Europe still has no clear goal on China

Europe still has no clear goal on China

A Europe that gives China its price list and the US its autonomy can only buy small concessions, leaving its ‘kill switch’ unused

This month alone, Europe has threatened China with a trade “kill switch”, rebuked it in parliament, sent its trade commissioner on a much-trumpeted trip to Beijing and announced three new economic security instruments.

The sequence exposed a European Union that has no clear goal on China, no hierarchy of priorities and has reached no agreement on what it wants from Beijing or on what it would pay to get it.