CEPII, Recherche et Expertise sur l'economie mondiale
The Fragmentation Paradox: De-risking Trade and Global Safety


Thierry Mayer
Isabelle Méjean
Mathias Thoenig

 Points clés :
  • We develop a quantitative model of trade and conflicts and apply it to the US-China relationship.
  • All welfare-relevant geoeconomic factors, such as the realized costs of war, the concessions to prevent it, and the probability of escalation, depend on the opportunity cost of war, itself shaped by observed trade flows.
  • The growing US dependence to Chinese products over the past thirty years has increased the cost of geopolitical disputes with China for the US.
  • While decoupling from China could offer geopolitical benefits, we highlight a fundamental security dilemma: Decoupling can paradoxically raise the risk of escalation by weakening incentives for restraint.

 Résumé :
We develop a model of international trade and geopolitical disputes, embedding a diplomatic game of escalation to conflict within a quantitative model of trade. Bilateral disputes arise exogenously, and rival countries engage in negotiations to avoid war. In equilibrium, negotiations may fail, resulting in conflict. All welfare-relevant geoeconomic factors, such as the realized costs of war, the concessions to prevent it, and the probability of escalation, depend on the opportunity cost of war, itself shaped by observed trade flows. We provide a simple procedure to estimate these factors in a model of trade calibrated to current data. This approach is then used to quantify the geoeconomic factors characterizing the US-China relationship, both historically and under various ``decoupling'' scenarios. We find that the growing US dependence to Chinese products and markets over the past thirty years has increased the cost of geopolitical disputes with China for the US. In this context, decoupling from China through increased tariffs may offer geopolitical benefits. Yet, the analysis highlights a fundamental security dilemma: because export and import dependencies influence bargaining power in negotiations, decoupling may reduce the diplomatic concessions needed to maintain peace but can paradoxically raise the risk of escalation by weakening incentives for restraint.


 Mots-clés : International Trade | Geopolitical Disputes | Interstate Conflict | Geoeconomics | Fragmentation | Derisking

 JEL : F1, F5
CEPII Working Paper
N°2025-23, December 2025

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 Domaines d'expertise

Commerce & Mondialisation
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