Trade and policy 'stickiness'

Why do some policies prove very 'sticky' and almost impossible to change whilst others are open to far-reaching, radical forms of change. A multitude of answers could be given but a new article by Eddie Ashbee and Steve Hurst in the Journal of American - East Asian Relations suggests that the circumstances in which a policy is first created can be important. They look at the Trump administration's turn to a trade war with China. Why was US-China trade policy open to change whereas trade relations with other countries and regions were more resistant. Eddie Ashbee and Steve Hurst suggest that the way in which the policy was 'sold' at the beginning of the new century and the coalitional blocs that were formed created a profoundly weak policy regime that as a consequence proved, two decades later, ripe for reform.

The US-China Trade War and Policy Resilience, Journal of American - East Asian Studies, 30  (2023) 188 - 215