The anti-trade backlash, building for years, has become explosive because the global economy has arrived at a sobering period of reckoning. Years of investment manias and financial machinations that powered the job market have lost potency, exposing longstanding downsides of trade that had previously been masked by illusive prosperity.
This tide of animosity may prove nearly impossible to reverse, given that technological disruption and economic upheaval are now at work in an era of scarcity. Today, many major nations are grappling with weak growth, tight credit and a gnawing sense that a lean future may persist indefinitely.
