One of the first decisions made by Donald Trump was the decision to withdraw from the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP). According to the director of the Institute of International Economic Relations of the Financial University, Victoria Perskaya, this decision was driven by a desire to force multinational corporations to pay taxes. "Actually, America wanted to write new rules of international economic relations. It concerns not just trade, but also rules of investment activity, intellectual property rights, labor disputes, domestic economic issues and competition in the domestic markets of TPP members. This is an interference in national legal system - the US offered to export their legal system or case-law to all TPP members," she said.
China opposed the US interference in labor disputes on its territory. "One of the most important components is salary. Salary in the US is about 2-3 thousand dollars a month. Salary in China is about 750 dollars (plus the annual increase by 50-70 dollars). Mexico - 1000 dollars, India - 300 dollars. The main actors of TPP are multinational corporations. US built their economies in a way that resulted in the creation of global value chains. For them, intellectual property is the most important component. They fought for it and they tried to implement its legal aspect in all countries. It's no coincidence that 10 centers were created in China. America offered India and China to creat centers for regulation of intellectual property rights. So TPP would provide a very high income. Not trade income, but income from export of intellectual property rights," she noted.
Meanwhile, according to her, Trump does not take services sector, an important component, into account: "79% of US GNP comes from services and intellectual property. Trade is a very small component. Naturally, in these conditions the US wanted to build world global system. Globalization, total domination, global value chains - everything is focused on the interests of largest multinational corporations. Trump has set the task that all multinational corporations have to be under US jurisdiction and pay taxes. The most positive element, which Trump achieved by withdrawing from TPP, was the fact that America no longer imposes its own conditions of international economic relations."
As the head of the Center for Southeast Asia, Australia and Oceania Studies of the Institute of Oriental Studies Dmitry Mosyakov believes, "TPP itself is the new rules of global management, where multinational corporations are granted equal rights with national governments and can appeal against the decisions of national parliaments in the court at any time. And I'm not talking about international court, I'm talking about TPP's own court that cannot be financed by government funds or enterprises, which is the most important element of state policy for the majority of South-East Asia countries."
According to Mosyakov, all these new developments are associated with the failure of the first stage of globalization: "It wasn't Washington and his allies who benefited from the first stage of globalization, but Vietnam, China - not liberal democratic countries, but countries with organized political regimes. Recently, many Asian countries, particularly Philippines, have expressed serious doubts regarding the ability of Americans to comply with agreements on the protection of these countries in case of conflict with China."
President of the Philippines Rodrigo Roa Duterte turned to China, Vietnam turns to China, pushing islands problem aside, now the US act as the main force that says that China will not get to these islands in the South China Sea. In other words, this step not just has global economic consequences for globalization, it simply stops globalization," the expert said.
According to him, Trump showed that America has political forces that understand that the United States themselves are losing their sovereignty and interests in the global financial system: "They start to protect the interests of global financial investors, guaranteeing them preferential treatment. Trump tries to separate the interests of global financial capital from American national interests. He saves the United States. Awareness of their own interests and the need to maintain balance in the framework of economic development is extremely important. Withdrawal from TPP has both global economic nature and purely political nature. Japanese and Koreans have the same question, what will the US do next? How will they build global balances system in this region? Obama build his policy in the line Philippines-Vietnam-Thailand-Burma towards, as they said, Chinese expansion. Will the United States continue this policy or not is not clear yet.
