030361 KU The Emerging Law of Strategic Autonomy and Geoeconomics (2025S)

After a period of economic liberalization on the international level, trade and investment relations are becoming increasingly politicized. The term 'geopolitics' relates to the use of economic policies to pursue non-economic objectives, such as the protection of national security or to achieve geopolitical goals. The intensifying rivalry between the United States and China, for instance, reflects these developments and has been coined as 'trade war'. Within these global power struggles, also the European Union (EU) seeks to find its position as a major economic actor. Within the past years, the EU has adopted several legal instruments aiming at establishing its strategic autonomy. These include the screening of foreign investments on grounds of security and public order, preventing market distortions by foreign subsidies and the protection from economic coercion by third states.

Nevertheless, using economic policies for achieving geopolitical objectives may be contrary to the framework of international economic law that has emerged from the process of globalization within the past decades. For instance, WTO law reduces tariffs and eliminates trade barriers. International investment law seeks to promote and protect foreign investments from state interference and provides for dispute settlement between foreign investors and states. While these international instruments also include mechanisms to balance economic goals with other objectives, it remains to be seen to what extend states may deviate from their obligations.

This course seeks to analyze the legal implications of this shift in international economic relations. After providing the theoretical basis for this transformation, the legal toolbox including sanctions, export control, investment screening, the role of foreign subsidies and industrial policy as well as means of protection from economic coercion will be presented and discussed. Moreover, the interaction of such 'geo-economic' instruments and the potential tensions with states' obligations in international trade and investment law will be assessed.