Simultaneous with the rise of trade protectionism in the twenty-first century has been a resurgence in nationalist politics, most notably in the USA, the UK, and parts of the EU. These developments in international and US trade policy, including Washington's launch of a full-fledged trade war against China in March 2018, have converged disastrously with the outbreak of the novel coronavirus in November 2019 and the onset of a worldwide pandemic. Given the status of the USA as the world's hegemon since 1945, what is new here is the effort of the Trump administration to abdicate US leadership, jettison longstanding alliances, and turn back the clock on the country's close integration with the world economy. Already, greatly reduced flows of goods, services, and people have translated into radically reduced global growth, widespread business disruptions, and high unemployment. Remarkably, the White House has refused to recognize the severity of the pandemic and has undermined the precautions of the US science community. We argue that these multiple shocks constitute a major critical juncture on par with what the world community faced in 1945. However, in the twenty-first century we have seen that high levels of economic uncertainty and political instability have superseded the longheld notion that international interdependence would pull the world community through tough times such as these. Could the triple whammy of a destructive trade war, deadly pandemic, and secular decline of US leadership trigger a new generation of policy innovation and institution building on par with the post-1945 era? In terms of the global trade regime, it would be difficult to imagine a buoyant recovery of the world economy in the absence of a serious reckoning with the pattern of norm erosion that we identify here.
El objetivo principal de este artículo es analizar la evolución teórica que han tenido los estudios vinculados a la internacionalización de la empresa. Para ello, se llevó a cabo una revisión bibliográfica del estado de las investigaciones en la temática en revistas arbitradas y libros vinculados al tema de interés. Se realizan algunas referencias al concepto de internacionalización y se efectúa una revisión panorámica y sistemática de la literatura sobre el tema de las teorías relacionadas al proceso gradual de internacionalización, de los enfoques que hablan de los procesos no graduales o acelerados de internacionalización y, en tercer lugar, se complementa el análisis con otros enfoques o modelos sobre la internacionalización de las empresas que se consideran aportan a los objetivos de este estudio. La revisión de esta literatura resulta pertinente desde un punto de vista histórico, ya que gran parte de los trabajos actuales sobre la internacionalización de la empresa se ha desarrollado bajo contextos en los que la política comercial imperante a nivel mundial era la de liberalización comercial y no ante contextos de proteccionismo comercial creciente. Estudios recientes analizados en este artículo han resaltado justamente la necesidad de adaptar los conceptos de internacionalización de la empresa a contextos dinámicos, sistémicos, e inciertos. En definitiva, este artículo profundiza en cómo las empresas alcanzan la actividad exportadora y cuáles son las bases teóricas que explican estos mecanismos.
These two books motivate us to think more broadly and ask new questions related to the current trading system. For instance, why has free trade become so unpopular in the last decade? What are the reasons behind this unpopularity and what should be done to fix it?
The main goal of this paper is to situate current trade policy debates in a proper historical context by analyzing the main trade policy milestones of the 21st-century. It does not attempt to offer an extensive historical overview of trade policy, which has been done masterfully by other scholars, but to analyze the events that have led to a stagnation of the multilateral trade system and rising protectionism. This paper begins with the winding road of trade liberalization since World War II, briefly tracing how we arrived from the early stages of the Bretton Wood System to the current moment of stagnation of the multilateral system and rising protectionism. It then turns to four key events to understand the current new reality: China’s accession to the World Trade Organization (WTO) in 2001, the Global Financial Crisis (GFC) of 2008 to 2009, the trade war between the United States and China, and the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic in trade policy dynamics. It concludes with some final comments on the relevance of understanding current trade debates from a historical perspective.
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