CGTN Europe interviewed David Henig, Director of the UK Trade Policy Project at the European Centre for International Political Economy (ECIPE)
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00:00Thank you. David Hennig is Director of the UK Trade Policy Project at the European Centre for International Political Economy.
00:07David, welcome back. Good to see you. Let's just pick up on those figures.
00:10Scandinavian countries and Canada seem to be at the forefront of these consumer boycotts. Why?
00:18Well, look, it's early days yet, but in the case of Canada, it's fairly clear that they regard themselves as being under existential threat
00:26because President Trump has actually said he wants Canada to be the 51st state.
00:31The Canadians aren't taking that terribly well, so it's not surprising that we're seeing boycotts there.
00:36Very much led at a political level, though, so hence when you're seeing US products being withdrawn,
00:43that's because Canadian provinces have that power, for example, over alcohol, to withdraw their purchases of US alcohol.
00:50In the case of Europe, there's always been a little bit of a latent anti-American sentiment,
00:55and that is obviously coming back to the surface now. A lot of distrust around the US.
01:02Denmark obviously has an issue with Greenland, which is one of its territories that President Trump again is showing some interest in.
01:10Essentially, this is a deepening of distrust between the US and Europe that's always had the potential to be there
01:19and now it's getting worse.
01:21David, if you're an old person like me, of course you'll remember the Buy British campaign in the 1970s.
01:27I mean, this is different, isn't it? I mean, are there historical precedents for this kind of consumer-led economic backlash?
01:35I think there haven't been such examples on this scale.
01:40The best example I can recall is boycotts of produce from South Africa when it was under the apartheid regime in the 1980s.
01:52But clearly there weren't huge numbers of exports from South Africa at the time. It was mainly fruit.
01:58There's an awful lot more products and services that come from the US or are associated with the US that can be targeted now.
02:07So there's just more potential for these kinds of activities to take place, which is, I think, what we're seeing.
02:14I mean, is there really going to be any traction from this boycott? Is anyone in Washington going to be listening?
02:21The danger is here, surely, is that this is going to be a social media echo chamber, isn't it?
02:26I think the chances are this is not going to cause huge economic damage in the first instance.
02:33I think the issue for the US will be when this extends from, as it already is doing, from individual consumers into the political systems around Europe.
02:44And we're already seeing distrust growing, even in countries which have historically been friendly towards the US, like Poland, for example.
02:55And that stands to do real damage. For example, purchases of weaponry and arms.
03:02Europe is looking at rearmament, but there are considerable voices now in Europe saying don't use US products.
03:11You can't trust the US. They're no longer the allies. That is when economic damage is going to be caused to the US.
03:19And is it going to be possible to measure the effects on US companies because of these boycotts?
03:27At the moment, the best efforts we have, really, are via the stock market.
03:34So, clearly, we've seen Tesla shares go down. Obviously, Elon Musk is associated with this regime.
03:41I wouldn't be surprised to see similar happening in the weeks and months to come if particular US products are targeted and associated with particular shares.
03:53In some cases, that won't be an exact measure because many of the iconic US brands, for example, in terms of liquor, are actually owned by multinational groups.
04:02So you perhaps won't see that.
04:05But if this sustains, and I think there's every chance that it will, given that we expect US policy to sustain,
04:12then I think that we will see some parts of damage and it will become more obvious in different ways what is happening.
04:19So it's a slow start, but we're just at the start of this process now.
04:23What is your sense of how people in the United States perhaps might feel about this boycott, and come to that, the tariffs too?
04:33Well, at this stage, trade wars do tend to incite a certain amount of nationalist feeling on both sides.
04:40And at this stage, there's every sign that in the US they probably don't understand the reaction that is being sparked off in other countries.
04:49Clearly, some people do.
04:51I think with regard to US domestic feeling, a lot will come down to the expected economic effects in the US,
04:59which will be to make prices higher, perhaps reduce choice.
05:04Some of the people in the US will work for companies that start to be affected.
05:08So at that point, you may see some change in economic feeling.
05:13But at this stage, actually, in the US, tariffs are broadly popular.
05:17The President is slightly more unpopular than he is popular, but nothing completely out of normal in US politics.
05:26So again, I think it might take some time for people in the US to really respond to consumer boycotts.
05:35And I'm afraid that many will be cheering on their side and their President in exacerbating divisions.
05:41David, good to see you. Thanks for that.
05:43David Hennig, Director of the UK Trade Policy Project at the European Centre for International Political Economy.