We should remember that in the 20th century, international trade as a %age of global GDP peaked in 1913, just before WWI, and declined until 1945. It then rose and recovered its peak ratio in the 1970s. Was popularism the cause then, or was it more about instability and risk of supply lines? Why did international trade not recover in 1918, but continue to fall even though the beggar-thy-neighbor policies did not get enacted until the Depression starting in the late 1920s and extended throughout the 1930s?
I am reminded of advice from conglomeration Harry Figgie that it was important to overstock expensive and critical items as any disruption in replacement would halt production. Covid and China's international aggressiveness may be increasing supply risk. We are seeing this already in microchip supply. Reduced orders in 2020 reduced supply, and China's moves to threaten Taiwan, a major global supplier, are the likely causes, but while the former will be resolvable, the second might increase the risk of supply. Huawei experienced this with the previous administration's blocking of US IP products. With the controversy over the ownership of ARM, there is the possibility of increased risks to using the ARM architecture. IMO, the America First approach to trade by the previous administration seemed to follow the Nazi party approach to trade before WWII. Will this unwind, or will the threat of a new nationalist administration in a few years maintain the higher risk of international supplies?
For me, it isn't "populism" that is the issue, as much as nationalism (unless one equates the two terms as effectively being the same).
We may not have a complete understanding of how to "generate the largest positive engineering externalities", but I think that the basic framework is reasonably clear, from things like Bell Labs, DARPA, NIAC, and even the actions of venture capitalists. That framework seems to be "let 1000 flowers bloom", then nurture the ones that are successful. That is: give a bit of support to anything that looks at all promising - recognizing that most of these will not pan out - and then more support for things that do.
Re: Globalization
We should remember that in the 20th century, international trade as a %age of global GDP peaked in 1913, just before WWI, and declined until 1945. It then rose and recovered its peak ratio in the 1970s. Was popularism the cause then, or was it more about instability and risk of supply lines? Why did international trade not recover in 1918, but continue to fall even though the beggar-thy-neighbor policies did not get enacted until the Depression starting in the late 1920s and extended throughout the 1930s?
I am reminded of advice from conglomeration Harry Figgie that it was important to overstock expensive and critical items as any disruption in replacement would halt production. Covid and China's international aggressiveness may be increasing supply risk. We are seeing this already in microchip supply. Reduced orders in 2020 reduced supply, and China's moves to threaten Taiwan, a major global supplier, are the likely causes, but while the former will be resolvable, the second might increase the risk of supply. Huawei experienced this with the previous administration's blocking of US IP products. With the controversy over the ownership of ARM, there is the possibility of increased risks to using the ARM architecture. IMO, the America First approach to trade by the previous administration seemed to follow the Nazi party approach to trade before WWII. Will this unwind, or will the threat of a new nationalist administration in a few years maintain the higher risk of international supplies?
For me, it isn't "populism" that is the issue, as much as nationalism (unless one equates the two terms as effectively being the same).
We may not have a complete understanding of how to "generate the largest positive engineering externalities", but I think that the basic framework is reasonably clear, from things like Bell Labs, DARPA, NIAC, and even the actions of venture capitalists. That framework seems to be "let 1000 flowers bloom", then nurture the ones that are successful. That is: give a bit of support to anything that looks at all promising - recognizing that most of these will not pan out - and then more support for things that do.