In The News

BBC: France Activates No-Deal Brexit Plan

January 17, 2019
Cooperation on complex trade, financial and security relationships requires compromise. Brexit’s most vehement supporters did not realize that leaving the European Union would still require compromise. Britain, as one member among 28 nations and representing about 16 percent of the European Union’s total GDP, lacks leverage. Agreement of all EU members is required for any deal. The British...

Guardian: May Endures Historic Defeat

Andrew Sparrow January 15, 2019
The United Kingdom scrambles on what to do next after Parliament soundly rejected Prime Minister Theresa May’s Brexit plan. After a campaign of misleading information and interference by foreign interests, British voters narrowly approved exit from the European Union in June 2016. Numerous trade, security and immigration agreements formed over the course of decades have long guided British...

European Sting: Confronting Neo-Mercantilism

Paul Rawlinson January 8, 2019
Trade tensions run high, led in no small part by the US-China trade spat, Brexit negotiations and the need for World Trade Organization reforms. “Without agreed legal frameworks, the default becomes ‘might is right,’ where the most powerful countries leverage their positions to favour themselves over others,” explains Paul Rawlinson for the European Sting. “The unforeseen return of mercantilism...

Asia-Pacific Journal Japan Focus: China’s BRI Goals

John A. Mathews January 2, 2019
China’s Belt and Road global investment strategy is financing more than $1 trillion in infrastructure development in more than 70 nations. The initiative, global in scope, is a response to the US “pivot to Asia” announced under the Obama administration, “carefully and astutely crafted to take advantage of moves by the US as the current hegemon,” explains John A. Matthews for the Asia-Pacific...

Caixin: Casualties in China-US Trade War

David Mahon December 31, 2018
As the US-China trade war continues, small nations expected to take sides will suffer economic losses. Countries, struggling to avoid coercion, must assess their relationships and values. Some like New Zealand will turn to other excuses, suggests David Mahon in an opinion essay for Caixin, but the trade war is the impetus. He points out that for New Zealand and more than 40 other nations, China...

Times of India: Orwellian Option

Nayan Chanda December 19, 2018
US-Sino trade tensions run high, especially since the arrest of a Huawei Technologies executive in Canada. Huawei reports it supplies equipment to 45 of the world’s 50 largest telecommunications companies, so the trade war could soon ensnare other nations like India. “Three of India’s top telephone carriers use Huawei equipment and the company has been invited to take part in the next generation...

Globe and Mail: Canada Arrests Huawei Global CFO

Robert Fife and Steven Chase December 7, 2018
The US-Chinese trade war has taken a new turn with news of the December 1 arrest of China’s Huawei Technologies chief financial officer in Vancouver, Canada – about the same time as Donald Trump and Xi Jinping put a pause on the trade war. Meng Wanzhou faces extradition for violation of trade sanctions against Iran. “The decision by Canadian authorities to detain such a high-profile Chinese...