In these times of economic and political turmoil, there is a short phrase that I see coming up quite frequently: “it’s the end of globalization and our only lifeline is sovereignty”. I hear it from people who think “digital sovereignty” but it could apply to any sector.
As for the end of globalization, I wouldn’t be so radical. It is certainly the end of a form of globalization, but not the end of globalization. I would even say that it is rather the end of a cycle of globalization. The economy operates in cycles, and it wouldn’t be the first time that we backtracked on a subject only to come back even stronger in the future.
But what I wonder about above all is positioning sovereignty as the only alternative, as if it were necessary to choose between opening up or protecting oneself, cooperating or isolating oneself.
For me, the real question is not so much to arbitrate between sovereignty or globalization, but to think about the place of sovereignty in globalization. And vice versa.
In short:
- Globalization is evolving but not disappearing, but it is entering a new cycle.
- Sovereignty and globalization are not opposed, they must be linked.
- Sovereign withdrawal weakens, uncontrolled dependence makes one vulnerable.
- The challenge is to have sovereignty focused on vital sectors, without excluding trade.
- To be sovereign is to choose one’s dependencies, not to suffer them.
In fact, there are three possibilities.
Sovereignty without globalization is isolationism
This is the option of closure, which consists of voluntarily cutting oneself off from world trade and from any form of economic or technological cooperation in order to regain a form of total control over one’s economic, technological or cultural choices.
At first glance, it is the most reassuring choice, the choice of reason: you produce locally, you protect your markets and you avoid dependencies.
But history shows that in an interdependent world, this often amounts to becoming poorer rather than stronger.
By rejecting globalization, we deprive ourselves of levers of development, we lose influence, and we find ourselves marginalized on strategic issues.
Globalization without sovereignty means sufered dependency.
Conversely, some countries have opened up their economic and technological borders extensively without giving themselves the means to control what is happening.
The result has always been a high degree of dependency on global supply chains, foreign digital platforms, and decisions made by private actors or third countries.
This is the situation we experienced with the COVID-19 pandemic, the war in Ukraine and the recent tensions over semiconductors.
When you have no control over your critical stocks or technologies and you have no control over your strategic resources, you no longer have sovereignty, you don’t control anything, you suffer.
Such dependencies are a risk in an unstable world, but one must also know what will be strategic tomorrow, as we saw with masks during the pandemic.
On the other hand, when it comes to digital technology, one certainly did not need to be a visionary to see that we had the winning combination in Europe between dependence and criticality.
Sovereignty in globalization is about striking the right balance
This is the real challenge, provided we can find the right balance, which requires both vision and subtlety.
The idea is not to oppose sovereignty and globalization, but to articulate them intelligently.
This means distinguishing between what is vital (what must be mastered or secured) and what is exchangeable (what can be exploited at the cost of dependence).
Being sovereign does not mean producing everything yourself, it means choosing what you cannot afford to delegate: health, energy, food, defense, key technologies, culture, provided, of course, you have the resources to do so.
At the same time, this does not exclude opening up to the world for the rest (industrial partnerships, international trade, research, circulation of ideas, free movement of goods and people) when certain resources are lacking or when it is more economically advantageous for in non-critical areas.
It is a sovereignty that is not intended to be absolute but selective and strategic.
What framework for sovereignty?
Sovereignty should not be a rejection of the world but participation in it without dissolving into it.
It should be a kind of compass that guides decisions and helps to set the rules of the game and, ultimately, a lever for negotiation.
It should therefore not be measured by the number of barriers that are erected, but by the ability to remain in control of one’s choices while knowing that we will always be dependent in certain areas.
Bottom line
We will never be self-sufficient, but we must choose our dependencies instead of suffering them.
Contrary to popular belief, it is not globalization per se that weakens sovereignty, but the lack of vision and, above all, of decision-making on what we are willing to delegate and what we want to preserve.
Sovereignty is therefore not the enemy of trade, but to believe that it can be total is a dangerous illusion.
Visual credit: Image generated by artificial intelligence via ChatGPT (OpenAI)
