Sanctions policy, customs policy
Trump's epoch-making wisdom that tariffs are a better
weapon than sanctions. He is not a fan of sanctions policy, but he is a big fan
of tariffs. He says, with a softened tone, that the three most beautiful words
in the world are love, religion and customs. The latter is the right that I
(the state) may levy customs duties, and thereby cut off foreigners, and favour
and fatten up my subjects. An ancient right, by the way, but Trump is keen to
emulate a famous predecessor, President McKinsey. (One suspects that Trump
didn't get to the end of McKinsey's biography, because then his idol will
honestly admit what a mistake this cult of customs was).
So what to do? Sanction the bad
guys? Or do we tax them? Maybe this, maybe that. Or do we do the whole world
trade thing differently? Surprisingly and regrettably, the International Trade
Organisation is now almost absent from the agenda, despite decades of hard
negotiations on new principles, decades of GATT rounds, when the foundations
were laid for a new world trade policy, with the 'most-favoured-nation'
principle at its heart. That it is only right that all states, for all, should
have the most-favoured-nation principle.
Equality, transparency,
predictability, partnership, stability and so on and so on. – these should
govern international relations, not discriminatory sanctions not approved by
the UN Security Council. These are in fact acts of war. And let us leave it for
now that the latest sanctions have been announced against Russia, which is at
war, but it was with such sanctions that Saddam's Iraq was tried and succeeded
in being reduced to a rag. Iran too. Not to mention Cuba. Cuba has been
squeezed by sanctions for seventy years. Who will pay for that? For the
torture, poverty and deprivation of people? Who will pay for this? So sanctions
are a crime against humanity. We must put world trade, world integration on a
new footing and exclude these Cold War elements.
Of course, we should not dem
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