A Brave New World for Trade
The global environment for trade is undergoing significant changes. New emerging players such as China are aiming to adapt the rules and institutions inherited from the postwar Bretton Woods system.
With the administration of Donald Trump, the US is revising its international posture to adopt a more inward-looking and unilateral attitude under the motto of “America First” that jeopardizes the dynamics for multilateral engagements and more liberal and ambitious norms for trade. Against this background, major economic powerhouses such as the EU and Japan are adjusting their strategy to fight back against protectionism and to uphold high-level principles for future practices for trade.
This note offers the main conclusions of the discussions held during a conference at Ifri, on November 15, 2017.
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A Brave New World for Trade
China and Trade in Critical Raw Materials (CRMs)
Critical raw materials (CRMs) have become central features of a new dynamic in global power politics, with China now wielding considerable leverage. Amid rising regional and global uncertainty, resource security is back in the spotlight as a key determinant of sovereignty and national security for Europe, its allies and its partners. The very survival of key, even vital industries, from automotive to aerospace to health to energy to defense, is at stake.
Japan’s Energy Policy after Hormuz. Security, Competitiveness, and Decarbonization
The 2026 Hormuz crisis has strengthened rather than weakened the rationale for Japan’s decarbonization strategy, contrary to what might have been expected. Rather than energy policy supplanting climate policy, the two should actually be viewed as inseparable.
Japan and Nuclear Weapons: Between Extended Deterrence and Normative Dilemmas
Since the late 1950s, Japan’s nuclear weapons policy has been based on the coexistence of two competing normative rationales: the rejection of nuclear weapons, rooted in the legacy of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, and the recognition of the central role of US extended nuclear deterrence for Japan’s security.