Trade, globalisation and shipping

One T-shirt traced from a Texas cotton farm to a Chinese factory and beyond.

Trade imbalances come from policies that hold down household consumption.

For trade, but against hyperglobalisation that overrides national choices.

Trade imbalances come from how income is shared within countries.

The supply-chain breakdown of 2020 to 2022, traced through shipments and people.

The case for localisation after the pandemic supply shocks.

Trans-Saharan gold and salt trade; the medieval West African economy

The 1997 warning that the political backlash was coming.

Globalization as the new international system, seen from Amazon farms to Wall Street.

How the shipping container cut freight costs and remade global trade.

Long-distance trade from Mesopotamia and the spice routes to modern globalisation.

The economics of shipping: the market cycle, freight rates and vessel costs.

How the diesel engine and the gas turbine made modern global trade possible.

Aboard a Maersk box ship; the economics of the trade Denmark dominates.

Globalisation's two phases: cheap shipping of goods, then cheap movement of ideas.

An attack on the IMF's one-size-fits-all policies in the crises of the 1990s.

Ten forces around 2000 that let anyone, anywhere compete in the global economy.