Suchergebnisse

The reaction of the European Commission to a series of provocative protectionist acts by the Trump Administration is characterised and then evaluated according to six criteria. The traditional "playbook" for dealing with high-profile US protectionism is found wanting, calling further into question the apparent logic of retaliation. Indeed, the European Commission's current approach appears to be more of a tactic to buy time than an effective strategy to alter U.S. policy. Implications for the next European Commission are also drawn.

This paper contests the view that, before the U.S. tariff increases of 2018 and 2019, governments around the world successfully resisted protectionist pressures since the onset of the global financial crisis. Before President Trump was inaugurated, the cumulative build-up of over 11,000 policy interventions that discriminated against foreign commercial interests implicated over two-thirds of world goods trade. An exploratory data analysis of possible drivers of national policy mixes towards domestic and foreign commercial interests is presented. Clear differences between G20 and other nations and between the immediate crisis response (from November 2008 to December 2010) and afterwards are found.

The desire of many policymakers to tame the Chinese Dragon is apparent. But what is particularly disappointing is the little, if any, reflection on how to induce the government in Beijing to change course, whether with respect to domestic policy or foreign economic policy.