News

New Project on Global Affiliate Structure of German Firms and their Resilience against Shocks

18th July 2025
KCG Secretary
News
News
Container Ship Parade moored in Harbor
For decades, the world experienced extensive trade liberalization and deepening globalization, during which firms built and expanded their global production networks. However, this trend began to reverse following the 2008 financial crisis, as national policies have increasingly shifted toward protectionism. This trend has been further intensified due to natural disasters, climate change, the Covid-19 pandemic, and, particularly, geopolitical events such as the Russian invasion of Ukraine and the rising tensions between the US and China[...]

New Policy Brief on Significance and Policy Implications of EU-U.S. Services Trade

17th July 2025
KCG Secretary
Publications
Publications
Trade in services is an important component of international trade and is becoming increasingly more important with growth rates exceeding the rates with which goods trade increases. This is also true in the bilateral U.S. – EU relationship: Trade in services, and especially trade in digitally deliverable services, is a highly important element of the economic relations between the U.S. and the EU. And it is growing much faster than goods trade between the two economies. Despite its importance, trade in services has received much less attention in political and public discussions on the transatlantic trade relationship[...]

Special Economic Zones Policies Contribute to Urbanization and Inclusive Growth in Africa

1st July 2025
KCG Secretary
Publications
Publications
Fishing boats on the shore of Cape Coast, Ghana
There has been an increasing number of Special Economic Zones (SEZ) in Africa since the early 1990s. While there were only around 20 SEZs in the early 1990s in Africa, the number amounted to more than 200 zones all over Africa in 2021. These zones are established to “promote local economic development and reduce regional disparities” (Abagna et al., 2025: 1). In policy debates and academic research, little attention has been paid so far to the impact of SEZ on the households’ welfare development in Africa[...]

Germany’s Path Forward: Building on Leading Edges to Counter China’s Challenges

24th March 2025
KCG Secretary
Public Contributions
Public Contributions
China has made substantial economic progress during the last decades, shifting towards advanced manufacturing and technologies. Chinese firms in key sectors have received massive subsidies which enable them to produce at lower costs and to better compete in the global markets. One key example here is the car industry, particularly the production of electric vehicles (EVs)[...]

Görg on Trump’s blackmail strategy: “Then the trade order would be completely dead

3rd February 2025
KCG Secretary
Public Contributions
Public Contributions
US President Donald Trump is imposing an additional 25% tariff on imports from Canada and Mexico, and an additional 10% tariff on imports from China until the crises of illegal migration and drugs are alleviated. A week ago, President Trump also threatened to implement steep tariffs on imports from Colombia after the country barred deportation flights from landing. In the end, Colombia agreed to accept deported migrants, temporarily avoiding a trade war between the two countries[...]

Görg: Tariffs on electric vehicles from China will have significant negative impacts on the electrification transition of the European automotive industry

17th June 2024
KCG Secretary
Public Contributions
Public Contributions
In October 2023, the European Commission initiated an anti-subsidy investigation on imports of battery electric vehicles from China. On June 12, 2024 the Commission provisionally concludes the “electric vehicle value chains in China benefit from unfair subsidies”[...]