The Biden administration : trilateral and transatlantic economic coordination on China

Abstract

The advent of the Biden administration has resulted in an opening for a more expansive cooperation framework between the United States, the EU and Japan on strategic economic questions. Much of this is driven by China. The trilateral meetings between the three trade ministers represented one of the few structured open high-level efforts to come up with a common approach among the major economic powers to dealing with Chinese non-market practices. However, the potential agenda extends well beyond classic trade issues and any specifically China-directed measures. Between them, the United States, the EU and Japan represent the nucleus of any plurilateral initiatives in most economic and technological domains. The obstacles to building such initiatives preceded the Trump administration and will not be overcome by the weight of the China challenge alone. However, determining what might be possible in this regard is likely to be at the heart of relations between the three powers in the coming years, and to be one of the central issues not just for the US’s China policy but also for its broader strategy. This paper evaluates three questions. What forms of strategic economic cooperation have already advanced in recent years? What new opportunities now exist? And what are the primary roadblocks to exploiting them?