The us government has not only launched a trade war against China, but is escalating it in both depth and breadth, and has begun to go beyond trade disputes. This has brought more and more uncertainties to the world outlook, and has become a major threat to global interests and human well-being.

The us government's thinking on economic relations with China and its trade bullying practices have produced or are producing at least five major global hazards, affecting the international community's cognition and understanding of global governance and development direction.

It has battered world economic growth

Trade growth is a key driver of global economic growth. However, a trade war and technological blockade by the largest economy against the second has left the world economy, which is struggling to recover, facing the risk of slipping back into recession.

World economic growth will slow to 2.7 percent in 2019, 0.3 percentage points lower than the year before, according to the latest UN forecast. The organisation for economic co-operation and development cut its forecast for global growth by 0.3 percentage points in 2019.

The world trade organisation has cut its forecast for global trade growth to 2.6 per cent in 2019 from 3.7 per cent previously. Global trade sentiment in the second quarter was at its lowest level since March 2010.

Morgan Stanley, the us investment bank, has warned that global growth could slow by about 50 basis points to 2.7 per cent if the us maintains a 25 per cent tariff on $200bn of Chinese goods for three or four months.

Countries in the world leverage their comparative advantages and cooperate with each other to form an efficient global industrial, supply and value chain. In effect, raising taxes on all businesses in the chain forces entrepreneurs to invest less, undermining the economy's momentum.

Japanese companies will lose about $500 million in direct trade friction with the United States, according to an analysis by daiwa research institute, a Japanese research institute. French finance minister Bruno le maire said economic friction between China and the United States will directly reduce the flow of goods and hurt jobs in Europe and France.

As the world economic environment worsens, some countries will have to loosen monetary policy to stimulate their own economic growth. This, in turn, will contribute to the accumulation of global debt, raise medium-term financial risks and hinder the long-term health of the world economy.

It seriously undermines the international economic order

The United States is the principal founder of the current international economic order and multilateral trading system. However, it has become a major factor undermining the international economic order, damaging the multilateral trading system and disrupting the world economic governance system.

Since world war ii, the rules-based international order, the multilateral system with the United Nations at its core and the multilateral trading system with the wto at its core have been gradually established worldwide. On the premise of abiding by the basic framework of the international political and economic order, countries have opened up and cooperated and achieved common development.

However, the us launched a trade war against China, inciting economic populism and anti-globalization to spread around the world and posing a subversive threat to the international economic order. Once the foundation of the international economic order is completely destroyed, global economic activities will plunge into turmoil and damage the long-term development interests of all countries.

Bypassing the WTO dispute settlement mechanism, provoking economic and trade frictions according to domestic laws, and imposing massive tariffs on Chinese goods in violation of WTO authorization -- this shows the us's disregard for the multilateral trading system, and its reckless behavior of putting its own selfish interests above international rules, which poses unprecedented risks to the international economic order.

In particular, the us, which prides itself on being a "full market economy", has also blatantly used state power and technological superiority to impose technology embargoes on Chinese technology companies such as huawei in the name of "national security". This is to market economy principle and commercial civilization order wanton trample.

The United States' actions have made some technology companies in other countries feel the fear of a cold snap, causing incalculable direct and indirect damage to the development of the world's technology industry.

Creating new imbalances in the global economy

America's direct excuse for starting a trade war with China is "trade imbalance". In fact, the root cause of the us trade deficit with China is structural problems such as too much consumption and insufficient savings.

It would be counter-productive for the us to impose high tariffs on goods from other countries, such as China, rather than focus on solving its own problems.

What's more, the us itself is one of the main causes of global economic imbalances, and its current approach will not help the current rebalancing of the global economy, but will create new structural imbalances in the global economy.

American misdeeds are put many businesses in dilemma embarrassment, many foreign businesses in China, in particular, if continue to stay in China, could face a trade war caused by rising costs, and choose to leave may lose the Chinese market for a long time, and some potential transfer countries although Labour costs are lower, such as infrastructure, business environment and the industrial chain of completeness is far worse than China.

According to a survey conducted by the European chamber of commerce, about a third of the entrepreneurs surveyed cited economic and trade frictions between China and the United States as their biggest concern. The uncertainty of china-us economic and trade relations makes it more difficult for enterprises to make business decisions, which has a serious negative impact on business growth.

One of the major causes of structural imbalances in the global economy is the inadequate division of labor in global industries.

Some developing economies at the lower end of the value chain engage in manufacturing and processing links due to low barriers to entry, resulting in excessive competition and overcapacity.

However, some developed economies at the high end of the value chain take advantage of technological monopoly advantage and global pricing power to grab excessive benefits and hinder the transformation and upgrading process of developing economies.

The direct and derivative effects of the us trade war with China and the partial embargo on science and technology are creating new distortions and structural imbalances in the world economy.

"Destructive government variables"

According to the common sense of political economy, a government should deal with instability, not be an unstable factor. Abiding by the rules and paying attention to commitments allows different individuals, groups and countries to form a wide range of cooperation, which is the main feature of humanity's entry into a civilized society.

Given its share in the world economy and its say in international political and economic governance, the United States should have made a positive contribution to world prosperity and stability. However, the United States has taken a series of dishonest actions, making itself a serious "destructive variable" in spite of the universally recognized and followed norms of international exchanges.

The capricious and mercenary nature of the us government has been exposed in china-us trade negotiations, and the uncertainties it creates and spreads have seriously disturbed the expectations and behaviors of global market players.

Before that, a series of destructive ACTS caused by "America first", from withdrawing from international organizations such as UNESCO and the UN human rights council to withdrawing from international treaties such as the Paris climate agreement, the comprehensive agreement on the Iranian nuclear issue and the inf treaty, have seriously impacted the trend of world peace and development.

Obviously, the United States is becoming the "black swan" and the "gray rhino" on the international community's high alert.

Wanton violation of the economic sovereignty of other countries

At the negotiating table, the U.S. government made a number of outrageous demands on China, including restrictions on the development of state-owned enterprises. Obviously, this goes beyond the scope of trade negotiations and touches upon China's basic economic system.

This shows that the us is trying to violate China's economic sovereignty and force China to damage its core interests behind launching a trade war with China.

The charter of economic rights and obligations of states, adopted by the United Nations in 1974, clearly states that "each state enjoys full and permanent sovereignty over all its wealth, natural resources and economic activities, including the right of ownership, use and disposal, and is free to exercise this sovereignty".

For example, after the second world war, the United States led to establish system of international trade, encourage technology transfer to developing economies developed economies to form the technology spillover effect, so as to adapt to their own economic and social changes, take advantage of low production costs in developing countries, with its own abundant capital and advanced technical advantage to form strong complement each other.

The Chinese government encourages foreign investment to carry out technical cooperation based on the principle of voluntariness and commercial rules, and the conditions of technical cooperation shall be determined by the investors through consultation on an equal footing in accordance with the principle of fairness.

It can be seen that the Chinese government does not have a mandatory system or systematic behavior on technology transfer, but a reasonable and standardized approach in line with the market economy.

However, the United States has labeled China as a "forced technology transfer" and forced it to change its development path.

Other countries have also suffered. The U.S. government frequently USES "long-arm jurisdiction," which requires entities or individuals in other countries to comply with their domestic laws or face penalties such as listing on the entity list.

Statistics show that as of last August alone, the number of subjects listed on the "entity list" of the us department of commerce reached 1,013 worldwide.

This is, in effect, part of the evidence that America is encroaching on other countries' economic sovereignty.

(source: xinhua news agency, Beijing, May 25)