The reality is that WTO allows double standards and allows members to play with a variety of rulesets. Asymmetry governs instead of interrelation.
Carbon emissions are another variable that has dramatically increased for China since joining the WTO. It’s been up more than 200%. And this increase offsets well beyond the rest of the world’s decline. China accounted for almost a third of the world’s carbon emissions in 2021. This is more than the combined combined US, India, Russia, Japan and Iran (the five biggest polluters since then).
In conclusion, the global climate crisis is reinforcing the need to oppose an autocratic system like China. The real issue of climate change is not holiday flights to Florida or Mallorca. The problem is that it has little effect on the world’s largest carbon contaminants. It is pursuing a completely different political agenda. And lastly, we ourselves contribute to it by outsourcing unwanted climate sin in our backyards to China and elsewhere.
From today’s perspective, entry as a full member of China’s WTO was a fundamental mistake in trade policy led by wishful thinking. Motivated, but often, goodwill has created a much worse imbalance in the damage to the democratic market economy.
The main mistake was to give them an entry into a economically heavy, democratic state. The most ridiculous mistake was to grant China the status of a developing country. This is all exceptions and exemptions that come with it, even though it is the second largest economy in the world, still exists today. It’s like giving privileges to the most ruthless kids on the block. Competition is no more unfair or self-deprecating.
The results of this experiment were predictable. In the short term, it provided growth and economic success for all participants, but in the long term, it changed the balance in a way that dependencies and unilateral benefits could emerge. In particular, the masochism in the US and Europe led not only to weakening their own relative economic power, but ultimately to the erosion of the WTO as a whole.
And speaking of the end, the WTO has reached the end of the line. What we see before us now is a dysfunctional, paralyzed colossus, a shadow of our former self. All of this leads to an unforgiving conclusion: the WTO should be disbanded.
“Trades with the Dictator: A CEO’s Guide to Democracy” was published in January 2025 by Simon & Schuster.
