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China Just Co-created the World’s Biggest Trade Block. Is China’s World Order Already Here?

China is no longer content to “join” the existing global order but is constructing its own multilateral infrastructure [Photo: Getty Images]
Note: This article was first published on The Loop

RCEP is only the latest of many new multilateral institutions created by China. The alternative to American-led liberal international order looks increasingly viable.

Last week’s signing of the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP) brings China’s continued embrace of multilateralism into stark relief. While the United States under President Trump has recoiled from multilateral institutions and jettisoned its much-touted Trans-Pacific Partnership, China and fourteen other Asia-Pacific countries have just created the largest preferential trading zone in history, encompassing 30 percent of the world’s population and around a third of global GDP. While the RCEP is a relatively shallow trade agreement and is less “comprehensive” than it sounds, it is a major symbolic victory in China’s attempt to reorient world order. Continue reading “China Just Co-created the World’s Biggest Trade Block. Is China’s World Order Already Here?”

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