Which are the actors and levels to analyze the trade war between the United States and China?

Trade war between United States and China 

The two largest economies in the world have been involved in a trade war that has mainly developed through the imposition of tariffs on some products; those economies are from the United States and China, the last one is a country which «Its growth spurt is remarkable for its geographic spread as well as its speed and longevity» (Brandt, 2008)., and the interests that trade economists and businessman have in the country is «driven both by its large quantitative importance as an exporter of manufactured goods and by the paucity of natural experiments in international trade» (Autor, 2016). Everything points that «China thrives like no one else, and many eyes, especially of an economic nature, are on Beijing» (Schmidt, 2006). 

To understand the actors involved in the trade war, it is necessary to take into account four levels of analysis, the First is the individual level, in which the war is presented as «exclusive product of the measures that President Trump has taken, without consulting the United States Congress, against China and other business partners» (Agosin, 2019)., this is caused since «according to Trump’s logic, if I win, you lose; there is no scenario in which we can both win» (Baute, 2019)., for him, there is not cooperative negotiation, there is always a competitive, in which «the negotiator puts results before relation. Therefore, he uses tactics that allow him to achieve his objectives before the opposite» (Ponti, 2002). 

The second level is a group, in which we find the Democratic and Republican political party, characterized by «Ideological divides among voters by race and education have also widened, most notably a shift of less-educated whites towards Republican candidates and policy positions» (Autor, 2017), within the representatives of this party is Donald Trump. He gives his electoral message of the dissatisfaction of the American middle sectors with the effects caused by the globalization, reason why «blames the commerce with China of such evils» (Rosales, 2019)., so, the majority of people belonging to this party support the measures that Trump takes. 

At the state level, it should be understood that the United States has always tended to be one of the most reliable and most stable countries in terms of politics and economics, so it seeks to defend its position and interests against growing economies such as China’s to achieve hegemony worldwide, that is why «the North American global strategy is perceived as an attempt to maintain and strengthen the unipolar structure of the world» (Bustos, 2019)., so being a world superpower is «protagonist of conflicts in different focuses simultaneously» (Hernández, 2012)., so, in essence, the United States is a country that has both the instruments to start and end an international conflict, which in turn affects less developed countries such as Colombia. 

The system-level deals with the impact that the economic war has in the world, so it is necessary to understand that «globalization has encouraged economic growth and the modernization of various parts of the world while generating changes and new social tensions in the national and international distribution of resources» (Ortiz, 2018). There are adverse effects in different countries since there is too much uncertainty, currencies are fluctuating, and the financial conditions of companies changed, because «there is a 15% decrease in the profits of US companies, which correlate with the increase in corporate debt and turn causes the same effect in other countries» (International Monetary Fund, 2018)., affecting the productive sectors and the economy of its inhabitants.