Controls in a
Changed Global Environment (Washington, DC: The National Academies Press, 1991), appendices; Department of
Defense, Defense Industrial Base Assessment: U.S. Space Industry, Final Report, Dayton, Ohio, August 31, 2007.
40 In a survey of the literature done in 2000, CRS determined that those empirical studies placed “static economic losses
(costs) of export controls in a range from 0.007% to 0.2% percent of U.S. GDP.” The same report, when addressing
dynamic losses, noted “The existence and size of such dynamic effects, however, are more uncertain than the existence
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Nevertheless, it is commonly asserted that unilateral controls, when the controlled goods are
available from other sources, are more economically costly than coordinated controls.41 When
U.S. exporters are limited by controls, foreign competitors not subject to controls may gain an
economic advantage.42 Moreover, as trading partners start to see U.S. exporters as potentially
unreliable providers, end-users in restricted countries may develop indigenous capabilities to
replace the controlled U.S. goods. For example, there have been claims by scholars and U.S.
officials that strict U.S. controls harmed the U.S. space industrial base by, according to the
Department of Defense (DOD), “encouraging other nations, in many cases [U.S.] allies, to
develop indigenous space capabilities and industries that now market globally.”43 Indeed, a 2007
DOD report found that export controls had “either directly or indirectly precipitated … global
competition” and were “a significant impediment to the U.S. space industry’s ability to market to
foreign buyers.”44 However, some analysts have disputed the Department of Defense’s finding.45

of static efficiency effects” and encouraged a cautious approach to data in this area. CRS Report RL30430, Export
Controls: Analysis of Economic Costs, February 10, 2000 by Craig K. Elwell (archived, copy available from author).
41 For example, in EAA 1979, Congress found, “The restriction of exports from the United States can have serious
adverse effects on the balance of payments and on domestic employment, particularly when restrictions applied by the
United States are more extensive than those imposed by other countries;” In 1983, the House Committee on Foreign
Affairs noted, “The committee's review of the implementation of the Export Administrative Act [of 1979] over the past
4 years. and the impact of the act upon U.S. export trade, leads to the conclusion that actions taken under the act,
particularly for purposes of furthering U.S. foreign policy goals, may be the single greatest hindrance to U.S. exports,
costing significant loss of U.S. jobs. Although imposed for good and even noble purposes, such as encouragement of
human rights and freedoms and avoidance of excessive European dependence upon Soviet energy resources. these
controls have created a pervasive belief in world markets that U.S. firms cannot be relied upon as suppliers particularly
for larger projects which require long-term servicing, spare parts, and the like…. [T]he historical willingness of the
United States to impose controls has led foreign buyers, manufacturers, and planners actively to avoid and eliminate
dependence upon U.S. products and technologies, and has been exploited by foreign competitors.” U.S. Congress,
House Committee on Foreign Affairs, Export Administration Amendments Act of 1983, report to accompany H.R. 3231,
98th Cong. 1st sess., H.Rept. 98-257 Part 1 (Washington, DC: GPO, 1983), pp. 6-7; Ed Schau, “Export Controls and
America’s Competitive Challenge, High Technology Law Journal 1, no. 1 (Spring 1986), pp. 1-6.
42 See, for example, Eric L. Hirschhorn, “Export Controls on Emerging and Foundational Technologies: A Null Set?,”
China Business Review, June 23, 2020: “when we unilaterally control any technology too tightly, there’s a good chance
that we will drive research and development, and ultimately production, offshore;” See also Clark Packard, Why We
Should Be Wary of Export Controls, CATO Institute, April 15, 2022: “An overly restrictive export control regime thus
poses significant long‐term risks to the U.S. economy.”
43 Department of Defense, Defense Industrial Base Assessment: U.S. Space Industry, Final Report, Dayton, Ohio,
August 31, 2007, p. 10; For a narrative account, see Hugo Meijer, Trading with the Enemy: The Making of U.S. Export
Control Policy Toward the People’s Republic of China (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2016), p. 8, chap. 6; For
other analyses on the role of export controls on the development of indigenous technologies, see A. Baskaran, “The
Impact of Export Controls on Indigenous Technology Development in India's Space Programme,” International Studies
38, no. 2 (2001): “India’s experience shows that if a ‘target’ country is prepared to invest heavily in terms of money
and human capital over a long period of time (fifteen to twenty years), it will eventually succeed in achieving threshold
capacities;” Tim Hwang, and Emily S. Weinstein, Decoupling in Strategic Technologies: From Satellites to Artificial
Intelligence, Center for Security and Emerging Technology, July 2022, pp. 6-7: “The case study of space technologies
highlights that decoupling is at best a tool of delay.”
44 Department of Defense, Defense Industrial Base Assessment: U.S. Space Industry, Final Report, Dayton, Ohio,
August 31, 2007, p. 48.
45 John Hoffner, “The Myth of ‘ITAR-Free,’” Aerospace Security, Center for Strategic and International Studies, May
15, 2020, available at https://aerospace.csis.org/itar-satellite-regulation/.
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link to page 12 link to page 12

Types of International Export Control Coordination
There are several ways the United States has coordinated its exports controls. Analysts have
characterized all past and present coordination on export controls as informal insofar as such
coordination has not involved legally binding international commitments.46
While informal, such coordination has often included the establishment of regimes or
international institutions.47 Some of these have been “conditionally open,” in that they are based
on publicly available texts that define generalized principles of conduct, articulate
decisionmaking procedures, establish regular meetings of experts or policymakers, and provide
for any state to petition for membership upon meeting or agreeing to certain conditions.48 This is
true of the existing international regimes for coordinating export controls (see “Conditionally
Open Institutional Coordination / Multilateral Coordination”).
Other regimes have been “restricted,” in that they are explicitly or implicitly limited to a select
group of partners to achieve specific policy goals and, in some circumstances, target specific
countries for national security, foreign policy, or economic reasons.49 This was true of the
arrangement used to coordinate export controls amongst NATO members during the Cold War.
Other examples of “restricted” coordination have been limited in scope and duration, based on
diplomatic discussions to achieve specific, temporally limited objectives, and have not involved
establishing institutions.50 Several recent actions coordinated by the United States in response to
the actions or policies of Russia and China have taken this limited form.51

46 Paul C. Webster, “COCOM: Limitations on the Effectiveness of Multilateral Export Controls,” Wisconsin
International Law Journal (1983), p. 113: “COCOM was created by an informal agreement;” Michael L. Lipson,
“International Cooperation on Export Controls: Nonproliferation, Globalization, and Multilateralism,” PhD diss.,
(University of Wisconsin, 1999): “Subsequent export control arrangements have adopted many of the features of
CoCom, the first such organization. Specifically, they are predominantly informal, non-treaty-based organizations
whose rules are implemented at the national level.” Daniel H. Joyner, “Restructuring the Multilateral Export Control
Regime System,” Journal of Conflict and Security Law 9, no. 2 (Summer 2004), p. 184: “All [the major export control
regimes] are informal political arrangements, with no elements of legal formality in the commitments of member states
either in the originating regime documents or with regard to subsequent guidelines and decisions made by or within the
regimes;” Seema Gahlaut, “Multilateral Export Control Regimes: Operations, Successes, Failures, and Challenges
Ahead,” in Non-Proliferation Export Controls: Origins, Challenges, and Proposals for Strengthening, ed. Daniel
Joyner (London: Routledge, 2006), pp. 9-11.
47 Stephen D. Krasner defines a regime as “principles, norms, rules, and decision-making procedures around which
actor expectations converge in a given area.” Stephen D. Krasner, “Structural Causes and Regime Consequences:
Regimes as Intervening Variables,” International Organization 36, no. 2 (1982), p. 186; Robert A. Keohane defines
institutions as “persistent and connected sets of rules, formal and informal, that pre- scribe behavioural roles, constrain
activity, and shape expectations.” Robert A. Keohane, “Multilateralism: An Agenda for Research,” International
Journal 45, no. 4 (Autumn 1990), p. 732. Douglas C. North similarly defines institutions as “the humanly devised
constraints that structure political, economic and social interaction [and] consist of both informal constraints (sanctions,
taboos, customs, traditions, and codes of conduct), and formal rules (constitutions, laws, property rights).” Douglass C.
North, “Institutions,” Journal of Economic Perspectives 5, no. 1 (Winter 1991), 97.
48 The typology here is based on that elaborated upon in Keohane, “Multilateralism,” pp. 750-751.
49 Keohane, “Multilateralism,” pp. 750-751.
50 At least not publicly as of the writing of this report. CoCom itself was intended to be secret for many years after its
establishment. U.S. Foreign Operations Administration. World-Wide Enforcement of Strategic Trade Controls: Mutual
Defense Assistance Control Act of 1951 (the Battle Act): Third Report to Congress (Washington, DC: GPO, 1953), pp.
19-22.
51 See, “Recent Coordination on Export Controls,” below.
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As there have been no legally binding commitments, the executive branch has not sought formal
congressional approval to participate in any extant institutions or regimes that coordinate
controls.
Conditionally Open Institutional Coordination / Multilateral
Coordination
Some experts have used the term “conditionally open” to refer to institutions that “are open in
principle to states that are willing to accept a set of prescribed commitments, which not all states
may be able (much less willing) to do.”52 There are currently four53 regimes that coordinate
controls on the export of certain goods and all four existing regimes are conditionally open. These
are the Zangger Committee54 and Nuclear Suppliers Group55 (nuclear material and related
technology);56 the Missile Technology Control Regime (MTCR; missiles and related
technology);57 the Australia Group (biological and chemical weapons and related materials);58 and
the Wassenaar Arrangement (conventional arms and dual-use goods).59 All of these regimes
emerged between the late-1960s and 1990s amid global concerns over the proliferation of
conventional arms and weapons of mass destruction.60 The regimes encourage broad participation

52 Keohane, “Multilateralism,” p. 750.
53 There is some variation in how the regimes are counted. Some experts, policymakers, and government agencies say
that there are five multilateral regimes, others say there are four. The variation in the number depends upon whether the
speaker or writer considers the Zangger Committee and the Nuclear Suppliers Group to be independent arrangements
or two parts of the same regime. For example, the Department of Energy in some guidance notes “requirements
regarding technology related to weapons of mass destruction (WMD) flow from U.S. membership in five multilateral
export control regimes” (emphasis added). In contrast BIS notes “much of the CCL [is] based on the control lists
published by four multilateral export control regimes” (emphasis added). Department of Energy, Acquisition Guide,
Compliance with U.S. Export Control Laws, Regulations and Policies, June 2016; BIS, “Support Document
Requirements with Respect to Hong Kong,” 82 Federal Register 6216, January 19, 2017. Based on a survey of writing
on the topic, most treat the Zangger Committee and the Nuclear Suppliers Group as two parts of a single regime and
thus identify four regimes. For information on the Zangger Committee’s relationship to the Nuclear Suppliers Group,
see Tadeusz Strulak, “The Nuclear Suppliers Group,” Nonproliferation Review 1, no. 1 (1993), pp. 2-3; Isabelle
Anstey, “Negotiating Nuclear Control: The Zangger Committee and the Nuclear Suppliers’ Group in the 1970s,”
International History Review 40, no. 5 (2018). Moreover, it is increasingly common in policy debates to discuss the
creation of a “fifth” regime. Kevin Wolf and Emily S. Weinstein, “CoCom’s Daughter,” WorldECR (May 2022): “Calls
for creating a fifth new regime among the techno-democracies ….” (emphasis added); William Alan Reinsch, “Meeting
the Technology Transfer Challenge: Part II,” Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), August 1, 2022,
available at https://www.csis.org/analysis/meeting-technology-transfer-challenge-part-ii: “This has led Bureau of
Industry and Security (BIS) undersecretary Alan Estevez to advocate for a fifth regime—an addition, not a
replacement” (emphasis added). For these reasons this report adopts four as the number used.
54 Zangger Committee, http://zanggercommittee.org.
55 Nuclear Suppliers Group, https://www.nti.org/education-center/treaties-and-regimes/nuclear-suppliers-group-nsg/.
For background on the origins of the Nuclear Suppliers Group, see William Burr, “A Scheme of ‘Control’: The United
States and the Origins of the Nuclear Suppliers’ Group, 1974–1976,” International History Review 36, no. 2 (2014).
56 Scholars and policymakers often discuss the Zangger Committee and Nuclear Suppliers Group as a single regime.
See discussion above.
57 Missile Technology Control Regime, https://mtcr.info; For an overview of the Missile Technology Control Regime,
see Waheguru Pal Singh Sidhu, “The Missile Technology Control Regime,” Arms Control Today 37, no. 3 (April
2007).
58 Australia Group, https://www.dfat.gov.au/publications/minisite/theaustraliagroupnet/site/en/index.html.
59 Wassenaar Arrangement, https://www.wassenaar.org.
60 The term weapons of mass destruction is commonly defined as referring to nuclear, biological, and chemical
weapons or other weapons of similar destructive potential. See, for example, Weapons of Mass Destruction Control Act
of 1992, Title XV of P.L. 102-484 §1502(1)(A), 106 Stat. 2567 (1992); Commission on Conventional Armaments
(continued...)
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and cooperation rather than strategic, political, or economic rivalry. To encourage participation,
these arrangements refrain from formally targeting specific states61 and allow any country to
petition for membership, with admission based upon an applicant’s willingness and capacity to
adhere to generalized principles of conduct.62 Additionally, all these regimes have a permanent
institutional presence, including ongoing technical working groups to identify and discuss what
technologies should be controlled; permanent points of contact or a secretariat; rotating
chairmanships; and annual plenaries.63
All but the MTCR have more than 40 members. Non-member states, in addition, also use the
regimes’ lists to implement their own export control programs to meet U.N. Security Council
obligations to “refrain from providing any form of support to non-state actors that attempt to
develop, acquire, manufacture, possess, transport, transfer, or use nuclear, chemical, or biological
weapons and their means of delivery.”64

(CCA), UN document S/C.3/32/Rev.1, August 1948; However, the definition is often used more broadly. W. Seth
Carus, Defining “Weapons of Mass Destruction,” National Defense University, Center for the Study of Weapons of
Mass Destruction, Occasional Paper, No. 8, January 2012.
61 While not formally directed against a particular state, these multilateral arrangements were created in response to the
actions of a particular state or group of states. The Nuclear Suppliers Group arguably formed in response to India’s
detonation of a nuclear device in 1974. Anstey, “Negotiating Nuclear Control,” p. 986. Similarly, the Australia Group
was formed in response to Iraq’s use in 1984 of chemical weapons in the Iran-Iraq War. Australia Group, The Origins
of the Australia Group, available at
https://www.dfat.gov.au/publications/minisite/theaustraliagroupnet/site/en/origins.html. Moreover, while not explicitly
directed at specific states, such regimes have sometimes targeted specific states in practice. Lynn E. Davis, then-Under
Secretary of State for Arms Control noted in a speech about the then-new Wassenaar Arrangement, “all of the
participating countries currently maintain national policies to prevent transfers of arms and sensitive technologies for
military purposes to the four pariah countries—Iran, Iraq, Libya, and North Korea. This is a critical requirement that
the United States insisted on—and will continue to insist on in examining the credentials of new members.” Lynn E.
Davis, “The Wassenaar Arrangement,” DISAM Journal 18, no. 3 (Spring 1996), p. 76; Kenneth A. Dursht, “From
Containment to Cooperation: Collective Action and the Wassenaar Arrangement,” Cardozo Law Review 19, no. 3
(December 1997), p. 1109; For a survey of the precipitating events for many of the regimes, see GAO,
Nonproliferation: Strategy Needed to Strengthen Multilateral Control Regimes, GAO-03-43, October 2022, p. 5, Table
1.
62 Nuclear Suppliers Group, Participants, available at
https://web.archive.org/web/20230415174519/https://www.nuclearsuppliersgroup.org/en/participants1; Zangger
Committee, Outreach, available at https://www.zanggercommittee.org/outreach.html; Missile Technology Control
Regime, MTCR Partners, available at https://mtcr.info/partners/; Australia Group, Australia Group Membership,
available at https://www.dfat.gov.au/publications/minisite/theaustraliagroupnet/site/en/membership.html; The
Wassenaar Arrangement on Export Controls for Conventional Arms and Dual-Use Goods and Technologies, Public
Documents, Volume I: Founding Documents, p. 8 (Initial Elements, Appendix 4). Although admission is purportedly
based upon an applicant’s willingness to adhere to generalized principles of conduct, in practice, admission decisions
have been subject to political considerations. For example, Mark Hibbs, “A More Geopoliticized Nuclear Suppliers
Group,” Strategic Trade Review (Autumn 2017); These regimes fit the narrower definition of multilateral commonly
used by many international relations scholars since the 1990s. For example, Ruggie, “Multilateralism,” p. 571;
Keohane, “Multilateralism,” pp. 750-751; Zangger Committee and Nuclear Suppliers Group: Anstey, “Negotiating
Nuclear Control,” p. 983; Missile Technology Control Regime: Wyn Q. Bowen, “U.S. Policy on Ballistic Missile
Proliferation: The MTCR's First Decade (1987–1997),” Nonproliferation Review 5, no. 1 (1997), p. 22: “since 1987,
membership has grown from seven relatively like- minded states to 29 diverse nations, including Argentina, Brazil,
Russia, and South Africa, each of which was once targeted by the regime;” Wassenaar Arrangement: The Wassenaar
Arrangement on Export Controls for Conventional Arms and Dual-Use Goods and Technologies, Public Documents,
Volume I: Founding Documents, p. 14 (Initial Elements, Appendix 4).
63 Gahlaut, “Multilateral Export Control Regimes,” p. 11.
64 United Nations (UN) Security Council Resolution 1540, S/RES/1540, April 28, 2004; Kolja Brockmann, Challenges
to Multilateral Export Controls: The Case for Inter-regime Dialogue and Coordination (Stockholm: Sipri, 2019), p. 3.
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Restricted Institutional Coordination / Institutional Plurilateral
Coordination
In contrast to conditionally open institutions, some experts have used the term “restricted” to refer
to institutions that “deliberately limit membership to a relatively small number of states that have
some set of interests in common or that have specified domestic political arrangements.”65 The
North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) and the Organization of Petroleum Exporting
Countries (OPEC) are examples of such coordination.66 Some states have also established
restricted institutions to limit exports to specific states for national security, foreign policy, or
economic reasons. During the Cold War, for example, the aforementioned CoCom coordinated
controls on exports to many communist countries among NATO members, Japan, and Australia.67
Some policymakers have begun to call this type of coordination “plurilateral” to distinguish it
from the conditionally open, multilateral regimes discussed above.68
Ad Hoc Coordination / Ad Hoc Plurilateral Coordination
Coordination of export controls may be negotiated between countries for the purpose of meeting
specific, temporally limited objectives without the establishment of any durable institutions. For
example, in order to avoid CoCom disagreements or secure the participation of states outside of
CoCom, U.S. negotiators sometimes used other diplomatic channels to coordinate with others to
control the trade in specific goods.69 Recently, the United States has employed the same approach
with respect to the four existing regimes to coordinate export controls with other groups of
likeminded states.70 For example, following Russia’s further invasion of Ukraine in 2022, the

65 Keohane, “Multilateralism,” p. 750.
66 Ibid.
67 Like this report, Michael Lipson uses Keohane’s typology to describe CoCom as a more restricted regime to the
Wassenaar Arrangement that would follow CoCom’s dissolution. Michael Lipson, “The Reincarnation of CoCom:
Explaining Post-Cold War Export Controls,” Nonproliferation Review 8, no. 2 (Winter 1999) p. 39.
68 For example Kevin J. Wolf, Testimony before the U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission, pp. 10-
11: “Another benefit of such informal and plurilateral efforts is that core Wassenaar member countries can work
together to get alignment on new types of items that should be multilaterally controlled;” Jeannette Chu, “The New
Arms Race: Sanctions, Export Policy, and China,” CSIS, March 25, 2022, available at
https://www.csis.org/analysis/new-arms-race-sanctions-export-control-policy-and-china: “The use of export controls
and sanctions as unilateral and plurilateral foreign policy tools has become more frequent and complex.” This term has
been borrowed from another trade context where it is more common. See Walter Goode, Dictionary of Trade Policy
Terms, 5th ed., s.v. Plurilateralism: “doing things in small groups involving more than bilateralism (two participants),
but less than multilateralism (many participants).”
69 Beginning in 1984, for example, the United States coordinated its export controls on “supercomputers” with Japan
and, later, Canada on a “Supercomputer Safeguard Plan” to limit exports in excess of what was controlled by CoCom.
Glenn J. McLoughlin and Ian F. Fergusson, High Performance Computers and Export Control Policy: Issues for
Congress, CRS Report RL31175, Updated May 5, 2005, p. 7; Robert Johnston, “U.S. Export Control Policy in the
High-Performance Computer Sector,” Nonproliferation Review (Winter 1998), pp. 46-47. For other examples, see
Cantoni, “What's in a Pipe?” p. 81; Michael Mastanduno, “The United States Defiant: Export Controls in the Postwar
Era,” Daedalus 120, no. 4 (Fall 1991), p. 98.
70 See, for example, Supplement No. 3 to Part 746 - Countries Excluded From Certain License Requirements of §746.8,
15 C.F.R. §746 (2023); White House, FACT SHEET: Joined by Allies and Partners, the United States Imposes
Devastating Costs on Russia, February 24, 2022, available at https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefing-room/statements-
releases/2022/02/24/fact-sheet-joined-by-allies-and-partners-the-united-states-imposes-devastating-costs-on-russia/:
“Countries that adopt substantially similar export restrictions are exempted from new U.S. licensing requirements for
items produced in their countries. The European Union, Australia, Japan, Canada, New Zealand and the United
Kingdom, have already communicated their plans for parallel actions;” White House, Joint Statement on the Export
Controls and Human Rights Initiative, December 10, 2021, available at https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefing-
(continued...)
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United States and 37 countries committed to implementing substantially similar export controls
on Russia and Belarus.71 The United States is also working with other governments to restrict the
export of advanced semiconductor manufacturing equipment to China.72
Congress and International Coordination of Export
Controls
For more than 70 years, Congress has periodically authorized the President to regulate exports of
dual-use goods to protect U.S. national security,73 “further [significantly] the foreign policy of the
United States”74 and (until 2018) reduce inflation.75 Since the end of the Second World War,
Congress has enacted four comprehensive peacetime dual-use export control statutes: The Export
Control Act of 1949; the Export Administration Act of 1969; the Export Administration Act of
1979; and ECRA.76 With each successive act, as well as with amendments between the major
reforms, Congress provided increasingly detailed policy statements and more firmly worded
directives to the executive branch.77 These directives have shifted over the decades, emphasizing
control in some acts, while urging decontrol and liberalization in others. For example, ECA 1949
authorized controls that “further the foreign policy of the United States.”78 Twenty years later,
Congress slightly narrowed that language to “further significantly the foreign policy of the United
States.”79 Similarly, ECA 1949 did not require the President to determine whether a good or
technology was available from a foreign source.80 In contrast, EAA 1969 required the President to

room/statements-releases/2021/12/10/joint-statement-on-the-export-controls-and-human-rights-initiative/: “Over the
coming year of action, we commit to working to establish a voluntary, nonbinding written code of conduct around
which like-minded states could politically pledge, to use export control tools to prevent the proliferation of software
and other technologies used to enable serious human rights abuses.”
71 15 C.F.R §746.8(a)(4), Supplement no. 3. See “Export Control Coordination on Russia and Belarus” below.
72 Alper and Shepardson, “U.S. Official Acknowledges Japan, Netherlands Deal….”
73 ECA 1949 §2; EAA 1969 §3; EAA 1979 §3; ECRA §1752(1)(A).
74 ECA 1949 §2; EAA 1969 §3; EAA 1979 §3; ECRA §1752(1)(B). Note that “significantly” was not included in ECA
1949 and was added as part of EAA 1969.
75 ECA 1949 §2; EAA 1969 §3; EAA 1979 §3; ECRA §1757, codified at 50 U.S.C. §4811. Note that ECRA removed
the short supply controls that had been a central feature of ECA 1949. During periods when these statutes expired, the
President used authority under the Trading with the Enemy Act of 1917 and the International Emergency Economic
Powers Act of 1977 to keep in place the Export Administration Regulations. See, for example, Executive Order 13222
of August 17, 2001, “Continuation of Export Control Regulations,” 66 Federal Register 44025, August 22, 2001.
Trading with the Enemy Act of 1917 (TWEA), P.L. 65-91, 40 Stat. 11 (1917), codified as amended at 50 U.S.C.
§§4301 et seq. (2018); International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA), P.L. 95-223, 91 Stat. 1626 (1977),
codified as amended at 50 U.S.C. §§1701 et seq.
76 These have sat alongside, and often complimented or reinforced other statutes authorizing the President to control
exports of goods related to nuclear, biological, chemical, conventional weapons as well as certain other defense
services. For example Arms Export Control Act of 1976, P.L. 94-329, 90 Stat. 729 (1976); Nuclear Non-Proliferation
Act of 1978, P.L. 95-242, 92 Stat. 120 (1978); Chemical and Biological Weapons Control and Warfare Elimination Act
of 1991, P.L. 102-82, 105 Stat. 1233 (1991).
77 Whereas the Export Control Act of 1949 ran a short three pages in the Statutes at Large, the Export Administration
Act of 1969 ran seven, the Export Administration Act of 1979, 34, and ECRA, 30. While ECRA is arguably shorter
than EAA 1979, it incorporated by reference certain elements of EAA 1979 and the International Emergency Economic
Powers Act of 1977. ECRA §1766, 50 U.S.C. §4601 note. These attempts to restrict the President’s discretion were not
necessarily successful. William J. Long, U.S. Export Control Policy (New York: Columbia University Press, 1989), p.
30.
78 ECA 1949 §2(b).
79 EAA 1969 §3(2).
80 ECA 1949.
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make such a determination and to report to Congress whenever considerations of national security
overrode considerations of foreign availability.81
One constant during that time has been the increasing emphasis on the importance of coordinating
controls with other countries. The Export Control Act of 1949 said nothing about international
coordination. The Export Administration Act of 1969, in contrast, declared:
It is the policy of the United States (A) to formulate, reformulate, and apply any necessary
controls to the maximum extent possible in cooperation with all nations with which the
United States has defense treaty commitments, and (B) to formulate a unified trade control
policy to be observed by all such nations.82
The Export Administration Act of 1979 and ECRA further expanded upon those directives to
encourage cooperation “with all nations,” and not just those with which the United States had
defense treaty commitments.83 The 2018 authorization, ECRA, contains more references to
international coordination than any of its predecessors.84 While statutory references to
coordination have increased over time, Members of Congress have pressured administrations and
allies to coordinate export controls from virtually the beginning of the modern dual-use export
control era.85
Indeed, congressional criticism about the perceived lack of participation of NATO allies in
controls on the Soviet Union led the executive branch to disclose publicly the existence of
CoCom, which had been a closely guarded secret, in 1953.86 In its third report to Congress, the
short-lived U.S. Foreign Operations Administration87 said that it decided to disclose CoCom’s
existence to combat “false or exaggerated notions” about the “world-wide enforcement of
strategic trade controls.”88 Its report, in a “note to historians,” identifies many of the sensitive
issues related to controlling exports that still confront policymakers:

81 EAA 1969 §4(b)
82 EAA 1969 §3(3).
83 EAA 1979 §3(3): “It is the policy of the United States (A) to apply any necessary controls to the maximum extent
possible in cooperation with all nations, and (B) to encourage observance of a uniform export control policy by all
nations with which the United States has defense treaty commitments” (emphasis added); ECRA §1752(4), 15 U.S.C.
§4811(4): “The national security and foreign policy of the United States require that the United States participate in
multilateral organizations and agreements regarding export controls on items that are consistent with the policy of the
United States, and take all the necessary steps to secure the adoption and consistent enforcement, by the governments
of such countries, of export controls on items that are consistent with such policy.”
84 ECRA §§1752-1753, 15. U.S.C. §§4811-4812.
85 See, for example, Mutual Defense Assistance Control Act of 1951 (Battle Act), P.L. 82-212 §101, 65 Stat. 644, 645
(1951): “It is further declared to be the policy of the United States that no military, economic, or financial assistance
shall be supplied to any nation unless it applies an embargo on such shipments to any nation or combination of nations
threatening the security of the United States, including the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics and all countries under
its domination.”
86 U.S. Foreign Operations Administration, World-Wide Enforcement of Strategic Trade Controls: Mutual Defense
Assistance Control Act of 1951 (the Battle Act): Third Report to Congress (Washington, DC: GPO, 1953), pp. 19-22.
87 The U.S. Foreign Operations Administration (FOA) was a government agency that existed from 1953 to 1955 during
the administration of President Dwight D. Eisenhower. It was created from the merger of several pre-existing agencies,
including the Economic Cooperation Administration and the Mutual Security Agency, with the purpose of managing
foreign aid and assistance. Dwight D. Eisenhower to Secretary Dulles, “Letter to Secretary Dulles Regarding Transfer
of the Affairs of the Foreign Operations Administration to the Department of State,” April 17, 1955, available at
https://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/documents/letter-secretary-dulles-regarding-transfer-the-affairs-the-foreign-
operations.
88 U.S. Foreign Operations Administration, World-Wide Enforcement of Strategic Trade Controls: Mutual Defense
Assistance Control Act of 1951 (the Battle Act): Third Report to Congress, pp. 19-22., p. III.
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People sometimes fail to recognize that effective multi-national security trade controls
would not exist today unless they had been developed on the basis of mutual accord and
voluntary action of the participating governments. On the one hand there are segments of
American opinion convinced that international cooperation in this field has been lacking,
or at best passive. On the other hand there are segments of opinion abroad that strict United
States export controls have … been forced upon other countries against their will…. Both
of these views are erroneous…. [In January 1950 a] Coordinating Committee (known as
COCOM) was organized to provide an informal forum at a working level for day-to-day
discussions.89
Stated reasons for congressional pressure to coordinate have varied over time, but congressional
action, inaction, and Member statements have consistently focused on issues of effectiveness,90
cost,91 and the occasional expression of moral concern.92 Such pressure is also made in the
context of a broader U.S. willingness to use trade in general, and export controls in particular, to
achieve a variety of policy goals;93 the United States, for example, has long been one of the only
major economies to control exports for human rights purposes.94
Historical Coordination of Export Controls
CoCom and the Cold War
Prior to the Second World War, the United States rarely regulated exports. The Constitution’s
prohibition on export taxes,95 combined with the geographic security afforded to the United States
by the Atlantic and Pacific oceans, meant that Congress generally did not consider regulating
exports other than during times of war or armed conflict or in defense of U.S. neutrality.96

89 Ibid., p. XX. This sentiment, and its analogue at the corporate level, is still common. See Chad Bown, “Episode 170:
National Security, Semiconductors, and the U.S. Move to Cut off China,” Trade Talks, November 2, 2022: Kevin
Wolf: “Everybody in the business thinks that their competitor is being favored. Foreign companies think that American
companies are being favored, and American companies think that foreign companies are being favored. And from a
licensing decision – working with lots of US and some non-US companies, I never really saw that.”
90 For example, EAA 1979 §5(f); ECRA §1752(5); U.S. Congress, Senate Committee on Banking, Housing and Urban
Affairs, U.S. Export Control Policy and Extension of the Export Administration Act, hearing, 96th Cong, 1st sess.,
March 5-6, 1979 (Washington, DC: GPO, 1979), p. 1.
91 For example, U.S. Congress, U.S. Export Control Policy and Extension of the Export Administration Act, pp. 137-
149.
92 For example, Ibid., pp. 1, 137-149, 208.
93 For example, Congress has prohibited the export of western red cedar from public lands under certain circumstances
as well as horses by sea. Customs and Trade Act of 1990, P.L. 101-382 §491, 104 Stat. 629, 719 (1990), codified as
amended at 16 U.S.C. §620c; 15 C.F.R. §754.4; Export Administration Amendments Act of 1985, P.L. 99-64 §125, 99
Stat. 120, 156 (1985), codified as amended at 15 U.S.C. §1824a; 15. C.F.R. §754.5; See also, U.S. Congress, U.S.
Export Control Policy and Extension of the Export Administration Act, pp. 137-149, p. 1.
15 C.F.R. §754.5.
94 15 C.F.R. §742.7; ECRA 1753(b)(7), codified at 50 U.S.C. §4812(b)(7).
95 U.S. Constitution, art. 1, §9, cl. 5.
96 There were some embargoes in the earliest days of the Republic both during the War for Independence and during
the Wars of the French Revolution, see Continental Congress, “Articles of Association,” October 20, 1774, art. 4,
Journals of the Continental Congress 1 (Washington, DC: GPO, 1904), p. 77: “If the said acts ... are not repealed, we
will not directly or indirectly, export any merchandise or commodity whatsoever to Great Britain, Ireland, or the West-
Indies, except rice to Europe;” Act of June 4, 1794, 3 Cong. Ch. 41, 1 Stat. 372: Congress authorized the President to
lay an embargo on all ships in the United States “whenever, in his opinion, the public safety shall so require;” Act of
December 22, 1807, 10 Cong. Ch. 5, 2 Stat. 451-452: “an embargo be, and hereby is laid on all ships and vessels in the
(continued...)
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During the Second World War, the United States established, in coordination with its allies, an
expansive system of export controls.97 Following the defeat of Germany and Japan in 1945, many
items were gradually decontrolled.98 However, by 1947, some U.S. policymakers had begun to
argue that the United States should restrict its trade with the Soviet Union because U.S.
technology might contribute to the development of the Soviet economy and thus improve the
country’s military capacity.99 At the same time, some policymakers were arguing that liberalizing
trade was a key component of crafting a peaceful postwar international order.100 As Assistant
Secretary of State William L. Clayton testified before Congress in 1945, “Nations which act as
enemies in the marketplace cannot long be friends at the council table.”101
This tension between liberalizing trade and restricting exports to the Soviet Union and other
communist countries was at the center of policymaking during the early years of the Cold War. In
1950, a year following the successful detonation of an atomic bomb by the Soviet Union, officials
from the Departments of State and Defense jointly drafted NSC 68, a “landmark” policy paper for
the National Security Council (NSC) assessing U.S. objectives in peace and war and that
established the early outlines of U.S. strategy in the emerging Cold War.102 NSC 68 observed that
“economic conditions are among the fundamental determinants of the will and the strength to
resist subversion and aggression.”103 The principal features of U.S. national security policy, the
paper argued, should include financial assistance to Western Europe and other countries, “efforts
to re-establish an international economy based on multilateral trade, declining trade barriers, and

ports and places. within the limits or jurisdiction of the United States, cleared or not cleared, bound to any foreign port
or place.” Congress repealed its embargo in 1814. Act of April 14, 1814, 13 Cong. Ch. 56, 3 Stat. 123; The United
States began controlling exports again during its participation in the Spanish-American War (1898) and World War I
(1917-1919). Joint Resolution of April 22, 1898, P.R. 55-25 (1898); Trading with the Enemy Act of 1917, P.L. 65-91,
40 Stat. 411 (1917); During the 1930s, to preserve U.S. neutrality, Congress prohibited exports of arms and munitions
to countries engaged in armed conflict. Joint Resolution of August 31, 1935, P.R. 74-67 §3, 49 Stat. 1081, 1083 (1935);
Joint Resolution of February 29, 1936, P.R. 74-74 (1936); Joint Resolution of May 1, 1937, P.R. 75-27, 50 Stat. 151
(1937); Neutrality Act of 1939, P.R. 76-54, 54 Stat. 4 (1939); See Richard T. Cupitt, Reluctant Champions, U.S.
Presidential Policy and Strategic Export Controls (London: Routledge, 2000), pp. 31-50.
97 Cupitt, Reluctant Champions, pp. 46-47.
98 Ibid., p. 55.
99 For example, Report by the National Security Council,” December 17, 1947, Foreign Relations of the United States,
1948, Eastern Europe; The Soviet Union, Volume IV, eds. Rogers P. Churchill et al. (Washington, DC, Government
Printing Office, 1974), Document 328, p. 512: “The National Security Council therefore considers that US national
security requires the immediate termination, for an indefinite period, of shipments from the United States to the USSR
and its satellites of all commodities which are critically short in the United States or which would contribute to the
Soviet military potential;” “A Report to the National Security Council by the Executive Secretary,” NSC 68, April 14,
1950, Foreign Relations of the United States, 1950, National Security Affairs; Foreign Economic Policy, Volume I,
eds. Neal H. Petersen et al. (Washington, DC: Government Printing Office, 1977), Document 85, pp. 234-293, 259
(NSC 68).
100 Trade liberalization, in the opinion of Franklin D. Roosevelt’s long-serving Secretary of State Cordell Hull, would
provide the conditions for a “permanent peace.” The link between free trade and peace was a central tenet of Hull’s
approach to international economic policy throughout his career in Congress and in the Franklin D. Roosevelt
Administration. For example, Cordell Hull, Memoirs of Cordell Hull (New York: Macmillan, 1948), pp. 1:81-82, 174.
101 U.S. Congress, Senate Committee on Finance, 1945 Extension of the Reciprocal Trade Agreements Act, hearings,
79th Cong., 1st sess., May 30 – June 5, 1945 (Washington, DC: GPO, 1945), p. 5.
102 NSC 68. For historical assessments of the document’s importance, see Joseph M. Siracuse, “NSC 68: A
Reappraisal,” Naval War College Review 33, no. 6 (November-December 1980), p. 5; Ken Young, “Revisiting NSC
68,” Journal of Cold War Studies 15, no. 1 (Winter 2013), p. 3. For a collection of opinions on the document from
scholars and policymakers, see Ernest E. May, ed., American Cold War Strategy: Interpreting NSC 68 (Boston:
Bedford, 1993).
103 NSC 68.
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convertible currencies.”104 But in addition to these liberalizing measures, NSC 68 also called for
the “restriction of East-West trade in items of military importance to the East.”105
U.S. officials were not alone in wanting to restrict Eastern Europe’s and the Soviet Union’s access
to materials and goods of military importance. By 1949, officials in the United Kingdom (UK)
and France were also increasingly concerned about trade with the Soviet Union, particularly after
learning of Soviet progress in developing an atomic weapon.106 The two countries took the
initiative in negotiating with other European countries over a proposed list of goods that French
and British officials thought should be subject to eastward export restrictions.107
By January 1950, officials from the United States, the UK, France, Italy, Belgium, the
Netherlands, Luxembourg, Denmark, and Norway had established lists of goods that all the
countries agreed to control. In addition, they established an informal regime to coordinate efforts.
This regime included the Consultative Group, which was composed of high-ranking officials and
responsible for general policymaking, and the Coordinating Committee (CoCom), which was
staffed by experts from all participating countries.108 While the Consultative Group rarely met,
CoCom was “in effect [a] permanent consultative mechanism”109 that grew in membership and
became the central coordinating body for export controls amongst most members of NATO as
well as Australia, and Japan.110
The formation of CoCom in 1950 was critical for coordinating export control policy during the
Cold War. As one scholar put it:
By bringing the West European states together in a multilateral forum, CoCom provided
what each government required: immediate and up-to-date information regarding what all
other participating states were willing or unwilling to embargo and thus knowledge of
whether and to what extent economic sacrifices were strategically justifiable.111

104 NSC 68, p. 259.
105 Ibid. “United States foreign economic […] policy can be summarized as follows: […] (5) restriction of East-West
trade in items of military importance to the East; […] (7) efforts to re-establish an international economy based on
multilateral trade, declining trade barriers, and convertible currencies […].”
106 Ian Jackson, The Economic Cold War: America, Britain and East-West Trade, 1948-63 (London: Palgrave, 2001), p.
38.
107 U.S. policymakers believed that having British and French officials lead discussions over coordinating export
controls would be more likely to result in establishing a successful coordination mechanism. The Administrator of the
Economic Cooperation Administration (Hoffman) to the Embassy in France, February 9, 1949, ECA Telegram Files,
Lot W–131, Paris Torep: Telegram, Foreign Relations of the United States, 1949, Eastern Europe; The Soviet Union,
Volume V (FRUS 1949:V), eds. William Z. Slany and Rogers P. Churchill (Washington, DC: GPO, 1975), Document
30, available at https://history.state.gov/historicaldocuments/frus1949v05/d30: “Most desirable that British take
leadership in gaining cooperation other govts …;” Jackson, Economic Cold War, pp. 40-41.
108 The Special Representative in Europe for the Economic Cooperation Administration (Harriman) to the Economic
Cooperation Administrator (Hoffman), January 13, 1950, London Embassy Files: Lot 59 F 59: 500 Marshall Plan:
Telegram, Foreign Relations of the United States, 1950, Central and Eastern Europe; The Soviet Union, Volume IV
(FRUS 1950:IV), eds. William Z. Slany, Charales S. Sampson, and Rogers P. Churchill (Washington, DC: GPO, 1980),
Document 32, available at https://history.state.gov/historicaldocuments/frus1950v04/d32; Jackson, Economic Cold
War, p. 41.
109 FRUS 1950:IV, Document 32.
110 Iceland is a member of NATO, but was not a member of CoCom. Mutual Security Agency, World Wide
Enforcement of Strategic Trade Controls, Third Report to Congress as Required by the Mutual Defense Assistance
Control Act of 1951 (Battle Act, Third Report) (Washington, DC: GPO, 1953), p. 19; Michael Mastanduno, Economic
Containment: CoCom and the Politics of East-West Trade (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1992), p. 4.
111 Mastanduno, Economic Containment, p. 78.
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Put another way, the countries of Western Europe had to worry less that their controls would be
secretly undercut by a neighbor’s sales of controlled goods to Eastern Europe.112
CoCom’s Functioning
CoCom, drawing in part on how the allies had controlled exports during the Second World War,
established a model for how subsequent export control institutions could function. Three
characteristics were, and continue to be in successor regimes, particularly important. First,
CoCom was informal.113 Lacking both a binding agreement and a formal enforcement
mechanism,114 all CoCom members enacted any agreed-upon controls in their own domestic law
and regulations.115 Second, much of CoCom’s activity involved the sharing of information and
drafting of detailed lists of goods to be controlled.116 Third, and most crucially, all modifications
to those lists were adopted by consensus—all participants had to agree.117 These three
characteristics have been present in all subsequent institutions for coordinating export controls.118
But CoCom had some unique elements that subsequent regimes have lacked. First, even after the
United States revealed its existence in 1953, CoCom’s operations remained largely hidden from
public view. The committee’s control lists, for example, were never published. Instead, scholars
and researchers reconstructed them only by comparing national control lists against one another.
Scholars have credited the secrecy with some early successes.119 The domestic political situations
of many European allies might have made it impossible to enter into a public arrangement.
Additionally, public participation might have led to retaliation by the Soviet Union or its allies.
Secrecy allowed for plausible denial.120
Second was CoCom’s exception process. Like the four export control regimes today, CoCom
required any participating government to notify the other members when it exported certain
controlled goods or technologies. Unlike the regimes today, members of CoCom who wished to
export certain highly controlled advanced goods or technologies to a proscribed destination were
expected to seek a “general exception,” which required the unanimous consent of all CoCom
members. This, in effect, gave every member of CoCom a veto over another country’s exports of
certain goods. The United States was both the most frequent applicant for general exceptions of
exceptions and the most frequent user of its veto, a fact which was not lost on its partners.121

112 Mastanduno, Economic Containment, p. 78.
113 Lipson, “The Reincarnation of CoCom,” p. 36; Mastanduno, “What is COCOM and How Does it Work?” p. 75.
114 Central Intelligence Agency, CoCom Book Cable, General CIA Records, FOIA/ESDN (CREST): CIA-
RDP85M00364R000601070005-6, Released: February 1, 2008, available at
https://www.cia.gov/readingroom/docs/CIA-RDP85M00364R000601070005-6.pdf.
115 Mastanduno, “What is COCOM and How Does it Work?” p. 75.
116 Lipson, “The Reincarnation of CoCom,” p. 37.
117 Mastanduno, “What is COCOM and How Does it Work?” p. 75.
118 Cindy Whang, “Undermining the Consensus-Building and List-Based Standards in Export Controls: What the US
Export Controls Act Means to the Global Export Control Regime,” Journal of International Economic Law 22 (2019),
p. 583.
119 Michael Mastanduno, “What is COCOM and How Does it Work?” in The Post-Containment Handbook, ed. Robert
Cullen (Boulder, CO: Westview Press, 1990), p. 75; Mastanduno, Economic Containment, pp. 80-81.
120 Ibid.
121 Mastanduno, “What is COCOM and How Does it Work?” p. 76.
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CoCom Challenges
CoCom members frequently disagreed about the scale and scope of controls as well as the overall
purpose for controlling exports. At many points in CoCom’s history, U.S. policymakers favored a
total embargo against exports to the Soviet Union and its allies in an effort to retard Soviet
economic development.122 Between 1947 and 1952 annual U.S. exports to Eastern Europe fell
from $350 million to less than $10 million following the U.S. imposition of expanded export
controls.123 The United States was better-positioned to support a total embargo because the
country was less reliant on exports in general and less reliant on trade with the Soviet Union and
its allies in particular than its European allies. U.S. policymakers were also more inclined to use
export controls tactically to respond to specific events.124
Although CoCom’s European members were reluctant to participate in what some scholars have
characterized as “economic warfare,”125 the outbreak of the Korean War and the successful
detonation of the first Soviet atomic weapon in 1950 fused a consensus among U.S. allies in
Europe around an expansive embargo. But that consensus was short-lived. By the mid-1950s,
under pressure from its European members, CoCom began to decontrol a number of goods. Over
the next forty years, CoCom generally focused on a strategic embargo, only controlling goods
with clear military purposes. While there were some moments when the embargo was expanded
(such as after the Soviet Union’s invasion of Afghanistan in 1979), these were infrequent.126
The Gradual Shift to Open Institutional Coordination /
Multilateral Coordination
Warming Relations and Nonproliferation
The threat of nuclear proliferation, coupled with some warming of relations between the Soviet
Union and the United States led to the collaboration between the two superpowers on export
controls related to nuclear proliferation under the Nuclear Supplier’s Group (NSG).127 Unlike
CoCom, the NSG, founded in 1974, was not born out of a military alliance and did not target any
state or group of states.128 Like CoCom, negotiations over the scale and scope of the controls
were difficult, especially as several Western European entities remained eager to sell nuclear
energy technology abroad without burdensome regulations.129 These difficulties compounded as
NSG membership quickly expanded.130

122 Mastanduno, Economic Containment, pp. 68-74; Adler-Karlsson, Western Economic Warfare.
123 Mastanduni, Economic Containment., p. 74.
124 Ibid., pp. 313-318.
125 Ibid., pp. 68-74; Adler-Karlsson, Western Economic Warfare.
126 Ibid., chaps. 3, 7.
127 The precursor to the Nuclear Suppliers Group, the Western Suppliers Group, was informal, secretive, and did not
include the Soviet Union or Eastern European States. Nevertheless, the effort was different from CoCom in its
ambition. Although the Soviet Union was not a part of the Group, it also was not the explicit target of the Group’s
strategy, particularly since the Soviet Union had ample reserves of Uranium. Anstey, “Negotiating Nuclear Control,” p.
986; K.D. Kapur, “Nuclear Non-Proliferation Regime and the Soviet Union,” India Quarterly 44, no. 3/4 (July-
December 1988), p. 205.
128 Burr, “A Scheme of ‘Control,’” p. 260.
129 Ibid., p. 253.
130 Ibid., p. 270.
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Despite the difficult negotiations, similar arrangements soon proliferated, with the foundation of
the Australia Group in 1985 and the Missile Technology Control Regime in 1987. These
nonproliferation regimes, like the Nuclear Suppliers Group, did not target specific countries.
Moreover, they lacked CoCom’s veto provision.131 Unlike CoCom, all three of these regimes
were open to participation from a variety of countries, including U.S. adversaries. The goal of
these organizations was a breadth of participation and today all three of these regimes have at
least twice as many members as CoCom had at its height.
The End of the Cold War and the Creation of the Wassenaar Arrangement
Following the Soviet Union’s collapse in 1991, many U.S. allies saw CoCom as an impediment to
integrating Russia and the other former Soviet states into the global economy.132 A prominent
study of CoCom, published in 1992, found it unlikely that CoCom would survive much longer.
“In the absence of a perceived, direct military threat,” the study noted, “there is little to sustain
Western Europe’s interest in the strategic embargo.”133 Western Europe’s lack of interest, and U.S.
ambivalence, meant CoCom’s days were numbered. By 1993, the United States and its allies
agreed to dissolve CoCom and the organization ceased operations on March 31, 1994, a little
more than 44 years after its first meeting.134
While there was a lack of interest in maintaining CoCom, there was still broad interest, including
among Members of Congress,135 in coordinating controls on conventional arms and dual-use
goods in some capacity.136 Over several years, the United States, many former CoCom members,
and several former Soviet states, negotiated what became known as the Wassenaar Arrangement,
which began operations in 1996.137
Policymakers, scholars, and practitioners frequently describe the Wassenaar Arrangement as a
successor to CoCom.138 This claim, however, is only temporally correct; Wassenaar emerged from
a different international context and is more akin to the other multilateral nonproliferation
regimes.139 As Under Secretary of State for Arms Control and International Security Affairs Lynn
E. Davis explained in a speech given shortly after the establishment of the Wassenaar
Arrangement in 1996:
Although the COCOM parties were responsible for initiating development of The
Wassenaar Arrangement, the successor regime differs significantly in its goals and
procedures, given the changed strategic environment. COCOM was designed as an

131 For an example of the nonproliferation regimes being criticized as “toothless,” see Senate debate, Congressional
Record, vol. 135, part 19 (November 2, 1989), p. 27033; See also Meijer, Trading with the Enemy, p. 131.
132 Michael Lipson, “The Wassenaar Arrangement: Transparency and Restraint through Trans-Governmental
Cooperation,” in Non-Proliferation Export Controls: Origins, Challenges, and Proposals for Strengthening, ed. Daniel
Joyner (London: Routledge, 2006), p. 51; Kathryn C. Lavelle, The Challenges of Multilateralism (New Haven, CT:
Yale University Press, 2020), pp. 106-107.
133 Michael Mastanduno, Economic Containment, pp. 336-342.
134 Lipson, “The Reincarnation of CoCom,” p. 36.
135 For example, Riegle-Neal Interstate Banking and Branching Efficiency Act of 1994, P.L. 103-328 §202, 108 Stat.
2338, 2368 (1994).
136 Lipson, International Cooperation on Exports, p. 177.
137 Ibid., pp. 190-201.
138 For example, Davis, “The Wassenaar Arrangement,” p. 79; Lipson, “The Reincarnation of CoCom,” p. 34; Jamil
Jaffer, “Strengthening the Wassenaar Export Control Regime,” Chicago Journal of International Law 3, no. 2
(September 2002), p. 521; Gahlaut, “Multilateral Export Control Regimes,” p. 8; “Wassenaar Arrangement (a.k.a.
‘New Forum’) to take place of COCOM,” Export Practitioner (January 1996), pp. 7-8
139 Lipson, “The Wassenaar Arrangement,” p. 51.
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institution of the Cold War.... As the original threats of the Cold War diminished, new
threats to global security began to emerge.... This led the U.S. and other countries to
develop worldwide non-proliferation regimes, such as the Nuclear Suppliers Group, the
Missile Technology Control Regime, and the Australia Group. The Wassenaar
Arrangement extends and complements this development.140
The product of a bipolar world, CoCom was a strategic alliance designed to limit trade in certain
goods with the Soviet Union, Eastern Europe, and China. In contrast, the Wassenaar Arrangement
was a product of the end of the Cold War and a unipolar world. Wassenaar was open to virtually
any state141 and was explicitly not “directed against any state or group of states.”142 Instead,
Wassenaar focused on non-state actors in stark contrast to CoCom’s state-centered approach. Nor
was Wassenaar meant to impede “bona fide civil transactions.”143 That is, Wassenaar was not used
as part of a broader strategy to limit the economic or technological development of a civilian
economy. Wassenaar’s focus was, like the other nonproliferation regimes, constraining
objectionable behaviors. As one senior State Department official succinctly put it a few years
after its founding, “Wassenaar is not and cannot be COCOM.”144
Criticism of Wassenaar
From the start, many U.S. policymakers criticized the Wassenaar Arrangement. U.S. allies had
expressed eagerness to liberalize exports following the end of the Cold War and reluctance to
maintain the strict controls for which the United States had advocated.145 Combining all the
regimes into a single regime, an early idea among some U.S. policymakers, met domestic
bureaucratic resistance as different U.S. agencies appeared reluctant to cede authority over their
historic policy turf.146 Combining the regimes might have lent Wassenaar the political weight of
being institutionally part of the regime controlling nuclear and biological weapons. Instead,
Wassenaar stood alone.
Wassenaar lacks many of the elements of CoCom. First, Wassenaar does not have a license
review mechanism. Whereas CoCom required members’ unanimous approval of export licenses
for certain sensitive technologies, Wassenaar’s Secretariat has no such review function. Instead,
Wassenaar members are free to export a controlled good, so long as they notify other members.147
Second, and similarly, Wassenaar lacks a formal no-undercut rule, which had prohibited a CoCom
member from granting a license to export a particular product to a particular country if another
member had denied such a license. Instead, Wassenaar only requires that governments, prior to
approving an export, consult members that had prohibited the same export.148 Third, whereas

140 Davis, “The Wassenaar Arrangement,” p. 79.
141 The Wassenaar Arrangement on Export Controls for Conventional Arms and Dual-Use Goods and Technologies,
Public Documents, Volume I: Founding Documents, WA-DOC (19) Pub 007, December 2019, p. 4 (Initial Elements
I.4), available at https://www.wassenaar.org/app/uploads/2021/12/Public-Docs-Vol-I-Founding-Documents.pdf.
142 Ibid., p. 14 (Initial Elements, Appendix 4).
143 Ibid.
144 Testimony of John D. Holum, Senior Advisor for Arms Control and International Security, U.S. Department of State
in U.S. Congress, Senate Committee on Governmental Affairs, The Wassenaar Arrangement and the Future of
Multilateral Export Controls, hearing, April 12, 2000, 106th Cong., 2nd sess., S. Hrg. 106-613 (Washington, DC: GPO,
2000) p. 5.
145 Meijer, Trading with the Enemy, pp. 135-142.
146 Ibid., pp. 130-131
147 The Wassenaar Arrangement on Export Controls for Conventional Arms and Dual-Use Goods and Technologies,
Public Documents, Volume I: Founding Documents, p. 8 (Initial Elements, Part V).
148 Ibid., p. 5 (Initial Elements, Part II).
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CoCom was established explicitly to limit exports to the Soviet Union and its allies, Wassenaar
has no list of target countries.149 Finally, and perhaps most importantly, Wassenaar was a much
larger organization at its founding and very quickly expanded. Whereas CoCom had at most 17
members during its existence, today the Wassenaar Arrangement has 48—nearly three times as
many—and includes countries, such as the United States and Russia, with conflicting national
security or foreign policy interests.
Within a few years of Wassenaar’s establishment, reports of the Senate Committee on Banking
and the House Committee on International Relations, expressed concerns with the Arrangement’s
limitations.150 Citing Wassenaar’s lack of a no-undercut mechanism151 and the lack of “respect”
for Wassenaar regime guidelines by non-arrangement members,152 the Senate Banking
Committee’s report called Wassenaar “the least effective” of the multilateral regimes.153
In addition to encouraging the President to improve Wassenaar’s effectiveness, the Senate
Banking Committee urged “[U.S.] participation in new export control regimes that serve the
national security and foreign policy interests of the United States.”154 By 2001, Under Secretary
of Commerce for Industry and Security Kenneth Juster stated to a reporter that he was exploring
arrangements between key countries to better control select technologies.155 Other committees
made similar recommendations.156
However, following the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, the United States redirected
much of its attention toward non-state actors—which the Wassenaar Arrangement was relatively
well-suited to address. Although there were still critics of Wassenaar in Congress, the
arrangement received less negative attention until well into the second decade of the 21st century.
Recent Plurilateral and Bilateral Coordination
Beginning in the 2010s, the United States has expanded, both in scale and scope, its use of export
controls to address national security, foreign policy, and economic concerns. Alongside this
expansion, the Department of Commerce’s Bureau of Industry and Security (BIS) has made what
many observers have described as “novel” uses of export controls (see textbox below).157 Many

149 Ibid., p. 14 (Initial Elements, Appendix 4).
150 U.S. Congress, Senate Committee on Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs, The Export Administration Act of 2001,
Report to Accompany S. 149, 107th Cong., 1st sess., S.Rept. 107-10 (Washington, DC: GPO, 2001); U.S. Congress,
House Committee on International Relations, The Export Administration Act of 2001, Report to Accompany, 107th
Cong., 1st sess., H.Rept. 107-297 (Washington, DC: GPO, 2001), p. 56: “The Committee strongly endorses
Administration efforts to strengthen existing multilateral regimes ... including the creation of new mechanisms in the
Wassenaar Arrangement providing for a ‘no undercut’ policy.”
151 Senate Committee on Banking, The Export Administration Act of 2001, pp. 20.
152 Ibid.
153 Ibid.
154 Ibid., pp. 7, 20-21.
155 Bruce Odessey, “Official to Explore Export-Control Deal Among a Few Countries,” Aerotech News and Review,
July 27, 2001, available at
https://web.archive.org/web/20010811143405/www.aerotechnews.com/starc/2001/072701/exports.html.
156 For example, U.S. Congress, House Select Committee on U.S. National Security and Military/Commercial Concerns
with the People’s Republic of China, U.S. National Security and Military/Commercial Concerns with the People’s
Republic of China, 105th Cong., 2nd sess., H.Rept. 105-851 (Washington, DC: GPO, 1999).
157 For example, Kevin J. Wolf, Testimony before the Senate Committee on Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs,
February 28, 2023, p. 5: “[T]he Trump Administration took a series of individual classical and novel unilateral export
control actions under its ECRA authorities.” Gregory C. Allen, Emily Benson, and William Alan Reinsch, Improved
(continued...)
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of these export control policies attempt to limit the access of certain countries to advanced
semiconductors and the equipment needed to produce them.158 But BIS has also targeted other
goods and sectors. Alongside these novel controls, the United States has expanded its
longstanding use of export controls to address human rights concerns.
The United States has attempted to limit circumvention of its expanded use of export controls by
coordinating with other countries. In response to Russia’s further invasion of Ukraine in 2022, the
United States coordinated with dozens of countries to limit exports of controlled technologies to
Russia and Belarus, reportedly to deny those states the means to conduct military operations.159
The United States has also coordinated with partner countries to limit the export of advanced
semiconductor manufacturing equipment to China, reportedly in response to China’s efforts to
develop advanced military technologies.160 Additionally, the United States has worked closely
with the European Union and other governments to coordinate controls on technologies that
might be used to commit human rights abuses.161
Foreign-Produced Direct Product Rule (FPDR)
At the center of these efforts has been a Cold-War era tool: the foreign-produced direct product rule (FDPR).
Under the FDPR, BIS can prohibit foreign manufacturers from exporting foreign-produced goods that are direct
products of control ed U.S. technology or software. The United States can use the FDPR to force foreign
manufacturers to comply with U.S. export-control strategies. But the FDPR can also be used to coordinate
controls with cooperative foreign governments that might lack the legal capacity to enact their own controls.
Similarly, the FDPR might insulate partner governments from domestic criticism and partner countries from

Export Controls Enforcement Technology Needed for U.S. National Security, Center for Strategic and International
Studies, November 2022, p. 2: “What is novel about these controls is that they represent a sea change in the U.S.
approach to China, particularly since the controls are both geographic in nature and unilateral;” Ellen Nakashima and
Jeanne Whalen, “U.S. Threatens Use of Novel Export Control to Damage Russia’s Strategic Industries if Moscow
Invades Ukraine,” Washington Post, January 23, 2022; Kevin J. Wolf, et al., “U.S. Government Imposes Expansive,
Novel and Plurilateral Export Controls Against Russia and Belarus,” Akin Gump Alert, March 8, 2022, available at
https://www.akingump.com/en/insights/alerts/us-government-imposes-expansive-novel-and-plurilateral-export-
controls-against-russia-and-belarus.
158 When policymakers discuss semiconductors and semiconductor manufacturing equipment (SME) they are generally
referring to “integrated circuits” and equipment for manufacturing them. And most commonly they are referring to
“monolithic integrated circuits.” A monolithic integrated circuit is a complete circuit made into or on top of a single die
or “chip” of semiconducting material (usually, but not always, silicon). Oxford Dictionary of Electronics and Electrical
Engineering, 5th ed., s.v. integrated circuit (IC); chip; Similarly, the export controls at issue often use the term
“integrated circuit” rather than “semiconductors.” For example, 15 C.F.R. §774: ECCN: 3A001.a Note 1; Nevertheless,
in order to accord with the language of policy discussions, this report will use the word semiconductors to mean
integrated circuits.
159 White House, “FACT SHEET: Joined by Allies and Partners, the United States Imposes Devastating Costs on
Russia,” press release, February 24, 2022, available at https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefing-room/statements-
releases/2022/02/24/fact-sheet-joined-by-allies-and-partners-the-united-states-imposes-devastating-costs-on-russia/.
160 White House, “Remarks by National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan on the Biden-⁠Harris Administration’s National
Security Strategy,” press release, October 13, 2022, available at https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefing-room/speeches-
remarks/2022/10/13/remarks-by-national-security-advisor-jake-sullivan-on-the-biden-harris-administrations-national-
security-strategy/:
[L]ast week, we launched significant, carefully tailored restrictions on semiconductor technology
exports to the PRC, focused on advanced semiconductor manufacturing tools, the most advanced
chips, and supercomputing capabilities. These restrictions are premised on straightforward national
security concerns. These technologies are used to develop and field advanced military systems,
including weapons of mass destruction, hypersonic missiles, autonomous systems, and mass
surveillance.
161 White House, “Fact Sheet: Export Controls and Human Rights Initiative Launched at the Summit for Democracy,”
press release, December 10, 2021, available at https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefing-room/statements-
releases/2021/12/10/fact-sheet-export-controls-and-human-rights-initiative-launched-at-the-summit-for-democracy/.
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retaliation by providing them space to deny complicity in enacting the controls. As Kevin Wolf, former Assistant
Secretary of Commerce for Export Administration, stated in an interview:
[Some countries] generally bristle at the extra-territorial jurisdiction of US law over their
companies. They wouldn't say it, but it is something that frustrates and upsets otherwise very
polite, good allies.
Other allies love it because they may have the same policy concerns, and they don’t have the
legal authority or the political wil in their countries to impose the type of controls that the US
has. They think, personally, “Great, the US is doing what I would love to be able to do in my
system. Go, get ‘em!”
Sources: 15 C.F.R. §734.9; Chad Bown, “Episode 170: National Security, Semiconductors, and the Move to
Cut of China,” Trade Talks Podcast, transcript, November 2, 2022, p. 13.
Export Control Coordination on Russia and Belarus
Following Russia’s further invasion of Ukraine in 2022, the United States coordinated controls on
a variety of exports with several allied and partner countries.162 As the White House put it, many
of these controls are designed to “choke off Russia’s import of technological goods critical to a
diversified economy and Putin’s ability to project power.”163 Additionally, some of these controls
are meant to limit the political capacity of Russia to continue the invasion. For example, controls
placed on the export of luxury goods were intended to “increase the costs on Russian and
Belarusian persons who support the government of Russia and its invasion of Ukraine.”164
The most expansive of the new controls requires a license to export any item on the Commerce
Control List (CCL) to either Russia or Belarus.165 Applications for such licenses are reviewed
under a policy of denial.166 Making use of novel strategies developed to limit exports of
semiconductors to China,167 Commerce used the foreign-produced direct product rule (FDPR) to
apply this requirement to foreign-produced goods that are direct products of controlled U.S.
technology or software or are produced in a factory that uses U.S. controlled technology or
software.168 In establishing these controls, the United States “excluded countries that committed
to implementing substantially similar export controls on Russia and Belarus under their domestic
laws.”169 Shortly thereafter, 37 countries committed to implementing such controls.170 When
announcing the controls, the White House described this “[h]istorical multilateral cooperation” as
“unprecedented.” 171

162 BIS, “Implementation of Sanctions Against Russia Under the Export Administration Regulations (EAR),” 87
Federal Register 12226, March 3, 2022, codified at 15 C.F.R. §746.8; White House, “FACT SHEET: Joined by
Allies…”
163 White House, “FACT SHEET: Joined by Allies….”
164 BIS, “Imposition of Sanctions on `Luxury Goods' Destined for Russia and Belarus and for Russian and Belarusian
Oligarchs and Malign Actors Under the Export Administration Regulations (EAR),” 87 Federal Register 14785, March
16, 2022.
165 15 C.F.R. §746.8(a)(1).
166 15 C.F.R. §746.8(b).
167 See “Export Control Coordination on China” below.
168 15 C.F.R. §746.8(a)(2)-(3); 15 C.F.R. §734.9(g).
169 15 C.F.R. §746.8(a)(4).
170 15 C.F.R. §746.8(a)(4), Supplement no. 3.
171 White House, “FACT SHEET: Joined by Allies…:”
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In addition, the United States, the European Union, and others have placed export controls on a
variety of other goods.172 These controls are not explicitly coordinated, nor has BIS effectively
compelled coordination by invoking the FDPR. As a result, there has been some variation in
export controls across governments on these items.173 During the first year following the further
invasion of Ukraine, the United States worked with allied and partner countries to bring these
export controls into closer alignment.174
Export Control Coordination on China
For several years, the United States has taken increasingly expansive actions to limit exports of
advanced semiconductors and advanced semiconductor manufacturing equipment to China.175
Some analysts date the start of this escalation to 2018 and 2019, when BIS announced several
actions to limit exports of semiconductors to two Chinese telecommunications firms, Zhongxing
Telecommunications Equipment Corporation (ZTE) and Huawei.176 BIS quickly faced problems
related to the effectiveness of these controls. Without coordination between states, Huawei
continued to source advanced semiconductors “by commissioning their production in overseas
foundries using U.S. equipment.”177 The U.S. semiconductor industry also expressed concerns
about the potential relative cost of the controls if manufacturers in other countries picked up the
Chinese market share, giving them greater access to capital for research and development.178
To reduce the risks of circumvention and the associated relative losses to U.S. manufacturers, BIS
used the FDPR to “to target Huawei’s acquisition of semiconductors that are the direct product of

172 15 C.F.R. §746.5; 15 CFR §746.10.
173 Ricardo Hausmann, Ulrich Schetter, and Muhammed A. Yildirim, “On the Design of Effective Sanctions: The Case
of Bans on Exports to Russia,” CID Faculty Working Paper No. 417, September 2022, p. 6: “[M]ore than 35% of all
product categories have been sanctioned by either the EU, the US, or both. Out of these product categories, ∼ 50%
have been sanctioned by both, ∼ 31% by the EU only, and ∼ 19% by the US only.”
174 BIS, “Implementation of Additional Sanctions Against Russia and Belarus Under the Export Administration
Regulations (EAR) and Refinements to Existing Controls,” 88 Federal Register 12175, February 27, 2023: “This rule
revises the EAR to enhance and strengthen the existing sanctions against Russia and Belarus by expanding the scope of
the Russian and Belarusian industry sector sanctions and the ‘luxury goods’ sanctions to better align them with the
controls that have been implemented by U.S. allies and partners imposing substantially similar controls on Russia and
Belarus.”
175 Matt Sheehan, “Biden’s Unprecedented Semiconductor Bet,” Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, October
27, 2022, available at https://carnegieendowment.org/2022/10/27/biden-s-unprecedented-semiconductor-bet-pub-
88270; Chad P. Bown, “Export Controls: America's Other National Security Threat,” Duke Journal of Comparative
and International Law 30, no. 2 (2020), p. 289.
176 Sheehan, “Biden’s Unprecedented Semiconductor Bet;” Bown, “Export Controls: America's Other National
Security Threat,” p. 289; BIS, “In the Matter of: Zhongxing Telecommunications Equipment Corporation ZTE Plaza,
Keji Road South Hi-Tech Industrial Park Nanshan District, Shenzhen China; ZTE Kangxun Telecommunications Ltd.
2/3 Floor, Suite A, Zte Communication Mansion Keji (S) Road Hi-New Shenzhen, 518057 China Respondent'; Order
Activating Suspended Denial Order Relating to Zhongxing Telecommunications Equipment Corporation and Zte
Kangxun Telecommunications Ltd.,” 83 Federal Register 17644, April 23, 2018; BIS, “Addition of Entities to the
Entity List,” 84 Federal Register 22961, May 21, 2019. ZTE and Huawei had both been the subject of a U.S.
investigation into the companies’ role in evading U.S. sanctions on Iran.
177 Department of Commerce, “Commerce Addresses Huawei’s Efforts to Undermine Entity List, Restricts Products
Designed and Produced with U.S. Technologies,” press release, May 15, 2020, available at https://2017-
2021.commerce.gov/news/press-releases/2020/05/commerce-addresses-huaweis-efforts-undermine-entity-list-
restricts.html.
178 Varas and Varadarajan, How Restricting Trade with China Could End US Semiconductor Leadership; John Neuffer,
“Report Shows Risks of Excessive Restrictions on Trade with China,” Semiconductor Industry Association, March 9,
2020.
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certain U.S. software and technology.”179 That is, BIS prohibited foreign-based users of licensed
U.S. technology and software from selling products of that technology and software, to Huawei
without a license from BIS. Since virtually all manufacturers of advanced semiconductors use
U.S. technology as part of the manufacturing process, the United States used the FDPR in an
attempt to limit Huawei’s ability to source advanced semiconductors from major manufacturers in
Taiwan, South Korea, and Japan, without having to wait for their governments to implement such
controls and without requiring their governments to explicitly endorse the controls. Since 2020,
BIS has subjected hundreds more entities to the FDPR.180 As one trio of scholars wrote, “China’s
decision to try to become more self-reliant with respect to technology can also be understood as a
response to the USA cutting off supply lines to essential technology with respect to ZTE and
Huawei.”181
On October 7, 2022, the Department of Commerce announced new export controls on certain
advanced semiconductors and advanced semiconductor manufacturing equipment (SME).182 The
Semiconductor Industry Association (SIA) described the new controls as “among the most novel
and complex EAR provisions ever published.”183 Another industry association, SEMI, expressed
concerns with multilateral cooperation, “Currently, the U.S. is the leader in the semiconductor
equipment industry, with 3 of the top 5 companies headquartered here in the U.S. Without
equivalent multilateral controls,” SEMI warned, “the U.S. is at serious risk of losing that
technological leadership as the legacy market provides a reliable source of income that funds
innovation.”184
Three countries—the United States, Japan, and the Netherlands—produce much of the world’s
SME. In January 2023, the United States acknowledged that all three countries had reached a deal
to coordinate controls on SME.185 Although neither Japan nor the Netherlands has explicitly
acknowledged coordinating with the United States, by March both governments had announced
new controls on SME.186

179 Department of Commerce, “Commerce Department Further Restricts Huawei Access to U.S. Technology and Adds
Another 38 Affiliates to the Entity List,” press release, August 17, 2020, available at https://2017-
2021.commerce.gov/news/press-releases/2020/08/commerce-department-further-restricts-huawei-access-us-
technology-and.html: “This amendment further restricts Huawei from obtaining foreign made chips developed or
produced from U.S. software or technology to the same degree as comparable U.S. chips;” BIS, “Export
Administration Regulations: Amendments to General Prohibition Three (Foreign-Produced Direct Product Rule) and
the Entity List,” 85 Federal Register 29849, May 19, 2020; BIS, “Addition of Huawei Non-U.S. Affiliates to the Entity
List, the Removal of Temporary General License, and Amendments to General Prohibition Three (Foreign-Produced
Direct Product Rule),” 85 Federal Register 51596, August 20, 2020.
180 15 C.F.R. §§744 Supplement no. 4, 734.9(e), 744.11.
181 Anthea Roberts, Henrique Choer Moraes, and Victor Ferguson, “Toward a Geoeconomic Order in International
Trade and Investment,” Journal of International Economic Law (2019), p. 665.
182 BIS, “Implementation of Additional Export Controls: Certain Advanced Computing and Semiconductor
Manufacturing Items; Supercomputer and Semiconductor End Use; Entity List Modification,” 87 Federal Register
62186, October 13, 2022.
183 Public comment 13 on Advanced computing IFR, Semiconductor Industry Association, January 13, 2023, Comment
ID: BIS-2022-0025-0018.
184 Public comment 26 on Advanced computing IFR, SEMI, January 31, 2023, Comment ID: BIS-2022-0025-0032.
185 Alexandra Alper and David Shepherdson, “U.S. Official Acknowledges Japan, Netherlands Deal to Curb
Chipmaking Exports to China,” Reuters, January 31, 2023.
186 Minister for Foreign Trade and Development Cooperation Liesje Schreinemacher to the House of Representatives
on the Additional Export Control Measures Concerning Advanced Semiconductor Manufacturing Equipment, March 8
2023; Gregory C. Allen, Emily Benson, and Margot Putnam, “Japan and the Netherlands Announce Plans for New
Export Controls on Semiconductor Equipment,” CSIS, April 10, 2023; Leo Lewis and Kana Inagaki, “Japan to Restrict
Semiconductor Equipment Exports as China Chip War Intensifies,” Financial Times, March 31, 2023.
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Export Control Coordination on Human Rights
Since the 1970s, in response to congressional concerns, the United States has controlled exports
of certain goods in furtherance of international human rights concerns.187 These controls have
been unilateral and generally, although not exclusively, focus on goods used for crime control and
detection that foreign governments might use, for example, to interrogate dissidents or spy on
minority populations.188 Other countries have rarely maintained similar restrictions.
In many cases the lack of international coordination has not hindered the primary purpose of U.S.
policy goals, which has been to prevent U.S. goods from supporting human rights abuses. U.S.
policymakers have long understood that export controls are unlikely to prevent foreign actors
from obtaining simple manufactured goods that are readily available—the United States and its
partners are hardly the only manufacturers of thumb screws and spiked batons in the world.189
Instead, controls have been imposed on such goods in large part to ensure, in the words of former
Chairperson of the Senate Committee on Banking William Proxmire, that “devices used to repress
and torture human beings are not stamped ‘Made in the United States of America.’”190
Although controls on simple manufactures for human rights purposes have not posed significant
policy or political challenges, controls on advanced technologies have. In such cases the United
States has sought not only to prevent reputational damage, but to actually prevent foreign actors
from obtaining certain goods.191 With respect to limiting access to advanced technologies,

187 Department of Commerce, Domestic and International Business Administration, “Exports of Crime Control and
Detection Equipment to U.S.S.R., Eastern Europe, and the People's Republic of China (Country Groups Q, W, and Y),”
39 Federal Register 26719, July 23, 1974.
188 For example, 15 C.F.R. §742.7; BIS, “Additions to the Entity List; Amendment to Confirm Basis for Adding
Certain Entities to the Entity List Includes Foreign Policy Interest of Protection of Human Rights Worldwide,” 88
Federal Register 18983, March 30, 2023: “The ERC determined to add the following [entities...] to the Entity List
under the destination of China, for engaging in activities contrary to U.S. foreign policy interests. These additions are
being made because [these entities] have been implicated in human rights violations and abuses in the implementation
of China's campaign of repression, mass arbitrary detention and high-technology surveillance against the Uyghur
people and members of other Muslim minority groups in the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region (XUAR).”
189 See 15. C.F.R. §742.11; Rep. Christopher H. Smith and Rep. James P. McGovern to Secretary Mike Pompeo and
Secretary Wilbur Ross, August 2, 2019; Rajesh Kumar Singh, “U.S. Company Supplying Tear Gas to Hong Kong
Police Faces Mounting Criticism,” Reuters, October 11, 2019; Gregory C. Allen expressed a similar idea when as part
of a panel on export controls he noted:
There are types of export control that the United States puts upon certain countries that we really
know are not going to work. For example, when the dictator of Syria was engaged in the Syrian
Civil War, the United States restricted the sale of hand cuffs to the Syrian regime. No one believes
in the United States Government that we successfully stopped Bashar Hafez al-Assad from
acquiring handcuffs. Those export controls were designed to send a signal, they were not designed
to make an impact.
Center for Security and International Studies, “Economic Security: Perspectives from Seoul and Washington,”
February 23, 2023, at 49:00.
190 U.S. Congress, Senate Committee on Banking, Use of Export Controls and Export Credits for Foreign Policy
Purposes, hearing, 95th Cong., 2nd sess., October 10 and 11, 1978 (Washington, DC: GPO, 1978), p. 2.
191 For example, the first export control imposed explicitly for human rights purposes was drafted in response to reports
that an American company was poised to sell voice identification technology to the Soviet Union, which many U.S.
policymakers worried would be used to oppress political dissidents. Sam Jaffe, “Russians Invited U.S. Firms to Police
Trade Show,” Chicago Tribune, July 7, 1974; Rep. Charles A. Vanik, “American Participation in Moscow Crime
Technology Trade Exposition,” remarks in the House, Congressional Record, daily edition, vol. 120 (July. 9, 1974),
pp. 22348-22350: Vanik quoted at length from Alexandr Solzhenitsyn’s The First Circle, before summarizing: “This
entire 670-page book describes the ordeal of a prison camp of scientists who have been ordered to build a voice print
device to catch a ‘political criminal.’ ...To provide voice print devices to a nation which makes no bones about massive
wiretapping would be a criminal and immoral act on the part of the United States;” Fourteen days after the news broke,
(continued...)
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coordination was essential both to the effectiveness of the control, but also to protect domestic
firms and limit domestic criticism. For example, after the United States began to expand its use of
export controls for human rights and other foreign policy purposes in the late 1970s, David
Packard, Chairman of the U.S. computer manufacturer Hewlett-Packard warned: “I think the only
thing such policies do is to guarantee the loss of business for the United States.”192 Specifically,
he argued, U.S. technology companies would be seen as unreliable suppliers leading countries to
turn to European and Japanese firms.193 This was especially true “if the products are high
technology items requiring skilled servicing and U.S. parts and components.”194 Perhaps because
of concerns about the potential economic costs,195 or perhaps because the United States
increasingly turned to financial sanctions as a tool in support of human rights, the debate over
using export controls for human rights purposes subsided gradually, with little activity by either
Congress or the executive branch from the mid-1980s through the 2000s.
In the mid-2010s, more nongovernmental organizations and policymakers began expressing
concerns about the impact of advanced surveillance technologies on human rights and began
advocating for stricter controls on their exports.196 In 2013, France and Britain negotiated the
addition of two types of network and intrusion software to the lists of dual-use technologies under
the Wassenaar Arrangement.197 Shortly thereafter, Human Rights Watch argued for more, writing,
“Any export policy relating to surveillance technologies should place human rights at its heart”
and urging members of the Wassenaar Arrangement to “refuse to grant export licenses for
surveillance technology destined for end-users in countries where they are likely to be used in an
unlawful manner i.e. not compliant with human rights legal standards.”198 By 2020, BIS had
amended the Export Administration Regulations to require the consideration of the human rights
implications of licensing the export of any controlled item.199 BIS noted that the revision was

the Department of Commerce published a rule regulating the export of such equipment. Department of Commerce,
Domestic and International Business Administration, “Exports of Crime Control and Detection Equipment to U.S.S.R.,
Eastern Europe, and the People's Republic of China (Country Groups Q, W, and Y),” 39 Federal Register 26719, July
23, 1974. Note that similar concerns have surfaced in the past several years—this time in response to facial (rather than
voice) recognition. David Shepardson, “IBM Says U.S. Should Adopt New Export Controls on Facial Recognition
Systems,” Reuters, September 11, 2020.
192 U.S. Congress, Use of Export Controls and Export Credits for Foreign Policy Purposes, p. 34.
193 Ibid.
194 Ibid.
195 See Ibid.
196 Organizations included, among others, Human Rights Watch, Amnesty International, and the International
Federation for Human Rights, Reporters without Borders. Several experts have argued that this advocacy was in
response to the use of surveillance technologies by certain governments during the Arab Spring. For example, Garrett
Hinck, “Wassenaar Export Controls on Surveillance Tools: New Exemptions for Vulnerability Research,” Lawfare,
January 5, 2018, available at https://www.lawfareblog.com/wassenaar-export-controls-surveillance-tools-new-
exemptions-vulnerability-research; Mark Bromley, “A Search for Common Ground: Export Controls on Surveillance
Technology and the Role of the EU,” About: Intel, available at https://aboutintel.eu/surveillance-export-control-eu/.
197 Wassenaar Arrangement, List of Dual-Use Goods and Technologies and Munitions List,” December 2021, pp. 80
(4.D.4. “Software” specially designed or modified for the generation, command and control, or delivery of “intrusion
software.”), 88 (5.A.1.j. IP network communications surveillance systems or equipment). Note, these definitions and
descriptions include additional language negotiated by the United States in 2016 and 2017 to address concerns that
controlling this technology could potentially cripple legitimate cybersecurity research. BIS, “Information Security
Controls: Cybersecurity Items,” 86 Federal Register 58205, October 21, 2021; See also Hinck, “Wassenaar Export
Controls on Surveillance Tools.”
198 An Open Letter to the Members of the Wassenaar Arrangement, December 1, 2014, available at
https://www.hrw.org/node/264946/printable/print.
199 This policy does not apply to license reviews for items controlled because they are in short supply. Bureau of
Industry and Security, “Amendment to Licensing Policy for Items Controlled for Crime Control Reasons,” 85 Federal
Register 63007, October 6, 2020.
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“necessary to prevent items currently controlled …, including [for] reasons related to certain
telecommunications and information security and sensors, from being used to engage in or enable
the violation or abuse of human rights.”200
The United States has sought to increase the effectiveness and decrease the costs of the controls
by engaging with likeminded states on the subject. In 2021 the United States, along with
Australia, Denmark, Norway, announced the Export Controls and Human Rights Initiative to
“help stem the tide of authoritarian government misuse of technology and promote a positive
vision for technologies anchored by democratic values.”201 Canada, France, the Netherlands, and
the United Kingdom later joined.202
Over the next year, the United States and several partners worked to draft a voluntary code of
conduct, in which the parties commit “to apply export controls to ensure that relevant goods and
technologies are used in compliance with international human rights law and not misused to
unlawfully or arbitrarily interfere with privacy or to otherwise commit serious violations or
abuses of human rights.”203 Twenty-five countries have endorsed the code and agreed to
participate in a meeting in the summer of 2023 “to begin discussions on implementing the
commitments in the Code of Conduct.”204 The code of conduct is voluntary and does not establish
a new institution like the Wassenaar Arrangement. Rather this informal and voluntary regime
creates a forum and a central text from which like-minded countries might bring export controls
into closer alignment through communication.205 Such an effort may enable more countries to
implement human rights controls, as some countries’ laws only allow controls that are grounded
in an international effort.206
Issues for Congress
In the past decade, through both legislation and oversight, Congress has made clear its continuing
interest in export policy and its relationship to maintaining U.S. technological leadership while
denying adversaries access to advanced technologies produced by the United States and its allies.
ECRA clearly stated that international coordination was of central importance to advancing the
goals of U.S. export control policy.
Several issues are central to ensuring effective export control coordination. First, effective export
control policy, for example, must take into account the pace of technological development. In the

200 Ibid.
201 White House, “Joint Statement on the Export Controls and Human Rights Initiative,” press release, December 10,
2021, available at https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefing-room/statements-releases/2021/12/10/joint-statement-on-the-
export-controls-and-human-rights-initiative/.
202 White House, “Fact Sheet: Export Controls and Human Rights Initiative….”
203 Code of Conduct for Enhancing Export Controls of Goods and Technology That Could be Misused and Lead to
Serious Violations or Abuses of Human Rights, available at https://www.state.gov/wp-
content/uploads/2023/03/230303-Updated-ECHRI-Code-of-Conduct-FINAL.pdf.
204 Countries that have endorsed the code include: Albania, Australia, Bulgaria, Canada, Costa Rica, Croatia, Czechia,
Denmark, Ecuador, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Japan, Kosovo, Latvia, The Netherlands, New Zealand, North
Macedonia, Norway, Republic of Korea, Slovakia, Spain, United Kingdom, and the United States. U.S. Department of
State, “Export Controls and Human Rights Initiative Code of Conduct Released at the Summit for Democracy,” press
release, March 30, 2023, available at https://www.state.gov/export-controls-and-human-rights-initiative-code-of-
conduct-released-at-the-summit-for-democracy/.
205 Code of Conduct for Enhancing Export Controls of Goods and Technology That Could be Misused and Lead to
Serious Violations or Abuses of Human Rights, available at https://www.state.gov/wp-
content/uploads/2023/03/230303-Updated-ECHRI-Code-of-Conduct-FINAL.pdf.
206 See “Partner Legal and Administrative Capacity,” below.
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1990s, the United States liberalized its controls, in part, due to an expectation of continuous and
rapid technological innovation. While many argue that technological development continues to
proceed at a rapid pace, some scholars have cautioned that technological development may be
slowing. One potential response to a slower innovation environment might be stricter controls,
which would require coordination to be effective. Whether through the creation of a new
multilateral regime or through plurilateral cooperation, coordinating export control policy
requires that domestic and foreign stakeholders recognize the aims of U.S. export control policy
as legitimate. Additionally, U.S. partners and allies must also possess the legal and administrative
capacity to participate in such coordination. The following sections detail some of these issues
and suggests some options for Congress to encourage effective coordination of export control
policy.
The Pace of Technological Development and U.S. Export Control
Strategy
Congress drafted ECRA with embedded assumptions about the pace of technological
development. Some scholars and policymakers argue that technological development has
continued to proceed at a rapid pace;207 other scholars have argued that the pace of innovation has
slowed. As one scholar argues, the early twentieth century was a period of rapid technological
development during which a “unique clustering” of “great inventions” enabled a period of
exceptional economic growth.208 U.S. export control policy emerged during that time and has
embedded within it assumptions about the pace of technological development. For example, since
the late 1980s, the United States has maintained a “run faster” strategy with respect to export
controls for national security purposes.209 That strategy was based on both the decreased
effectiveness of multilateral controls and the adoption of a strategy of civil-military “integration”
to “allow the Pentagon to exploit the rapid rate of innovation and market-driven efficiencies of
commercial industries to meet defense needs”210 In contrast to the use of embargos during the
Cold War, the “run faster” approach encouraged exports of existing technology to fund more
research and development. One assumption underlying the strategy was that continuing
innovation would keep the United States several generations ahead of its strategic competitors.
This approach was particularly applicable to semiconductors where heavy private investment in
research and development drove incremental progress at a relatively steady and predictable

207 Erik Brynjolfsson and Andrew McAfee, The Second Machine Age: Work, Progress, and Prosperity in a Time of
Brilliant Technologies (New York: Norton, 2014), p. 12: “We should be confident that the scale and pace of innovation
in computers, robots, and other digital gear is only going to accelerate in the future;” Tyler Cowen, “Is Innovation
Over? The Case Against Pessimism,” Foreign Affairs (March/April 2016): “Perhaps [the greatest contribution of
Robert J. Gordon’s book on declining rates of technological development and economic growth] is that it
unintentionally demonstrates the weakness of the case for pessimism.”
208 Robert J. Gordon, The Rise and Fall of American Growth: The U.S. Standard of Living Since the Civil War
(Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2016), pp. 2-3.
209 Meijer, Trading with the Enemy, chap. 4; For characterizations of this policy, see, for example, White House,
Remarks by National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan at the Special Competitive Studies Project Global Emerging
Technologies Summit, September 16, 2022, available at https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefing-room/speeches-
remarks/2022/09/16/remarks-by-national-security-advisor-jake-sullivan-at-the-special-competitive-studies-project-
global-emerging-technologies-summit/: “We previously maintained a ‘sliding scale’ approach that said we need to stay
only a couple of generations ahead.”
210 National Economic Council and National Security Council, Second to None: Preserving America’s Military
Advantage Through Dual-Use Technology, February 1995, pp. 1-2.
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pace.211 But that pace may have slowed as semiconductors near the physical limits of
miniaturization.212
Semiconductors are not the only area where technological development may have slowed. The
early twentieth century’s rapid technological development, some academics argue, was unique
and is unlikely to be repeated.213 Indeed, some scholars have argued that the pace of innovation
has been slowing since the middle of the twentieth century214 making the economic growth
common in the last century unachievable in the twenty-first.215 Should the pace of technological
development slow, Congress could consider assessing whether the diffusion of current generation
technology over time, without new advances, could homogenize levels of technological
development. Congress might consider whether maintaining U.S. technological leadership would,
therefore, require both achieving a larger technological lead over strategic rivals as well as close
coordination with like-minded countries to slow the diffusion of advanced technologies.
The Biden Administration has announced some steps in this direction. At the Emerging
Technologies Summit in September 2022, National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan articulated
what some observers have described as a new doctrine with respect to U.S. export control policy:
On export controls, we have to revisit the longstanding premise of maintaining “relative”
advantages over competitors in certain key technologies. We previously maintained a
“sliding scale” approach that said we need to stay only a couple of generations ahead.
That is not the strategic environment we are in today.
Given the foundational nature of certain technologies, such as advanced logic and memory
chips, we must maintain as large of a lead as possible.216
Sullivan’s statements were followed a month later with expansive new controls on advanced
semiconductors and semiconductor manufacturing equipment.217 By early 2023, the White House
had announced that it was coordinating its controls with the countries where the most advanced
semiconductor manufacturing technology is produced.218
Congress could use its legislative powers or oversight role to examine assumptions about the pace
of technological development embedded in ECRA, assess whether they remain valid, and

211 Oxford Dictionary of Electronics and Electrical Engineering, 5th ed., s.v. Moore’s law.
212 Charles Q. Choi, “These Transistor Gates Are Just One Carbon Atom Thick: Researchers May Have Hit a Hard
Limit,” IEEE Spectrum, March 11, 2022.
213 Gordon, The Rise and Fall of American Growth, pp. 2-3.
214 Ibid, p. 7: “With a few notable exceptions, the pace of innovation since 1970 has not been as broad or as deep as that
spurred by the inventions of the special century;” David Graeber, The Utopia of the Rules: On Technology, Stupidity,
and the Secret Joys of Bureaucracy (London: Melville House, 2015), p. 114: “There is reason to believe that even by
the fifties and sixties, the pace of technological innovation was slowing down from the heady pace of the first half of
the century;” Michael Park, Erin Leahey, and Russell J. Fun, “Papers and Patents are Becoming Less Disruptive Over
Time,” Nature 613 (January 4, 2023), available at https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-022-05543-x: “Although the
past century witnessed an unprecedented expansion of scientific and technological knowledge, there are concerns that
innovative activity is slowing.”
215 Gordon, Rise and Fall of American Growth, p. 7: “[This book holds that] economic growth witnessed a singular
interval of rapid growth [between 1870 and 1970] that will not be repeated.”
216 White House, “Remarks by National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan at the Special Competitive Studies Project
Global Emerging Technologies Summit,” press release, September 16, 2022, emphasis added. For an example of
commentary describing these statements as constituting a “doctrine,” see “America’s Commercial Sanctions on China
Could Get Much Worse,” Economist, March 30, 2023.
217 See “Export Control Coordination: China” above.
218 Ibid.
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consider whether to support, seek to modify, or challenge the administration’s new approach to
using export controls to maintain U.S. technological supremacy.
A Fifth Export Control Regime
Almost since the Wassenaar Arrangement’s creation, some Members of Congress and other
policymakers have advocated for the creation of a “fifth” regime that is more like CoCom and
less like the other four nonproliferation regimes. In 1999, for example, the House Select
Committee on U.S. National Security and Military/Commercial Concerns with the People’s
Republic of China stated that “The dissolution of [CoCom] in March 1994 left the United States
without an effective international mechanism to control the transfer of important military
technologies.”219 The solution, the Committee argued, was the creation of “a new COCOM-like
agreement, under which national exports of certain militarily useful goods and technologies are
subject to international agreement, would enhance efforts to restrict technology transfers.”220
Critics, however, argued that such an agreement was politically unworkable at the time.221 Calls
for a new CoCom, or a “fifth regime,” mostly subsided as U.S. attention shifted toward terrorism
in the 2000s and early 2010s.
Since at least 2020, several experts, current and former BIS officials, and Members of Congress
have revived the subject in articles as well as in testimony before various congressional
committees.222 In February 2023, for example Under Secretary of Commerce for Industry and
Security Alan Estevez was quoted as stating, “I believe we need a fifth mechanism outside the
existing ones, which still work in their varying areas – missile control, nuclear control
chem/bio…. And all those were built in the 90s for the world of the 90s.”223 Over the past few
years, Members have also introduced legislation encouraging the United States to “explore the
value of establishing a body akin to the Coordinating Committee for Multilateral Export Controls
(CoCom) that would specifically coordinate United States and European Union export control
policies with respect to limiting exports of sensitive technologies to the People’s Republic of
China.”224

219 U.S. Congress, House Select Committee on U.S. National Security and Military/Commercial Concerns with the
People’s Republic of China, U.S. National Security and Military/Commercial Concerns with the People’s Republic of
China, 105th Cong., 2nd sess., H.Rept. 105-851 (Washington, DC: GPO, 1999), p. XXV.
220 Ibid.
221 For example, Jonathan D. Pollack, “The Cox Report's ‘Dirty Little Secret,’” Arms Control Today (April/May 1999).
222 Jared Cohen and Richard Fontaine, “Uniting the Techno-Democracies: How to Build Digital Cooperation,” Foreign
Affairs (November/December 2020); Ian Stewart, “Export Controls in an Era of Strategic Competition: Implications for
the Existing Landscape and the Need for a New Multilateral Trade Review Regime,” Strategic Trade Review 9, no. 10
(Winter/Spring 2023); Corey Lee Bell, Elena Collinson, and Australian Institute for International Affairs, “US Tech
Export Controls on China: Lessons from COCOM,” Australian Outlook, February 24, 2023; Wolf and Weinstein,
“CoCom’s Daughter;” Wolf, Testimony before the U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission Hearing,
September 8, 2021, pp. 18-19; Emily S. Weinstein, Testimony before the U.S.-China Economic and Security Review
Commission Hearing on “Challenges from Chinese Policy in 2022: Zero-COVID, Ukraine, and Pacific Diplomacy,”
Panel II: “Russia’s Invasion of Ukraine and Implications for Integrated Deterrence,” August 3, 2022, pp. 13-15; Tyson
Barker and the German Council on Foreign Relations, The Hidden G2 for Democratic Tech Governance is the EU-US
Relationship, DGAP Analysis 2 (June 2021), p. 9; Brett Fortnam, “Estevez: Growing Cooperation on Export Controls
Should Fuel New Regime,” World Trade Online, May 26, 2022.
223 Center for Security and International Studies, “Economic Security: Perspectives from Seoul and Washington,”
February 23, 2023, at 36:00; Brett Fortnam, “Estevez Eyes Next Steps in Expanding U.S. Export Control Regime,”
World Trade Online, February 24, 2023.
224 Identical text in:, Strategic Competition Act of 2021 (Menendez), April 15, 2021; H.R. 3524, Ensuring American
Global Leadership and Engagement Act (Meeks), May 25, 2021; S. 1260; United States Innovation and Competition
(continued...)
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As one former official recently wrote, “The existing multilateral system is generally either too
slow, too compromised, or too limited in terms of its nonproliferation-focused mandate.”225 A new
regime, these experts and officials argue, would provide space to coordinate on issues outside of
the limited nonproliferation concerns the existing regimes address, including: human rights
abuses, and strategic economic competition.226 Moreover, they argue, a new regime might also be
able to act with greater speed and efficiency, enabling the United States and its partners to quickly
respond to events like the Russian invasion of Ukraine.227
Some analysts, however, have expressed skepticism that the creation of a new institution would
add much beyond what can already be achieved through “plurilateral arrangements, particularly
over chokepoint technologies,”228 akin to what was announced in January 2023 between Japan,
the Netherlands, and the United States. Skeptics have also noted that divergent security concerns
and assessments of economic costs might make establishing a regime that specifically targeted a
country—like China—politically challenging. Even during the Cold War, it was often difficult for
the United States to convince its European allies to support robust controls on the Soviet Union.
Today, the European and Chinese economies are more integrated than the European and the
Soviet economies. Nevertheless, supporters have argued that Russia’s invasion of Ukraine
sparked a new interest among U.S. allies and partners in coordinating export controls.229
The costs associated with controlling exports have long been hard to quantify and the costs
associated with multilateral control, even more so. Members may want to consider whether or not
to assess, or require the administration to assess, how the creation of a fifth regime might affect
the U.S. economy, including the actual costs imposed by the regime on U.S. firms and the
regime’s potential impact on U.S. innovation.
Legitimacy, Coordination, and Effectiveness
The goals of U.S. export control policy must be seen as legitimate by a wide range of domestic
and foreign stakeholders in order for that policy to ultimately be effective. In ECRA, Congress
defined the goals of U.S. export control policy230 and can consider whether to refine and amend
those goals through hearings and legislation to encourage the support of foreign governments and
other stakeholders.
Since the Second World War, the United States has at times run into difficulties coordinating
policy goals with its allies and partners. In part, this can be attributed to diverging policy aims.
For example, during the Cold War, Western European countries were reluctant to engage in what
some characterized as “economic warfare” against the Soviet Union. Instead, European countries
preferred narrow controls on goods with clear military applications. Even such limited controls

Act of 2021 (Schumer), March 20, 2021 (passed Senate June 8, 2021); and H.R. 4521, United States Innovation and
Competition Act of 2021 (Johnson), March 28, 2022.
225 Wolf and Weinstein, “CoCom’s Daughter,” p. 25.
226 Ibid.
227 Ibid.
228 Scott Jones, “Think Twice Before Bringing Back the COCOM Export Control Regime,” Defense News, April 9,
2021.
229 Emily Weinstein and Kevin Wolf, “A New Export Control Regime for the 21st Century: How Russia’s Invasion
Has Created an Opportunity for a Techno-Democracy Partnership,” Center for Security and Emerging Technology,
May 23, 2022.
230 ECRA §1752, codified at 15 U.S.C. §4811.
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were often controversial. CoCom’s operations remained largely hidden from public view in part
to insulate democratic European governments from criticism by their electorate.231
Maintaining the legitimacy of the export control system is vital for its effectiveness. As one
scholar noted, “export control policies rely on the general perception of their legitimacy by the
Western business community, and acceptance of the policy by concerned owners or employees
provides the central underpinning of the system.”232 For example, concerned employees may
serve as whistleblowers, reporting sales that may violate U.S. export control laws.233
Coordinating export controls, therefore, requires a broad perception among the residents and
industries of the various participating countries that the controls serve a legitimate purpose.
As Congress considers U.S. export control strategy, it may wish to consider what economic goals,
values, and national security strategies have broad support among the electorates of close allies
and partners.
Ethical Trade and Export Control Coordination
Since before the U.S. War for Independence, trade has been central to American political debates
on moral and ethical concerns. In examining those debates, scholars typically have focused on the
politics of imports and consumption;234 as one historian put it, “the consumer boycott was a
brilliantly original American invention.”235 Although such politics are usually consumer-driven,
the U.S. government has occasionally enforced or encouraged moral boycotts through law. For
example, the United States has long prohibited the import of goods made with forced labor,
including forced child labor. 236 Similarly, during the Cold War, the United States imposed higher
tariffs on nonmarket economies that restricted emigration.237

231 Jacqueline McGlade, “COCOM and the Containment of Western Trade and Relations,” in East-West Trade and the
Cold War ed. Jari Eloranta and Jari Ojala (Jyvaskyla: University of Jyvaskyla Press, 2005).
232 Richard T. Cupitt, “The Future of COCOM,” in Export Controls in Transition: Perspectives, Problems, and
Prospects, ed. Gary K. Bertsch and Steven. Elliott-Gower (Durham, NK: Duke University Press, 1992), p. 236.
233 Ibid. Cupitt cites as an example the Toshiba case, in which an employee made the initial report of the illegal sales to
the Soviet Union. On the Toshiba case, see Wrubel, “The Toshiba-Kongsberg Incident.”
234 See, for example, Lawrence B. Glickman, Buying Power: A History of Consumer Activism in America (Chicago:
University of Chicago Press, 2009); Meredith A. Katz, “Boycotting and Buycotting in Consumer Cultures: Political
Consumerism in North America” in The Oxford Handbook of Political Consumerism. (Oxford: Oxford University
Press, 2018).
235 T. H. Breen, The Marketplace of Revolution: How Consumer Politics Shaped American Independence (Oxford:
Oxford University Press, 2004), p. XVI: He further argues that prior to the American War for Independence “no
massive political movement had organized itself around the denial of imported goods.”
236 Tariff Act of 1930, P.L. 71–361, 46 Stat. 590 (1930), codified as amended at 19 U.S.C. §§1301 et seq. Until
recently, the United States was the sole developed country with such provisions. Although this provision was not
primarily enacted to enforce a moral prohibition against buying goods made with forced labor, as evidenced by the
provision that allowed such imports if domestic production could not meet the consumptive demand of the United
States, there were Members of Congress, including the bill’s sponsor, who made such arguments. See, for example,
Senate debate, Congressional Record, vol. 71, part 4 (October 14, 1929), p. 4496: Sen. Blaine. “I understand that we
might suffer some economic loss, but we can not [sic] afford any economic gain at the sacrifice of the degeneracy and
death of the natives amounting to millions of men and women.” The provision took a more moral turn when the so-
called consumptive demand clause was removed in 2015. Trade Facilitation and Trade Enforcement Act of 2015, P.L.
114-125 §910, 130 Stat. 122, 239. Even more recently, Congress expanded the provision to address concerns about
Uyghur forced labor in the Xinjiang region of China. Act of December 23, 2021 (Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention
Act), P.L. 117-78, 135 Stat. 1525 (2021).
237 The so-called Jackson-Vanik Amendment to the Trade Act of 1974 imposed higher tariff rates on nonmarket
economies that did not allow free emigration. Trade Act of 1974, P.L. 93-618 §402, 88 Stat. 1978, 2056 (1975),
codified as amended at 19 U.S.C. §2432(a).
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link to page 29

Export politics have also had this moral dimension at times. During the Cold War, some
policymakers argued that exporting to the Soviet Union was morally suspect and U.S. nationals
should be prohibited from doing so regardless of the economic cost to U.S. industry.238 Similarly,
since the 1970s, the United States has maintained controls on exports of goods that might enable
human rights abuses.239
Few other countries have enforced moral concerns through trade law;240 for 75 years, the United
States was virtually alone in formally prohibiting the import of goods made with forced labor.241
Recently, several likeminded states have enacted, or are in the process of enacting, similar
prohibitions—including Canada,242 Mexico,243 and the European Union.244 Similarly, the United
States was virtually alone in controlling exports explicitly for human rights purposes. However,
several countries have recently joined with the United States in discussing how to coordinate
exports for such purposes (See “Export Control Coordination on Human Rights” above).
Congress has appeared to be more willing to explicitly tie trade policy to moral or ethical
concerns than the executive branch. Given the increasing interest among close allies and partners
in building a trade policy around ethical and moral concerns, Congress in its legislative or
oversight roles may consider whether to encourage or discourage the executive branch to frame
its export control strategy around human rights issues of concern.
Partner Legal and Administrative Capacity
Since the late 1940s, Congress has provided a variety of authorities that enable the President to
control exports for national security, foreign policy, and economic purposes. This includes
authority to impose controls unilaterally, without coordinating with partners and allies.245 Even in
periods where Congress did not renew export control authorizations when they expired,
Presidents have used emergency authorities to maintain the U.S. export control regime. This legal
authority is coupled with a relatively robust administrative capacity to enforce U.S. export
controls.

238 Timothy Aeppel, “The Evolution of Multilateral Export Controls: A Critical Study of the CoCom Regime,” Fletcher
Forum (Winter 1984), p. 114; Theodore C. Sorensen, “Why We Should Trade with the Soviets,” Foreign Affairs 46,
no. 3 (April 1968), p. 576.
239 Department of Commerce, Domestic and International Business Administration, “Exports of Crime Control and
Detection Equipment to U.S.S.R., Eastern Europe, and the People's Republic of China (Country Groups Q, W, and Y),”
39 Federal Register 26719, July 23, 1974.
240 However, some countries or trade blocs have attempted to use trade preferences to encourage improvement in
foreign human rights conditions, particularly with respect to labor and environmental conditions. For example, the EU
turns to its Generalized System of Preferences program to promote human rights abroad. European Parliamentary
Research Service, Human Rights in EU Trade Policy (May 2018), p. 1.
241 Law Library of Congress, Laws Banning the Import of Goods Produced with Forced Labor in Selected
Jurisdictions, Report for Congress, LL File No. 2021-020699, September 2021.
242 Canada-United States-Mexico Agreement Implementation Act, S.C. 2020, c. 1; Customs Tariff, S.C. 1997, c. 36, as
amended.
243 Secretaría del Trabajo y Previsión Social, “Acuerdo que establece las mercancías cuya importación está sujeta a
regulación a cargo de la Secretaría del Trabajo y Previsión Social” Diario Oficial de la Federación, February 17, 2023,
p. 20.
244 European Commission, Proposal for a Regulation of the European Parliament of the Council on Prohibiting
Products Made with Forced Labour on the Union Market, COM(2022)453, September, 14 2022.
245 ECRA §1758(c), codified at 50 U.S.C §4817(c).
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In contrast, the legal authority of many U.S. allies and partners is explicitly limited to
internationally coordinated controls.246 As a pair of scholars noted, “The laws of the allies are
governed almost exclusively by the structure of lists and specific items that are identified for one
of those WMD or conventional-weapons applications.”247 In other cases, allies may be limited by
the purpose of the controls. Export control officials in Japan, for example, may only control items
in a limited number of circumstances primarily for the maintenance of international peace and
security and “to sincerely implement a treaty or any other international agreement that Japan has
signed.”248 Japan was able to participate in the controls on exports to Russia and Belarus because
those controls were internationally coordinated.249 Similarly, the European Union imposes
limitations on the purposes under which an EU member can impose export controls.250 The
Netherlands was able to place controls on exports of SME in part because it was able to tie the
controls to human rights concerns.251
Just as many partners have limited legal capacity to control exports, so too do many have limited
administrative capacity. For example, one expert has claimed that BIS is the only export control
agency in the world with its own enforcement agents.252
As part of increasing coordination efforts, the United States may need to ensure its controls are
structured to allow foreign partners to impose controls under their laws and regulations or
encourage partners to adopt more capacious export control regimes. Congress through oversight
or legislation, could consider whether to encourage or direct the executive branch to take into
account the legal restrictions of close allies when framing controls to better enable coordination.
Alternatively, Congress could consider whether to use trade agreements to encourage partners to
expand their legal authority and administrative capacity to control exports.

246 Jordan Schneider and Irene Zhang, “New Chip Export Controls and the Sullivan Tech Doctrine with Kevin Wolf,”
China Talk, October 11, 2022, available at https://www.chinatalk.media/p/new-chip-export-controls-explained: “The
laws of the allies are governed almost exclusively by the structure of lists and specific items that are identified for one
of those WMD or conventional-weapons applications;” Kevin J. Wolf, Testimony before the U.S.-China Economic and
Security Review Commission, pp. 8-9: “The export control laws of our allies are largely based on and limited by the
scope of the controls, and purposes for controls, in the multilateral export control regimes;” There are exceptions. New
Zealand, for example, provides broad authorities to impose controls that are “necessary” and “in the public interest.”
Customs and Excise Act 2018, P.A. 2018-4 §96 (2018); This seems to be an authority the New Zealand government
intends to use widely, particularly with respect to assessments of the human rights record of destination countries.
David Smol and Jennie Kerr, A Review of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade’s Export Controls Regime July
2021, available at https://www.mfat.govt.nz/assets/Trade-General/Brokering-weapons-AND-Trading-weapons-and-
controlled-chemicals/Export-Controls-Report-22-July-2021.pdf.
247 Schneider and Zhang, “New Chip Export Controls….”
248 Foreign Exchange and Foreign Trade Act, Act No. 228 of December 1, 1949, as amended by Act No. 60 of 2019,
art. 48. Unofficial translation available at https://www.japaneselawtranslation.go.jp/en/laws/view/3700. See also Center
for Information on Security Trade Control, Overview of Japan’s Export Controls, 4th ed., June, 2015, p. 5, available at
https://www.cistec.or.jp/english/export/Overview4th.pdf.
249 15 C.F.R. §746.8(a)(4), Supplement no. 3.
250 Regulation (EU) 2021/821 of the European Parliament and the Council of 20 May 2021 Setting up a Union Regime
for the Control of Exports, Brokering, Technical Assistance, Transit and Transfer of Dual-Use Items, 2021 O.J. (L
206/1) arts. 4, 9, 10.
251 Minister for Foreign Trade and Development Cooperation Liesje Schreinemacher to the House of Representatives
on the Additional Export Control Measures Concerning Advanced Semiconductor Manufacturing Equipment, March 8
2023; Allen, Benson, and Putnam, “Japan and the Netherlands Announce Plans for New Export Controls on
Semiconductor Equipment.”
252This claim was made by Kevin Wolf, former Assistant Secretary of Commerce for Export Administration, Bureau of
Industry and Security (BIS). Schneider and Zhang, “New Chip Export Controls…:” “the Commerce Department is the
only export control organization on the planet with its own enforcement agents who are subject matter experts in export
controls.” CRS has not verified this claim.
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Trade Agreements, Trade Promotion Authority, and Export
Controls
Congress periodically authorizes the President to negotiate trade agreements. These
authorizations, colloquially known as trade promotion authority (TPA), define U.S. trade
negotiating objectives.253 Congress passed the most recent such authorization in 2015 (TPA
2015); it expired in 2021.254 In TPA 2015, Congress declared that any trade agreement made
under TPA 2015 was to include “strong protection for new and emerging technologies.”255 The
provision was established in the context of intellectual property protections, but Congress could,
should it choose to provide the President with TPA, consider whether to include provisions that
require trading partners to coordinate their export controls with the United States. For example,
TPA could require that any new trade agreement partners adopt robust legal and administrative
export control authorities. Similarly, if Congress is interested in encouraging the creation of a
“fifth regime,” it could consider whether to condition trade agreements with the United States on
participation in that regime by trading partners.

Author Information

Christopher A. Casey

Analyst in International Trade and Finance

Disclaimer
This document was prepared by the Congressional Research Service (CRS). CRS serves as nonpartisan
shared staff to congressional committees and Members of Congress. It operates solely at the behest of and
under the direction of Congress. Information in a CRS Report should not be relied upon for purposes other
than public understanding of information that has been provided by CRS to Members of Congress in
connection with CRS’s institutional role. CRS Reports, as a work of the United States Government, are not
subject to copyright protection in the United States. Any CRS Report may be reproduced and distributed in
its entirety without permission from CRS. However, as a CRS Report may include copyrighted images or
material from a third party, you may need to obtain the permission of the copyright holder if you wish to
copy or otherwise use copyrighted material.

253 CRS Report RL33743, Trade Promotion Authority (TPA) and the Role of Congress in Trade Policy, by Cathleen D.
Cimino-Isaacs and Christopher A. Casey.
254 Bipartisan Congressional Trade Priorities and Accountability Act of 2015 (TPA 2015), Title I of P.L. 114-26, 129
Stat. 320 (2015).
255 TPA 2015 §102(b)(5)(A)(ii).
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