Amidst rapidly shifting geopolitical shifts, the first webinar in the series The Political Economy of the Trump Era, titled ‘The Tariff Wars: India and the Global South in a Fragmenting System of World Trade’ attempted to understand the deeper currents shaping today’s tariff war and its implications on Global South economies. At a time when rising protectionism, weakened multilateralism, and increasing geopolitical tensions are reshaping how trade is negotiated and controlled. The webinar moved beyond the narrow framing of tariff disputes to examine the historical biases and structural inequalities embedded in the global trading system to highlight how trade rules have long favoured the interests of developed countries and multinational corporations, often at the expense of the Global South. Speakers traced the continuity of US trade policy across administrations, unpacked the use of non-tariff measures as hidden barriers, and critiqued the expansion of trade rules into areas like data governance, intellectual property, and government procurement. Central to the conversation was the urgent need for the Global South to assert economic sovereignty and find newer alternatives through regional cooperation, welfare-led development, and alternative financial architectures. This webinar included speakers Prabhat Patnaik, Ranja Sengupta and Andres Arauz and was moderated by V Sridhar.
Read the full report here: The Tariff Wars: India & the Global South in a Fragmenting System of World Trade
Centre for Financial Accountability (CFA), in collaboration with The Wire (as media partner), Sambhaavnaa Institute, and Progressive International, is co-organising this eight-part webinar series titled ‘The Political Economy of the Trump Era: Challenges & Opportunities of the Shifting World Order’, conceived to better understand the global moment we are all inhabiting.
Read more about the webinar series here.
Centre for Financial Accountability is now on Telegram and WhatsApp. Click here to join our Telegram channel and click here to join our WhatsApp channeland stay tuned to the latest updates and insights on the economy and finance.