Towards a geopolitical EU

The Eurointelligence Podcast

Wolfgang Munchau

News, Eu, European Politics, Political Economy, Italy, Brexit, Recovery Fund, Political Risk, Business, European Union, Netherlands, Ecb, Economics, Uk, Fiscal Union, Government, Transatlantic Relations, European Integration, France, Geopolitics, Eurozone, Banking, China, Spain, Germany, Political Union, Politics, Trade, Eu-china

4.5 • 30 Ratings

🗓️ 1 April 2023

⏱️ 27 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

In our latest podcast, our team discuss Ursula von der Leyen's call for the EU to subject the relationship with China to geopolitical considerations; and on the damage caused by Germany's decision to reopen the 2035 deadline for fuel-driven cars.

Transcript

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0:00.0	Welcome to the Eurointelligence podcast. I'm Wolfgang Munchau and with me are Zazana Muncheng and Jack Smith.
0:06.2	Today we would like to talk about Ursula von der Leyen's speech on China. In her speech this week, she indicated a substantial policy change from something we would have characterized as mercantilist, business first, to a geopolitical approach to China.
0:26.0	We wrote about this article this morning. Today is Friday. So we wrote about it in our news
0:31.1	briefing this morning. Generally positive. We think this is a long overdue measure that we take
0:36.2	geopolitical factors into accounts in our trade policies.
0:39.7	However, we've been issuing one warning. And the warning we issued was at the moment, we have,
0:45.1	the US and EU policies are aligned. But that may not be the case any longer after the next
0:51.7	US elections or even elections after the next U.S. elections, when there will
0:55.5	for sure be a new president. So the question is, is this a strategic shift that is durable,
1:01.1	or is this a spur-of-the-moment decision that might again have to be revised later on? Jack,
1:07.8	what do you think about this? I think the part that's definitely going to be here to stay
1:11.5	is what von der Leyen was saying about some of these kind of more sensitive sectors, right? And
1:15.7	especially things like dual use components and stuff like that. I think this is kind of a case of
1:20.2	correcting a problem that governments have started to identify and that have really come to the fore.
1:27.1	I think that is
1:28.2	going to stay and there's certainly going to be a more like wary attitude towards China.
1:34.7	The one thing that I think is kind of difficult when I look at this and I think it relates to
1:40.0	what you said about the kind of alignment between the EU and the US is we can have in the
1:45.7	EU a strategy towards China, we can have a strategy towards the US, we could have a strategy
1:52.2	towards I don't know like any other country or region you could care to name, whether it's
1:56.9	like ASEAN or Latin America or whatever. However, ideally, well, really, what this
2:03.6	should all be in service of is one sort of big strategy, some sort of idea within the EU of
	...

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