Target WTO (US China battle will ensnare everyone else too)

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 Target WTO (US China battle will ensnare everyone else too)

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• US demanding WTO abolition: Normally, only opponents of free trade would demand that a body like the World Trade Organisation be scrapped! But this time a US Senator has called for it.
• Hawley's arguments: Senator Josh Hawley claims that the pandemic has shown how US workers are losing jobs as they are fundamentally disadvantaged compared to the Chinese, and hence the US must abandon the WTO (that has aided China's rise).

1. WTO ensures that capital and goods move across borders easily, and jobs leave America for elsewhere as factories shut down (this is an attack by Hawley on trading system)
2. Hawley doesn't appreciate the post WW II American approach of creating a borderless world with supranational institutions, in the name of world peace and prosperity. The problem was that US was involved in multiple wars. And in parallel, kept sending production overseas, enriching others.

• Not liked: Experts derided this criticism of WTO, but Hawley is playing a political game. The pandemic has come right before the US election 2020, and he is polarising public opinion.
• Without the pandemic: It was clear that even without the virus, these questions were central to Donald Trump's campaign in 2020. Democratic opponent Bernie Sanders has spoken of more integration with China, not less. So Trump is hitting on both aspects - trade, and China.
• Problem of the Democrats: They cannot openly be seen as siding with the Chinese, but cannot back off from globalisation either because Wall Street's powerful men support that idea whole-heartedly.
• Move out of WTO: Hawley has moved a resolution in the US Senate asking the US to dump the WTO. Last time, this happened in 2005 when the resolution was beaten 338-86. Today, the Democratic Party has seen erosion from the working classes, as it keeps supporting free trade. 2020 Elections will show a lot regarding societal attitude on this topic.
• Resist Chinese imperialism: Hawley wants US to build a new system of ties with friendly sovereign nations, and to resist the Chinese aggression!
• India's stand: Trump is working hard to build a new system of global supply chains that would not centre on China (as today). It is clear that a battle is brewing about the WTO - to reform, reorient or bypass it. The last time, it was in the 1990s that India faced a major trade and economic challenge when the world economy changed shape. Today, in 2020, India faces the second such moment.
• Summary : US is aggressively pushing a change in the international trading structure, by proposing to dump the WTO, and this can alter India's equations too.

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