Why Donald Trump's reckless war on globalisation is so dangerous

Global free trade has helped build the modern world; a return to ‘mercantilism’ in which countries vie for economic supremacy could leave us all poorer

With Donald Trump continuing to take the rest of the world on his own patented rollercoaster ride, concerns that the wheels could come off the global economy remain.

The US President may have paused his most egregious tariffs for three months but the blanket 10 per cent rate remains – Brexiteers’ celebrations about the chance to exploit the UK’s lower rate compared to the EU’s did not last long, undone by Trump’s capriciousness.

It is also very clear that the ‘leader of the free world’ is no fan of globalisation, a concept so detested by some that it has almost become an expletive. However, they are usually on the hard left and so Trump’s right-wing supporters, in the US and around the world, now find themselves performing ideological gymnastics in an attempt to justify his stance.

The beneficial effects of global trade are easy to underestimate (Picture: Justin Sullivan) | Getty Images

Return to mercantilism?

If globalisation is increasingly assailed from both sides of the political spectrum, we could end up in a very different world, one in which countries must rely less on trade and more on domestic production. However, the opponents of global free trade tend to focus on the cons – such as manufacturing jobs going overseas where wages are cheaper – while underestimating just how many pros there are.

Much of the world we know today is based on a globalised system, from the ability to dine on watermelon during a Scottish winter and buy cheap clothes to less tangible effects such as a pressure to increase co-operation, rather than competition, between countries.

If Trump really is determined to return to 18th-century ‘mercantilism’, which the Encyclopaedia Britannica describes as an economic theory “that promoted governmental regulation of a nation’s economy for the purpose of augmenting state power at the expense of rival national powers”, the resulting trade wars could eventually lead to more serious forms of conflict. As an aside, Britannica notes mercantilism was “the economic counterpart of political absolutism”.

Globalisation has its faults but, like liberal democracy, it is a key foundation stone of the modern world. Taking a wrecking ball to it will come with considerable risks, not least to the thrillseekers currently being taken for a ride by the US President.