The Globalization Trilemma and Regional Policy Space: Opportunities and Challenges for the EU and East Asia

Abstract

One of the major challenges facing economies in Asia, Europe and elsewhere under intensive globalization is what Dani Rodrik refers to as the globalization trilemma: National sovereignty, globalization and democracy cannot be had at the same time. In this conceptual paper, the idea of a “regional policy space” beyond the level of national policy spaces is introduced to explore whether such spaces can soften the trilemma. Three major contributions are identified: First, for several undersupplied public goods, regions may be the optimal configuration level for providing them; second, evolutionary processes toward exploring the regional policy spaces may be helpful milestones toward eventually approaching multilateral solutions with a greater depth and width; and third, emerging regional leaders in today’s multiplex world can make positive contributions to this process, combining their strategic interests with helpful activities for the common good. Trans-regional schemes like ASEM may be tempting alternatives when global mechanisms are not available, but it is argued that their contribution as an additional policy space is limited. Adding the idea of a regional policy space to the concept of the globalization trilemma is assessed as a helpful heuristic device to illustrate major aspects of the potential choices, contributions and challenges of regional and trans-regional schemes in Asia, Europe and beyond.