Guest blog by Katrin Kuhlmann, Chantal Line Carpentier, Negin Shahiar, Tara Francis, and Ana María Garcés Escobar The authors encourage comments, thoughts, or feedback at mail@newmarketslab.org and UNCTADNY2@un.org. Changes in the international economic order have brought to the forefront two divergent trends in global trade that will continue to play out over the course of 2020. On one end, the World Trade Organization (WTO) is facing significant reforms following the U.S. Administration’s decision to block new Appellate Body judges. At the same time, according to the WTO and the Financing for Development Report 2019, the incidence of trade-restrictive measures imposed by G-20 governments has reached historically high levels. In light of this, today’s appeals for mutually beneficial gains from trade ring increasingly hollow, seemingly replaced in some parts of the world and increasingly even at the multilateral level by the simpler notion that trade is a zero-sum game,
The need for deep community engagement and more robust multi-stakeholder collaboration requires narrative tools that are more accessible to local communities not yet activated by the SDGs. Two could be the more grounded narrative tools of social protection and social equity that are more easily understood at the grassroots. Deliberate outreach to fields, like social welfare, that work with these tools to mobilize and transform communities is an elegant practical strategy. That you are genuinely committed to these grounded ways to reach local groups makes you a strong voice at the top, Felix. More power to you in your run for the top UNEP post! / R. Bong Vergara
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