Professor Emeritus Wolfgang Streeck discussed Trump’s trade war and its implications for the global economy in an interview he gave to German e-newspaper Der Freitag published on April 11, 2025.
Streeck argues that Trump’s aggressive use of tariffs signals the decline of U.S. global economic dominance. When asked whether Germany—as an export-driven economy—can survive without access to the U.S. market, he polemically points to the Global South as an alternative. He highlights the region’s enormous infrastructure needs and suggests that real development aid could come through German investment in power plants, desalination systems, and satellite technologies.
It is a useful challenge to “think outside the box” and envision a non-green, new economic and financial system together with the BRICS, which so far only the LaRouche movement has called for in Germany.
