How to Stop a Trade War

Donald Trump campaigned on a promise of a trade war more extensive than anything Americans have seen in decades .

Julian Zelizer : Trump 's willingness to be a disruptor gives him the potential to bring about the most significant changes to the international trading order since the current liberal global system arose in the early 1990s .

Zelizer says the ultimate contours of Trump ’s trade war remain opaque.

As China ’s manufacturing surplus has increased, a growing number of its trade partners outside the United States have begun to impose tariffs and other protectionist measures of their own.

This is hardly a tenable course for Washington and its allies during a period of geopolitical conflict, so Trump must pivot.

Pushing trading partners to raise their own barriers to Chinese products will ultimately boost U.S. manufacturing.

Writers: U.S. trade policies should focus less on rules and more on outcomes.

They say Trump should prod trade partners to match U.N. rules in areas including export controls and foreign investment screening.

Writers: Germany ’s trade surplus persists in large part because it is driven by macroeconomic policies that result in little domestic investment and generate too little domestic demand.

Trump is not the only leader who will get a say in rewriting the trading order, they say.