Trade Wars

This book explores the causes and instruments of 500 years of armed and non-armed international trade conflicts. Nils Ole Oermann and Hans-Jürgen Wolff draw on decades of experience to examine trade wars, economic sanctions, and different types of economic warfare, investigating their history, ethics, economic driving forces, and legality under current rules. They provide a clear and accessible account of the economics of trade, of trade and financial policy
since the nineteenth century, and of the effectiveness of sanctions and the 'winnability' of trade wars. The book also describes the transformation of economic warfare since 1989, namely in cyberspace and in the world financial system, and shows how China's rise challenges the Western model of democracy and
free market economies. The authors conclude with a plea for improved economic statecraft and an overhaul of the current trading regime.

Nils Ole Oermann is Full Professor of Ethics at the University of Lüneburg, specializing in sustainability and sustainable economics. He is also Visiting Professor for Business Ethics at the University of St Gallen and an Associate Faculty Member at the University of Oxford. He has served as personal advisor to the German Federal President and former head of the IMF, as well as to the Minister of Finance and Minister of the Interior of the Federal Republic of
Germany. He is the author of Albert Schweitzer: A Biography (OUP, 2016).
Hans-Jürgen Wolff works as a political advisor in Berlin, having retired from his former position in the Office of the German Federal President in 2010. Before that, he worked in the Department of Constitutional Law at the German Federal Ministry of the Interior (1989-1991) and from 1991 to 1995 he was responsible for issues of European economic and monetary policy at the German Federal Chancellor's Office.