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This study investigates trade shock transmission between selected African countries, the BRIC and the rest of the global economy with a view to understanding the likely disposition of African economies towards multilateralism in the years to come. The study extends the network approach of Diebold and Yilmaz [(2009). Measuring financial asset return and volatility spillovers, with application to global equity markets. The Economic Journal,  119(534), 158–171, https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1468-0297.2008.02208.x] by constructing generalized trade linkage measures at various degrees of aggregation using generalized forecast error variance decompositions of an underlying global vector autoregressive model. The results indicate that the trade linkage between Africa and the rest of the global economy is substantial, with the total trade linkage index having an average value of 87%. We find that China, USA, UK, Japan, EU and Canada dominate Africa’s trade and therefore have the potential to spread trade shocks to it. The results further indicate that apart from the BRIC, other regional trading blocs such as Asia, the Americas, and Europe play influential roles in Africa’s trade. Overall, the findings show that African economies are predominantly net receivers of trade shocks originating from the aforementioned dominant sources. We conclude that these patterns of cross-country trade shock spillovers, coupled with the ongoing challenges of legitimacy facing the World Trade Organisation, would likely influence Africa’s move from multilateralism to multi-polarism in the years to come.

“Middle powers,” variously defined, have served relevant and significant roles in the post-WWII regional and global orders, facilitated by structural conditions of “long peace” among great powers and proactive leadership by and among creative middle powers. Within the complex Asia-Pacific security order, “middle powers” such as Australia, Canada, and South Korea have had the “space” to engage the non-like minded and advance multilateralism with security guarantees from the US. However, Beijing and Washington today are eliminating this space and its associated choices for middle-power diplomacy by increasingly characterizing their rivalry as a confrontation of “existential threats” between incompatible “civilizations” and securitizing trade and technology. China and the US are each selectively ignoring or purposely eroding key aspects of a rules-based international order. This paper highlights the dilemmas of South Korea, Australia, and Canada, middle powers who have found themselves individually and collectively “stuck” facing contradictory global and regional policy choices.

The recent explosion of bilateral and regional deals, President Trump’s policy against multilateralism, and, lastly, the restrictions to international trade because of the COVID-19 pandemic have highlighted the issue of the need for a multilateral trading system, currently embodied by the World Trade Organization (WTO). Although the WTO has achieved most of its goals over the last two decades, it is undeniable that it is facing major challenges that question its relevance, effectiveness, fitness and responsiveness to contemporary issues. Is the lack of multilateralism worrisome? What will be the future of the WTO? By summarizing the past and current debate and proposing a critical reading of the WTO, this paper aims to answer these crucial questions.

The main contribution of this research is to provide evidence on the key drivers that shape individual opinions toward multilateralism. In particular, we show that even when people consider that international organizations take away too much power from the governments, this fact is not necessarily seen as a negative aspect. People’s opinions are relevant given that, in the decision-making process, governments should balance several elements and the opinion of voters may be a key driver. The goal of this analysis is to show that there is a robust U-shaped effect in the case of the level of educational attainment.

With the world’s largest number of netizens, China has been engaged in the ever more intense global competition for cyber governance over the past decade. Based on some preliminary studies, this article discusses China’s position, approach and contribution to global cyber governance, as well as the understanding gap on major issues between China and developed countries in the cyber arena. In the past decade, China has made significant contributions to the reform of global cyber governance utilizing a “patch-work” approach, and it will try to play a more active role as a constructive participant in global cyber governance while enhancing its own cyber capacity. Unlike many developed countries that advocate “Internet freedom,” China will continue to uphold the principle of cyber sovereignty. Yet in the meantime, China will try to work with other countries to build a “Community of Shared Future in Cyberspace,” in order to promote freedom, democracy and transparency in cyberspace in an incremental, stable and reasonable way.

Multilateralism is one of the key notions in China’s diplomatic discourse. Unlike the European Union, China tends to define multilateralism as a consultation process amongst all related members of the international community, so that their fundamental interests and appeals can be fully heard and considered. In the Chinese view, multilateralism features inclusive participation, UN leadership, and the goal of democratization of international relations. It is believed that, as a historical trend, multilateralism is not only crucial for tackling various global challenges, but it also helps foster a favorable international environment for China’s sustainable development. Multilateralism has been deeply ingrained in China’s foreign policy, exemplified by the country’s increasing support for the UN over the past two decades. Notably, both China’s financial contribution to the UN and the number of personnel sent on UN peacekeeping missions have grown rapidly in recent years. Also, China has been advocating the notion of a “community of shared future for mankind” on UN platforms, hoping to share its experience of development with the world. As China deepens its engagement with international organizations, however, the United States is making every effort to constrain China’s influence in the UN. In the future, China needs to work closely with supporters of multilateralism, especially developing countries, so as to play a greater role in the UN.

This paper argues that the growing US trade deficit has caused the decline of the WTO and the rise of regional trade agreements. Growing imbalances make countries more selective about who to cooperate with. This is formally shown in a three-country negotiation game that is based on a goods-market model. Subsequently, the model is parameterized and applied quantitatively. Using historical data, the model correctly predicts the date that US-Canada FTA talks began. Based on current data, moreover, the model paints a bleak picture for multilateralism: US exports to China would have to triple for a new WTO round to stand a chance. But even this may be insufficient: a dynamic extension of the game shows that regionalism can have a lock-in effect. Nonetheless, this does not plead for tougher WTO rules on regionalism. As is argued both qualitatively and quantitatively, these may push countries to less, not more, cooperation.

The well-known question whether regional trade agreements (RTAs) and the multilateral trading system (MTS) are “strangers, friends, or foes” (Bhagwati and Panagariya, 1996) has gained new importance with the widespread proliferation of RTAs in recent years. Based on an extensive data set which covers most of world trade over the past 60 years and about 240 regional trade agreements, we analyze the relationship between RTAs and the MTS by combining the gravity model framework with vector auto-regression analysis. Impulse-response-functions robustly suggest that multilateral trade liberalization responds in a significantly positive way to regional trade liberalization. We also find robust evidence that RTA liberalization Granger-causes GATT/WTO liberalization. Thus, our results indicate that RTAs do not undermine the MTS but serve as building blocks to multilateral trade liberalization.

East Asia has many distinctive features that set it apart from other comparable regions. Indeed, for students of comparative politics and the growing field of comparative regionalism (Sbragia 2008; Acharya 2012), what we now think of as ‘East Asia’ offers a veritable treasure trove of different political forms, economic structures and strategic perspectives. Attitudes to regional, as opposed to national, development and cooperation are equally varied, and this helps to account for the distinctiveness of East Asian institutions, their multiplicity and ultimately, I shall suggest, their ineffectiveness. The simple underlying regional reality in East Asia is that despite — or perhaps because of — the surprisingly large number of regional initiatives, none of the resultant institutions are especially effective (Beeson 2016). In this regard it is entirely possible that ‘institutional balancing’, like its more well-known power balancing counterpart, is designed not to facilitate but to prevent something from happening…

Even enthusiasts would have to concede that trade policy discussions are usually a specialist interest and can often be a little dull. No longer. The largely unpredicted election of Donald Trump as the 45^th President of the United States has given trade relations an unaccustomed prominence in policy debates, and overturned many of the rather complacent assumptions experts had about the likely trajectory of America’s economic relations. This continues a trend, which began with the Obama Administration’s launch of the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) in 2010, where trade initiatives have featured centrally in US geopolitical strategy. Trade has become an increasingly important and contentious part of American foreign policy, and is likely to remain so given the Trump Administration’s activist trade policy agenda. And yet this development should have come as less of a surprise than it did. For the theoretical and practical reality is that ‘geoeconomics’ — the application of economic instruments to advance geopolitical ends (Blackwill and Harris 2016) — has been an increasingly important part of the way states are pursuing international objectives…

After a century-long run since the first World War, the future of liberal democracy, open markets and joint security agreements hang in the balance. The world is rapidly transfiguring from a unipolar to a multi-polar reality. The international system is exposed to profound instability. The optimistic lot reinforces the idea that it is a temporary setback; and that, with new political leadership and renewed economic growth, the liberal order could bounce back. However, the future looks bleak and chaotic and in need of a new doctrine to help solve the issues of the present world. This chapter argues for a new multi-polar world order which could be loosely based on the Gandhian philosophy of global peace. This new concept of multilateralism could be placed on the axis of world peace as inspired by Gandhian thought and experiment. There exists a fundamental correlation between Gandhian ideals and the steps needed in the world to combat violence. World peace is defined as an idea of freedom and happiness among and within all nations. It is based on an idea of planetary non-violence by which nations willingly cooperate, either voluntarily or by a system of governance that prevents warfare. This notion of multi-polarity is a system centred on the commonality of principles. Every nation has accountability and has to show cooperative behaviour. This chapter is broadly divided into two major sections. One section starts with a background about the world order’s current scenario and explains the changing dynamics of polarity as transpired through history. It then discusses the current phase of transition and the problems with the current world order. The second section explains the Gandhian philosophy of world peace and how a multi-polar world based on the Gandhian model could be the way forward.

The International Solar Alliance (ISA) is a joint initiative of France and India that was launched during the Climate Conference in Paris in December 2015 (COP21) with the aim of making an unprecedented effort to promote solar energy to achieve three major goals: creating the conditions for a major decrease in the cost of solar energy; meeting the high energy demand in developing countries; and contributing to the fight against climate change. To achieve these objectives, ISA committed to set new ground rules, norms and standards for solar energy, regularly discussing with member countries the opportunities of developing innovative capacity-building measures and financial instruments to contribute to the harmonization of public policies, regulations, and prices between the countries. ISA has been conceived as an action-oriented, member-driven, collaborative multilateral platform aimed at reducing users, governments, and investors’ uncertainties related to the opportunity of relaunching both solar energy market and infrastructures to enhance energy security and sustainable development. Six years after ISA’s foundation, this chapter aims at discussing both its major achievements and failures, as well as to assess the validity and the strength of its multilateral framework as a model for dealing with some of the major energy-related challenges in a post COVID-19 world. In particular, the chapter will discuss the ability of the ISA to add new dynamism and momentum to energy diplomacy in the 21st century, alongside the feasibility and advantages of creating a similar framework to facilitate a multilateral coordination in other areas, such as wind energy, and hydro energy.

Over the past decades, the world has seen persistent attempts by international players to scrutinize a global consensus for acting on climate change, one of the most impending issues of the decade. Beginning at Copenhagen, being ill-sustained at Kyoto, and finding renewal at Paris, the climate change fight has shown us close moments wherein the international community expected a final climate agreement, with defined limitations on carbon emissions, investments, and pollution control. However, these moments failed to yield any tangible outcome; with there being further divisions among international stakeholders. The incentive to reach a global consensus-based regime toward mitigation of climate change and its effects, thus far, has found inadequate actualization due to conflicts of interest between developing and developed nations. The need for a consensus at such a large international stage has contributed to many of its failures owing to the obsession with multilateralism. Such an approach has only led to a cycle of disruptions and no change whatsoever. This chapter attempts to explore the concept of multilateralism; a significant contributing factor to futile agreements. Keeping the developing world at the center of the study, this chapter primarily explores three questions. First, we examine the ideological and theoretical flaw in the multilateral obsession that leads to a continuous hindrance of the cause of the developing and the developed world. Then, we analyze the conflict of knowledge and expertise, which the Global South faces while confronting the Global North at the negotiation table. Finally, we investigate the structural flaws in the deliberation process guided by a multilateral idea of negotiations. Subsequently, this chapter also examines the alternatives to the multilateral idea while exploring minilateral methods with a deliberative democratic approach.

Changes in trade policy affect a nation's economic welfare through terms-of-trade and volume-of-trade effects. A move to global free trade would imply higher world economic welfare equal to the sum of all nations' volume-of-trade, or efficiency, effects. Since the sum of the terms-of-trade effects across all nations is zero, terms-of-trade effects are contentious. Konishi, Kowalczyk and Sjöström (2003) have shown that if customs unions do not affect trade with non-member countries, immediate global free could be achieved if free trade were proposed together with international sidepayments equal to the terms of trade effects. How large would these terms of trade effects, and hence transfers, be? This paper presents estimates from a simple computable general equilibrium model of a world economy of perfect competition. We show that, in some cases, terms-of-trade effects are small compared to efficiency gains, and transfers are not necessary for free trade. In other cases, terms-of-trade gains may account for more than 50% of a country's gains from free trade and transfers could be large.