“I secretly agree with Donald Trump about China, offshoring, useless international organisations, energy independence and uncontrolled immigration BUT I must say nasty things about him so no-one can tell I agree”.

This article is a classic of the genre.

“Suspicion of foreigners facilitated Trump’s victory in 2016, as it did Brexit’s triumph.”

Bollocks, quite frankly. I’m a Brexit voter who is also almost a free-trade fundamentalist, and while global trade might have peaked in 2008, that in no way changes the fact that increased trade is a universally beneficial thing. One of my principle reasons for voting out of the EU is simply that the EU itself is a protection racket. To have made the claims above without recognising this fact calls into question the whole thesis, in my opinion.

More generally, I do not accept some of the arguments above: it is not inevitable, for instance, that the need to become more circumspect about where global supply lines are must lead to the need for an industrial strategy, as claimed, which is really just another word for dirigiste economic planning by governments. Nothing has changed about the fundamentals that history has proved to be a bad idea: the challenge is how to liberalise economies within the new strategic order, that’s all.

“Establishing outposts of free-market capitalism in countries such as Russia and China, it was hoped, would compel the regimes of those nations to liberalise: to institute the rule of law (if only to protect property and contracts), to embrace a free press and free elections, and maybe even to embrace democracy itself. Open markets, it was hoped, would produce open societies.
It is now clear that these hopes were misplaced.”
Nonsense. Trading partners that are mutually dependent rarely make war on each other. The problem with supply lines dependent on Russia or China goes afoul of one of the most basic tenets of business: Always have multiple sources of supply. And be sure at lease one of these is a supply line with a friendly nation, i.e. don’t become dependent on a potential adversary. Right, Germany?

Frankly, the West is still living as if it were the 80s.

The relentless hatred towards Russia and the intent to extend NATO all the way to their border (or more likely, use that threat to provoke a “cheap” Afghanistan style war) on one hand.

The utterly relaxed attitude towards China on the other hand. A China that is far more hostile, dangerous and powerful than the Soviet bloc ever was.

There are clearly certain people running foreign policy and strategic thinking at the top, who are not just utterly ruthless, vile and immoral….but also really, really stupid and still think it’s the old cold war ongoing, while doing everything they can to lose the next one.

Lines like this are what lose me:
“Suspicion of foreigners facilitated Trump’s victory in 2016, as it did Brexit’s triumph”
Brexit didn’t happen because white British people hate brown foreigners.
Trump didn’t win because white Americans hate brown foreigners.

Were there some Brexit campaigners who campaigned on this? Absolutely. Were there some Trump lines that sounded like this? Absolutely. But to repeat the lie that these were the animating forces of both movements is simply an attempt to tar millions of voters who have watched their standards of living decline over the last 20-30 years and are now legitimately afraid that their children will inherit a country radically different than their own.

Is it racism for American rest belt workers to resent those who shipped their middle-class jobs overseas just to sell their products for a few dollars less?
Is it racism for UK Jews to worry about their safety as new “refugees” being militant Wahhabist ideologies with them?
Is it racism for Texas farmers overrun with illegals immigrants and crugs to want the border enforced?
Are former blue-wall voters racist for supporting Brexit and Tories?

Every time this “white people hate brown people” narrative is regurgitated, it makes genuine pluralistic government harder., Unherd shouldn’t be doing that.

Neoliberalism is nothing more than liberalism perfected. The final triumph of the early modern liberals and their dreams. An atomised world of consumers and individuals. The idea that what we see now is a corruption is absolutely wrong. With the help of technology a world of individualist husks without borders is on its way. It is only enemies of the liberal order that will avoid that fate.

in essence we can never go back to how it was…the flaws the Neo Libs need to address are all linked together….and in world trade there will have to be a levy against club members who don’t play by the rules…. (e.g. rule of law, human rights and humane work practises etc)…..
unfortunately, with G7 debt at 3x gdp, it is clear we bet the ranch on idea these conditions (a “just in time” world of suppressed labour costs and no strategic contingency) would pertain forever. in this world the basics were very cheap and we thought it was ok to become reliant on Putin’s gas. The true costs of living in the real world are probably 30% above what we are used to. those with work and pricing power (organised labour and providers of essential goods and services) will see their wages grow. many of those who did so extra specially well out of globalism better fasten their seat belts. inflation happens when politics fail. if it stays inside bounds it is a thief with Robin Hood qualities. our problems are monetary and neither the right or the left want to grasp this.

I don’t know enough about economics to critique this article in its entirety, but I do know enough about history to know that this statement: “The response of Europe and America to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine reveals not just shock and horror at Putin’s savagery but a determination to restore a neoliberal world order that had been slipping away” is absurd, not only because little evidence is provided to support what the author believes are other motives besides the “shock and horror,” but also because the statement is supported by the following ridiculous statement: “Europe and America have rapidly been repairing a frayed Atlantic alliance. They have revived the spirit of the Atlantic Charter, agreed to by Roosevelt and Churchill in 1941, that called for restoring the values and principles that the Nazis were so intent upon destroying: the rule of law, respect for the territorial integrity of nations, the right of peoples to be free and self-governing, and the pursuit of economic prosperity through peace and trade rather than war and conquest.”
The conflation of the post-WWII economic settlement (i.e. Bretton Woods, GATT, etc.) and the globalism of the 1990s and early 2000s is misplaced, to put it kindly.

There is a 60s album called Forever Changes. The songwriter’s girlfriend told him she would love him forever, but she left soon after her promise.

“Globalisation has strengthened authoritarianism and illiberalism, not weakened them”
Sweeping statement, poorly evidenced. China was not notably more tolerant during Mao’s reign, for a starter! The Russian privatisations of the 1990s were naive, botched and rushed (albeit championed by many Russian economists) in a state that had a state-run economy for 70 years, and led indirectly to the restoration of autocratic rule. However even Putin isn’t quite as bad as Stalin.

I don’t think anyone sensible wants liberalism and globalism to collapse …..we just want the body politic to come to its’ senses. Ukraine will come to be seen as a historic inflection point…..where that leads us is not apparent yet. my best hunch is it will kill all forms of quackery and the more subversive attempts to attack democracy on both the right and left….but for this to happen we need to get real about the tab we created and the hideous distortions that were the unpaid costs of keeping the globalist show on the road ( in the last 20 years). the centrists on the right and the left still pretend it is business as usual and it is not. getting out of this hole requires intelligence, honesty and a sense of national purpose

But world trade in goods as a percent of GDP, ranging at about 50-60% for the last decade, isn’t as significant a factor for every country individually. The US’s percentage, for instance, is only about 25%, China’s is 35%. The OECD as a whole is 50%. Even Russia’s is in the low 50s.
The neoliberal arrangement is far from failing. It has, after all, transformed China’s worldview, and pretty much killed the command economy approach of the USSR. It has also, for all its faults, resulted in the greatest increase in world GDP in recorded time.
Moreover, inequality is broadly recognized as a problem. Thus China’s turn to “common prosperity”. Unlike a century ago, most government’s budgets are spent overwhelmingly on health, education, social welfare, and other public goods.
I’m open to suggestions about the next best world order, but don’t really see what the organizing principle might be.