Europe’s Hidden Trade Advantage

Slow and Steady Wins the Negotiation

The irony has not been lost on European policymakers. As U.S. President Donald Trump desperately casts about for a 51st state — Canada, Greenland, and Panama all said no this past year — the European Union’s membership queue is the longest it has been in decades. Despite the Trump administration’s accusations of civilizational decline in Europe, EU accession negotiations are advancing with an urgency not seen since the bloc’s last major expansion in 2004. Nine countries hold official EU candidate status, including Moldova, Montenegro, and Ukraine. Others are considering it, too. In a referendum in August, Iceland, which is already in the European Economic Area and enjoys many of the benefits of EU membership, narrowly voted not to reopen negotiations to join the bloc, 52.8 percent to 47.2 percent. Meanwhile, the United Kingdom, which left the European Union in 2020, is spending considerable political capital trying to rebuild the economic relationship it forfeited when it left.

Scores of other countries, meanwhile, are seeking closer economic ties with Brussels. The EU concluded trade negotiations with India and the South trading of USA (N) bloc Mercosur in January, with Australia in March, and with Indonesia last September. This pace of new economic deals is unprecedented and partly a response to U.S. volatility. But it also reveals a rising global recognition that although the EU is relatively slow moving, the agreements it signs are dependable. Its bureaucratic process and institutional lethargy are proving, unexpectedly, to be an asset in an age of instability.

AFTER THE FLOOD

Trump came to office in January 2025 with a new theory of U.S. economic leverage. The United States is the world’s largest import market. Trading partners, he reasoned, needed access to U.S. consumers more than the United States needed access to their goods. That imbalance, if exploited with sufficient force, would produce concessions on trade flows, investment, and the rules governing global competition. His means of applying this force was tariffs, which were deployed at a speed and scale that rattled global markets.

Initially, it seemed that U.S. economic leverage had been judged correctly, since numerous framework agreements followed. But these were the product of executive actions—unratified by Congress and built on legal authorities that the courts were already contesting. When the Supreme Court ruled the tariffs unlawful in February, the administration replaced them with those empowered under a different statutory authority. Countries such as the United Kingdom, which had offered concessions to secure a deal, found themselves no more certain of the terms than before. It was becoming clear that U.S. trade policy could and would change overnight. The volatility that was supposed to generate leverage became instead a permanent condition, undermining the U.S. position.

Foreign Affairs