Coercive Economic Diplomacy & Tariff Blackmail From An illiberal Trump Administration

"Political freedom means the absence of coercion of a man by his fellow men." ~ Milton Friedman

"One who uses coercion is guilty of deliberate violence. Coercion is inhuman." ~ Mahatma Gandhi

"Coercion created slavery, the cowardice of the slaves perpetuated it." ~ Jean-Baptiste Rousseau

"Totalitarianism is never content to rule by external means, namely, through the state and a machinery of violence; thanks to its peculiar ideology and the role assigned to it in this apparatus of coercion, totalitarianism has discovered a means of dominating and terrorizing human beings from within." ~ Hannah Arendt

Power, unadulterated power, does not seek equity; it seeks domination. In this technologically advanced global economy, the nations with maximum economic clout can exert influence by imposing commerce not in alliances, but through coercion. That is the political behaviour of coercive economic diplomacy wherein threats and pressures replace fair bargaining, and the free markets become war zones of dominance. The Trump administration was a classic exercise in this gamble, attempting to strongarm Canada and Mexico into imposing illegal tariffs on China. The reward? Reduction of their own U.S. imposed 25% tariffs. The cost? Their sovereignty, credibility, and allegiance to international trade law. Both refused, knowing that compliance would be a yielding to weakness, one that ultimately would cost them much more over time.

But coercion is an instrument as ancient as the age of power. When those in power can't prevail by reasoning, they resort to trickery. Free-trade principles are left behind in pursuit of leverage, and the global economic order will be distorted by the greed of one country.

A true free economy is based on voluntary exchange, nations exchanging goods and services on a mutually beneficial basis. Coercive diplomacy, however, thrives on surrender. It survives on coercion, where nations are compelled to make choices against their interests. It values power over principle, ensuring that power, not justice, dominates the trade relationship. More dangerously, it disregards international trade regulations, leaving the world economy subject to the lawless terrain where raw power is the only currency.

To the coercive state, commerce isn't supply and demand; it's coercion employed to achieve political influence. Tariffs are employed not to prop up industry, but to intimidate weak countries into compliance. Along the way, small economies are damaged. They rely on stability, on predictability in trade. But in a coercive world, stability is a luxury kept for the compliant only.

There is a deeper implication to this game of economic power. When a nation yields to coercion, it not only loses good terms of trade, it loses its sovereignty. It no longer has control over its own economic destiny; it dances to the tune of a higher power. What begins as a concession becomes dependence, and before long the coerced nation is no longer a commercial equal, but a 51st State in an empire of economic domination.

There was a moment when global bodies like the WTO made sure that trade disputes were dealt with fairly. But when big countries go around them, they undermine their credibility. Why should anyone else obey the rules if the most powerful ones no longer do? The consequence is a world in which agreements are meaningless, partnerships are unstable, and trust does not exist.

At a more basic level, economic coercion is an attack on democracy itself. Policies of a nation have to be decided by the people of that nation, not by foreign pressure. If economic threats make decisions, the will of the people is replaced by the will of a more dominant state.

It is not just that coercive economic diplomacy is a negation of free trade; it is also a denunciation of sovereignty, democracy, and the economic system of the modern technologically advanced world. It prefers coercion to cooperation, manipulation to mutual benefit. It warps markets, destroys trust, and, in the end, builds a world in which economic power is no longer the quest for prosperity, but domination.

For any unipower Empire, lost trust globally is difficult to recover. The question isn't whether coercion will succeed, but how long before this modern colonial militaristic Empire bursts under the weight of its own excesses and eat itself from inside out with civil unrest.