{"id":254,"date":"2020-10-30T12:36:30","date_gmt":"2020-10-30T16:36:30","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/carleton.ca\/tradenetwork\/?page_id=254"},"modified":"2024-07-15T10:25:17","modified_gmt":"2024-07-15T14:25:17","slug":"transatlantic-trade-and-global-trade-challenges","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/carleton.ca\/tradenetwork\/thematic-areas\/transatlantic-trade-and-global-trade-challenges\/","title":{"rendered":"Transatlantic trade and global trade challenges"},"content":{"rendered":"

The EU\u2019s trade relationship with North America represents only one of its many trade engagements in the world. The EU is pursuing or implementing deals with many other trade partners. Those partners vary in economic importance, political orientation, regulatory approaches, geopolitical power, and interests. The deals, in turn, vary in their extent, substance, objectives, and institutional features. A proper understanding of the transatlantic relationship requires an appreciation of the broader EU trade context. \u00a0This is so for at least two reasons.<\/p>\n

First, what the EU does in the rest of the world influences the transatlantic relationship. The EU\u2019s objectives and what it deems possible or desirable in relation to North America reflect, in part, its activities with actors elsewhere. For instance, a deepening of the EU-China trade has the potential to diminish EU interest in making progress on the TTIP. The strained relations between the EU and Russia might push the EU to find North American natural resources more attractive. Of course, causality is not unidirectional: what the US or Canada do in the world affects the transatlantic relations and the EU\u2019s relationship with other parties. Examples would include US-China relations or US extraterritorial sanctions applied on Iran and the Nord Stream 2 pipeline.<\/p>\n

Second, the complex nature of the transatlantic trade relationship \u2013 with CETA completed after considerable turmoil, and TTIP still on hold \u2013 results in part from the EU\u2019s general commitment to the \u2018new generation\u2019 of trade agreements. These emphasize regulatory standardization in ways that previous initiatives (and the WTO system more broadly) did not. Such standardization has generated serious opposition \u2013 from the public, industry, labor, and other actors. Accordingly, much can be gained by situating the problems of TTIP and CETA in the broader context of the EU\u2019s various approaches to standardization worldwide.<\/p>\n

This module discusses the following issues:<\/p>\n