Books | Arun M. Kumar

The Global Trade Paradigm: Rethinking International Business in the Post Pandemic World, published by HarperCollins, 2023.

Following the end of World War II, a consensus emerged that increased global trade, with fewer barriers, would be a key element to promoting peace and prosperity in the world.

Starting with the Bretton Woods conference of 1944, that led to the establishment of the international monetary system, the July 1945 San Francisco conference that led to the founding of the United Nations and the 1951 Treaty of Paris establishing the European Coal and Steel Community that was the precursor to the European Union, leading nations of the world took several initiatives in this direction.

The impact of liberal economic policies and the promotion of democracies helped in the economic recovery of a war-devastated Western Europe, Japan and the Far East.

The increasing openness and pursuit of comparative advantage led to the rise of global value chains. The entry of China into the global trading system led to the creation of a manufacturing powerhouse that became a key node in critical supply chains.

Recent decades however have been highly turbulent for global trade and commerce – affected by geopolitics and the imperfections of the global trade system itself. The Covid-19 pandemic was a Black Swan event that impacted the global trade system further, exposing the vulnerability of over-dependence on a single country as a source of supply.

We today witness an increasingly polarized world where countries are turning inward. Will an era of expansion and integration in global trade now change to one of isolation and retreat? How will the power dynamics of major nation-states, affect the future of global trade?

In The Global Trade Paradigm, Arun Kumar looks at the global trade ecosystem and points at the gaps within it. Based on rigorous research and Arun’s rich experience of more than four decades, this book presents how newly emergent forces, technology, geopolitics and nationalism are reshaping the global trade system.