The trade war in the context of Sino-American economic and diplomatic relations: past, present and future

Abstract

Every day, news of the ongoing trade war between China and the United States appear on the first page of newspapers and online articles and people suddenly started worrying about a possible “Third World War”. However, it is possible to retrace in their diplomatic and economic history some crucial events that shaped into the current state of affairs, as the swift “renaissance” of the Chinese superpower changed forever the balance of the world outlook. Therefore, the main objectives of this thesis consist of analyzing the history of U.S.-China relations and compare today’s trade war with some of the trade wars of the past to figure out what the possible outcomes of this conflict could be. In order to do so, we will analyze the diplomatic and economic relations between China and the United States before the trade war in the first chapter, together with some major events that laid the foundations for today’s antagonism. In the second chapter, we will proceed to explore some of the strategies used during the trade war by both countries, as well as the economic consequences they endured. Finally, in the third chapter, we will confront it to some of the economic conflicts from last century to formulate some hypothesis about what could happen during the course of the trade war.