The APEC leaders` meeting was the first since 2018, after Chile cancelled the annual summit due to violent internal protests. Yet at the Papua New Guinea summit in 2018, APEC leaders failed to make a joint statement, amid a dispute between the United States and China over trade policy. If China were to join the CPTPP, Xi`s government would make it a member of the two largest trade agreements in the Asia-Pacific region, while Washington is not one of them. The proposed free trade agreement was born out of the lack of progress in the World Trade Organization negotiations in Doha and the “pasta shell” effect created by overlapping and contradictory elements of the many free trade agreements – there were some 60 free trade agreements in 2007, another 117 were negotiated in Southeast Asia and Asia-Pacific. [34] In 2012, ASEAN-6 countries had 339 free trade agreements, many of which were bilateral. [b] Starting in 2005, almost all APEC members were parties to some kind of trade negotiation. Governments continue to conduct crude econometric studies that provide imaginative predictions of benefits; but they often downplay claims that tangible economic benefits are being realized. The motives are more strategic than economic. Negotiations between the United States and Chile, Singapore, Thailand and South Korea have been largely influenced by geopolitical relations.
China and Japan have competing hegemonic aspirations that are manifested in their approach to regional agreements, with China leading the way. Countries that say they are willing to negotiate with China, particularly ASEAN, seem more concerned with the process of developing their relations than with the economic (and social) outcome. Singapore and Chile justify these agreements as a means of selling themselves as platforms in their regions by providing foreign investors with guaranteed “quality” neoliberal regimes. There is also an ideological “demonstration effect.” Neoliberal evangelicals believe that the creation of a critical mass will help them push other countries to join, for fear of being abandoned and reducing the influence of the domestic political opposition. At the closing meeting of the APEC host year in Chile, the United States applauded Chilean leaders in 2019. This year marks the thirtieth anniversary of the creation of APEC and we continue to work to open APEC markets, promote high standards and achieve free, fair and reciprocal trade. This year`s host, Malaysian Prime Minister Muhyiddin Yassin, said at a press conference that the trade war between the United States and China, which has hampered talks in the past, had been “overshadowed” by the Covid-19 pandemic. “If we face the greatest economic challenge of this generation, we must not repeat the mistakes of history by retreating to protectionism. APEC must continue to ensure that markets remain open and trade opens up,” she said. At the meeting, he said Beijing would also “actively” consider joining the Trans-Pacific Partnership Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement, a trade agreement that includes Japan, Canada, Mexico and other regional economies, but not the United States.