Huang Yizhan: What is the impact of Trumps election on Southeast Asia?

All kinds of previous examples can be seen that if Trump is elected, the United States will not invest too much effort in Southeast Asia, but the influence from China will increase daily.Southeast Asian countries may need to be more difficult to cope with the competition between the United States and China, and may even be forced to be selected at a critical moment.

The world will usher in the most important US election. Whoever can enter the White House means that free trade and global order since the beginning of the 20th century, it is likely that it is likely to enter a completely different track due to different results.After the first round of presidential election debate, Trump rose to rise, and his opponent's performance was generally rated as catastrophic, making the Democrats feel anxious.According to most US media polls, the Democratic Party and the Republican Party's iron ticket prefecture is generally evenly matched. There are more than 90 votes in seven swing states, almost all of them are Trump's leading Biden. Obviously, all countries must do well in Trump again.Preparation of governing.

Although Trump is an unusual "madman", he is also a savvy businessman in his bones.If he was elected from the outside world, the Fiber of the US Treasury Secretary will be the Robert Lighthizer.) Trade multilateral system is also likely to disintegrate, free trade is no longer free, and if goods and labor wants to enter the United States, they must pay high tariffs.Of course, this helps the United States to slow down its fiscal deficit, but economists also warn that this will lead to extremely serious inflation. If countries scramble to sacrifice high tariff barriers, it will be a disaster for the global economy.

All of this is to be proved.After all, the current mainstream economics factions are standing in the Democratic Party. It is normal to see Trump's not eye.Because of this, these scholars and experts naturally have to work hard to take the wind and raise Trump's sense of crisis after being elected.

For Southeast Asia, Trump is known for his businessism and protection policies.I remember the trade war he promoted during the first term, and the sword refers to China and even the European Union. The commodity courses in the United States will be targeted at high tariffs (these measures are mostly continued by the successor of the Biden government).This time, he may not only re -applied techniques and impose higher tariffs on Chinese goods? It is also very likely to affect Southeast Asia, including Thailand's economic and trade performance and economic growth.Most Southeast Asian countries have a high degree of trade. The United States is one of the main markets. If the export is weak, it will not cause another Asian economic crisis.Fortunately, the fiscal and social structures of Southeast Asian countries are much more tough compared to the Asian financial turmoil period in 1997.

Trump will want to adopt protectionism. Frankly speaking, it is not completely unreasonable. Even if this may pay a great price in the short term, it will drag the world to launch the water together.We transferred the time to around 2000. With the advantages of global US dollar hegemony, the United States advocates that free trade can bring benefits to everyone. Behind it is to hope to make the United States the largest profit -making country, so there is therefore having it.The WTO architecture that Clinton strongly advocates is welcome to join the world's free trade system, and even for Russia to join NATO.

As everyone knows, for more than 20 years, China has not only shifted to open markets and go to a democratic camp because of its international integration.Strengthen the Communist Party's control of society.The same is true in other regions. The transnational supply chain system that has emerged due to the WTO architecture allows many manufacturing industries to leave the United States and seek cheaper production bases.Not to mention Russia, it is completely not at the core of the United States as the core, and has swallowed Crimea and launched the Ukrainian war. Why is it possible for the trade embargo and kicking out of the Global Bank of Financial Telecommunications (SWIFT)?Russia has no signs of collapse.

Trump's exposition is also very simple, that is, globalization and free trade have not brought expected benefits to the United States at all. Why do the United States continue to support this system?Since the rules were originally formulated by the United States, it can naturally be modified by the United States, without considering the position of other countries.But this will not only exacerbate the tension of trade in the United States and China, but also affect the economic system of Southeast Asian countries.After all, many of these countries depend on the two huge markets of China and the United States.For Southeast Asian countries, which are traveling between the two giants, they may need to balance their economic and foreign policies more cautiously.

From the perspective of political perspective, Trump's direct attention and speech on Southeast Asia during his last term is not much.He is more of a personal relationship with private relations with the diplomatic relations with the Asian security nations, such as interaction with former Philippine President Duterte, and invitation to visit the United States at the time of Baki, the then Prime Minister of Thailand.This is also the Supreme leader in Thailand since he has been invited to enter the White House again.

If Trump is elected again, this personal form of diplomacy may continue, but it is difficult to form a systematic regional policy, and it seems that it will not become the official official diplomatic position of the United States.In Trump's view, Asianan is not the most important strategic partner of the United States, which can be seen from the Asianan Summit in Bangkok in 2019.At that time, Trump and Vice President Pence did not attend, and it also caused dissatisfaction among leaders in Southeast Asian countries. At the subsequent United States -Asian Security Conference, they refused to attend or renamed lower -level officials to attend the meeting.It can be seen that if Trump is elected, the United States will not invest too much effort in Southeast Asia, and the influence from China will increase daily.Southeast Asian countries may need to be more difficult to cope with the competition between the United States and China, and may even be forced to be selected at a critical moment.

This may be a good thing for China.Taking electric vehicles as an example, China faces high tariffs in the United States, the EU's anti -subsidy investigation and possible export ban. A large number of good quality and cheap Chinese electric vehicles will naturally aim at the Southeast Asian market.This has become a trend in Thailand, and car manufacturers such as BYD, SAIC, GAC, Great Wall have successively settled.According to the estimates of the Thai auto union, the sales of electric vehicle in 2025 are expected to exceed 1 million units, most of which will be mainly Chinese car.

Even if China has no longer promoting the Belt and Road Initiative in the near future, it has not slowed down in regional integration and overseas direct investment (FDI).China's influence and infrastructure investment in Southeast Asia's economy is increasing, which will inevitably have a very important effect on the development of the region, deepen the economic and trade connection between Asia's detailed and China, and make up for the demand for foreign capital after the United States fades out.It is true that based on maintaining a global hegemony position, the United States will not completely withdraw from the role of Southeast Asia. In order to prevent China, how to strengthen the first island chain and even the Western Pacific military alliance should also be the main foreign strategy.However, according to Trump's attitude towards NATO, if Southeast Asian countries want to continue to enjoy the U.S. military protection umbrella, it is necessary to pay more costs instead of sitting in it as before.

In summary, the United States that Trump's administration will make Southeast Asia face more complex geopolitics and higher economic and trade risks. At the same timeReshape regional economic and trade order.For the Asian Gyeongan countries, this is both a challenge and opportunity. How to maintain moderate elasticity to the outside world, continuously attract Western forces but can use China's capital advantages;Collective forces to compete for external risks are issues that Southeast Asian leaders need to think about.