Will the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership be a game-changer? EU Centre Singapore Policy Brief No. 5, April 2013

In February 2013, US President Barrack Obama, European Council President Herman Van Rompuy and President of the European Commission José Manuel Barroso announced the decision to go for an ambitious and comprehensive trade and investment agreement between the US and the EU. To be called the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP), this agreement would lead to a new stage in the transatlantic relationship and be a much needed boost to the lacklustre economic recovery so far. Some analysts have even argued that TTIP would be a “game changer” – besides the economic gains, it would serve a bigger strategic purpose of promoting EU-US common objective to set higher standards of trade liberalisation, and thereby level the playing field in China and other key emerging markets. This policy brief examines the reasons behind the current push towards TTIP and the possible contents of such an agreement. It also discusses the possible obstacles to the realisation of TTIP, and at the same time, looks into what a successful conclusion of TTIP would mean for Asia and beyond.

Enhancing the Brazil-EU Strategic Partnership: From the Bilateral and Regional to the Global. CEPS Paperback. October 2013

This book examines the Brazil-EU Strategic Partnership and is the result of a project that ‘twinned’ five sets of eminent Brazilian and European scholars to investigate themes of undoubted strategic significance: macroeconomics, trade policy, climate change, foreign policy and continental regionalism. Results show that while the two parties cannot claim to determine global policies, they can develop a specialist niche in global affairs, working together in the avant-garde of those searching for workable global solutions, seeking to bridge the frequent wide differences between the West and the rest, or North and South, or old powers and new ones.