International trading relationships are more uncertain today than they have been in a long time. The inability of the World Trade Organization to bring closure to Doha round negotiations after more than a decade and a half has undermined already shaky faith in multilateralism.
The notion that mega-regional deals among several large trading partners could serve as an alternative, or perhaps a pathway, to global trade cooperation has taken a hard knock. The 12-nation Trans-Pacific Partnership pact is moribund for the foreseeable future, perhaps even dead.
