David Jane: Trade wars forever

Several years back, we wrote a piece about the end of globalisation and a movement into a more multi-polar world order, with disheartenment with widening income distribution driving a changed environment. The US trade war with China is an obvious recent example. The US's initial justification for embarking on the trade dispute with China was the protection of US manufacturing jobs from unfair competition from subsidised Chinese state-owned enterprises. It has quickly become evident, however, that the disagreements go much wider and deeper than early signs suggested. Issues around intelle...