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The collapse of global trade talks last week forces the world's big economies to seek new ways to pursue their quest for lower barriers to trade. It is far from clear that the World Trade Organization, the 149-nation organization that has been the forum for the talks, is up to the task.

Indeed, the WTO is at risk of becoming a 21st-century version of the League of Nations: a well-intentioned experiment in global governance that slides into irrelevance.

The trade talks reached an impasse last week amid disputes over how deeply to cut tariffs on farm products and farm subsidies. The inability to bridge those differences stalled parallel talks on services and industrial goods. WTO chief Pascal Lamy, faced with a snarl nearly five years in the making, suspended negotiations.

"The WTO really is at a crossroads," says Grant Aldonas, who was undersecretary of commerce for international trade in President Bush's first term. He says the collapse of the Doha Round of world trade talks, unless they're revived, sets the stage for the "steady erosion of the WTO's role as the principal forum for addressing not just trade, but the broader process of globalization."

When the WTO's predecessor, the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade, was set up after World War II, it was ruled by the U.S. and, to a lesser degree, the major economies of Western Europe. When they agreed, they could bludgeon other nations to follow suit. Consensus was easier to come by. Through eight rounds of negotiations beginning in 1948, tariffs and trade barriers fell steadily. By the end of the 20th century, world trade -- as measured by the value of goods that cross borders -- was 22 times what it had been in 1950.

That day is gone, and trade barriers aren't falling as rapidly. New nations have risen to economic prominence and demand a voice in setting the rules of trade. Unlike the United Nations and International Monetary Fund, where big countries have a veto or more voting power, any single country in the WTO can scotch any deal. "Operating on the basis of consensus, with 149 countries, is a stretch," says U.S. Trade Representative Susan Schwab. "That dynamic is pretty darn complicated."

A further complication is that the WTO isn't just a body that legislates world trade rules. It is also the court that enforces them, a task at which it has had some success. The deal that created the WTO in 1994 did away with a less-confrontational approach in which countries could ignore trade rulings. Now member nations are bound to follow WTO rulings.

But that has led to problems. Under the WTO's predecessor, disputes were frequently mundane. But the WTO has added such contentious issues as agriculture subsidies and intellectual-property rights. On Capitol Hill, lawmakers have grudgingly supported the WTO.

A core group in Congress has always viewed the WTO as an international expression of support for the rule of law, and that has buttressed the case among lawmakers for talks led by the group. But the WTO left a bad taste in the mouths of some Americans when it overturned a special tax break for U.S. multinational corporations with big export businesses to comply with a ruling on a complaint filed by the European Union; Congress never likes to see its -- or America's -- power constrained by foreigners.

The collapse of the Doha trade talks probably means the WTO is heading for trouble as it approaches more difficult issues, including some touchy disputes that had been kept out of its dispute-resolution mechanism in the hopes that Doha Round diplomacy would solve them.

Brazil, for instance, is considering whether to ask the WTO for permission to impose $1 billion in damages on the U.S., as compensation for cotton subsidies the WTO has ruled are illegal. Action on the penalties had been delayed, amid the focus on the larger talks.

Similar cases could be brought against the U.S. over corn, rice and sorghum. The EU is exposed to complaints involving tomatoes, wine and butter, among others.

To the degree that the WTO rules on items that are close to the heart of national sovereignty, support for the institution will wither, and with it the WTO's mandate to promote growth and fight poverty. "There's no question about it: that's very problematic," says John Engler, president of the National Association of Manufacturers.

The U.S. never joined the League of Nations. It stood by as the institution faded slowly into irrelevance, unable to meet the diplomatic and military challenges gathering ahead of World War II. So far, the world still looks to the WTO as the only honest referee in the global trade game, and the U.S. insists that the organization remains a vital cog in the global economy.

Perhaps the bright side of the collapse of the trade talks is that trade-dependent nations may be jolted into attention and redouble their efforts to reach a compromise. That might be enough to save the WTO and recommit major economies to reducing trade barriers and smoothing the tensions that cast a shadow over a globalizing economy.