China standard time: the boundary of techno-nationalism in megaregionals

The emergence of China’s indigenous standards has raised concerns within the trade community. Focusing on the compatibility of such Chinese-made standards with the WTO laws, existing legal literature seem to see China’s indigenous standards as being oriented towards ‘techno-nationalism’, thereby posing a credible threat to international economic order. By revisiting the case of the WAPI, one of the most (in)famous Chinese indigenous standards in the information and communication technology (ICT) industry, this chapter contends that the threat of China’s indigenous standards policy to the global trading system may be less serious than some had thought because of the contextual factors and new rules introduced through trade and investment laws in the era of megaregionalism.