News: Centre of Excellence

Policy Roundtable: Economic Coercion and International Trade: the nature of the challenge and policy response options

Wednesday 30th March, 2022. Arbitrary instances of economic coercion by state actors have become frequent in recent years, undermining multilateral norms and rules. Liberal democracies are increasingly concerned over the systemic quality of such coercion, and are debating and designing possible policy responses on how to respond while maintaining a stable international trading system. Event report by Dr Naoise McDonagh, Institute for International Trade.

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Swedish Perspectives on the Green Transition

Swedish Perspectives

30 March 2022. Presented by Deputy Head of Mission Per Linnér. Hosted by Institute for International Trade, Jean Monnet Centre of Excellence. Deputy Head of Mission Per Linnér provided a presentation titled ‘Swedish Perspectives on the EU’s Green Transition’. The presentation first provided an overview of the key forces driving Sweden’s political positioning and policy-making on green economy development, noting the powerful societal and grassroots origins of Swedish environmentalism that is energised by a strong sense of urgency to resolve climate change.

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Economic Coercion & International Trade. Policy Roundtable

Wednesday 30 March, 2022. Policy Roundtable, ‘Economic Coercion and International Trade: the nature of the challenge and policy response options’. Hosted by Institute for International Trade, sponsored by Jean Monnet Centre of Excellence. Arbitrary instances of economic coercion by state actors have become frequent in recent years, undermining multilateral norms and rules. In Brussels and Canberra there is growing concern and debate over the systemic quality of such coercion, as well as how to respond while maintaining a stable international trading system. Swedish Deputy Head of Mission Per Linnér will provide an EU perspective on this critical issue, followed by a brief overview of geopolitical trends driving coercion from IIT’s Dr Naoise McDonagh.

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The EU’s ‘Chips Act’: A Rent-Seekers Paradise or a Feasible Industrial Policy?

Microchip

Andreas Freytag, Professor and Chair of Economic Policy, Friedrich Schiller University, Jena and Visiting Professor with IIT. 
Microchip shortages are high on the agenda of governments and businesses feeling the pinch of ongoing supply shortages. Not least for this reason, there is a broad political consensus in Europe that strong support is needed for the European chip industry in order to be independent of Asian manufacturers in the future.

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Improving Border Adjustment Mechanisms

Gas emissions

Professor Mike Young, Institute for International Trade, The University of Adelaide. The European Union (EU) and a number of other countries including the USA, Canada, Malaysia and Japan are in the process of considering how best to prevent the flow of jobs and investment to countries that are making slower progress in the reduction of greenhouse gas emissions.

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Why Australia fails to understand the EU

EU

Richard Pomfret, Jean Monnet Chair in the Economics of European Integration at the Institute for International Trade, 2017-2020. Professor of Economics Emeritus at the University of Adelaide. Australian political leaders have long held a simplistic and misleading understanding of the European Union, due to over-reliance on reports from London for coverage of EU affairs. This op-ed argues Canberra needs to develop a more diversified and modern understanding of the EU project, and its value to Australia.

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Can Germany’s New Coalition Modernize the Country to Meet 21st Century Challenges?

 Reichstag Building Germany

Andreas Freytag, Professor and Chair of Economic Policy, Friedrich Schiller University, Jena and Visiting Professor with IIT.
Since Wednesday, the traffic light coalition has been in place and the new Chancellor Olaf Scholz has been elected. This will mark the end of a long Merkel era and the beginning of a new era under Social Democratic leadership.

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The market is a powerful instrument to counter human rights violations in China

Human Rights

Andreas Freytag, Professor and Chair of Economic Policy, Friedrich Schiller University, Jena and Visiting Professor with IIT
European Union (EU) foreign ministers have finally responded to China's documented human rights abuses by imposing sanctions on four individuals and one organization believed to be substantially involved in the oppression of Uyghurs in north-western China. Reports
of the Chinese government's treatment of the Uighurs provide evidence of mass detention and human rights abuses.

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Putting “Values” into Value Chains in an Era of System Rivalry

Value Chains Op-Ed

Naoise McDonagh, Lecturer in Political Economy, Institute for International Trade.
The EU and U.S. have a history of using trade agreements to project their value-systems on trading partners. The EU is forthright about this goal, stating: “projecting our rules and values in trade agreements helps the EU shape globalisation, especially on issues like human rights, working conditions and environmental protection”

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Pursuing an Open Strategic Autonomy trade policy against China: Expect policy fluidity

Op-ed by Weinian Hu

Weinian Hu is Research Fellow at the Centre for European Policy Studies, Belgium. The EU’s Open Strategic Autonomy policy approach was first revealed under the Commission’s recovery plan post-Covid, which was released in May 2020.

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