ABSTRACT
The European Union (EU) remains the biggest global trading power, despite having come under increasing pressure from competitors in Asia and from lingering crisis conditions. The effects of the 2008 global financial crisis and the eurozone crisis have deepened the already existing economic and social cleavage within the EU and re-emphasized the divergence of national preferences on trade. Moreover, growing public doubts about the legitimacy of the EU’s decision-making processes and the breakdown of the pro-market consensus have resulted in increasing scepticism towards the EU’s free trade agenda. This has been further augmented by the combination of the already noticeable absence of the departing United Kingdom (known as Brexit) which formerly acted as the strongest promoter of free trade in the EU and the growing doubts about the future of transatlantic trade relations with the USA. The EU consequently currently stands at a crossroads between further disintegration and a new post-Brexit impetus for a revitalized common trade agenda.
