There's a febrile atmosphere round the world trade community. The drumbeat of global trade war is getting louder. Some observers are anxiously scanning the horizon for the equivalent of the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand, which would spark a global conflagration.
In truth, everyone should take a deep breath and calm down. While it would be silly to deny there is serious potential for conflict, particularly around the issue of currencies, what we have seen so far is a fairly routine management of trade tensions. True, Washington and Beijing are trading heated accusations over whether China's continued policy of holding down the renminbi is responsible for global imbalances. But for the moment, as Gary Horlick, a veteran Washington lawyer, says: “There seems to be an implicit deal between the US and China not to start a [legal] fight on currencies and to let the lawyers litigate everything else.”
The last point is crucial. Those who want to be alarmist can portray the big trading powers – and particularly the US – as embroiled in a tangle of litigation and discord. Just last week Brazil threatened again to impose trade sanctions authorised by the World Trade Organisation after it won a case against Washington over cotton subsidies – a ruling with which the US has yet to comply. Last year Mexico imposed similar sanctions over the US's failure to implement a North American Free Trade Agreement ruling that Mexican trucks could operate within the US. And there has have been fusillades of litigation between Washington and Beijing, with China blocking US exports of chicken and starting a WTO case over the controversial decision of Barack Obama, US president, to slap emergency restrictions on imports of Chinese tyres.