Made in China: How Europe can tackle economic coercion
Mark Leonard welcomes Tobias Gehrke and Andrew Small to discuss how Europeans can combat varieties of Chinese economic coercion
Experts & Staff
Tobias Gehrke
Senior Policy Fellow
Areas of expertise
Geoeconomics, economic statecraft, global economy
Languages
German, English
Biography
Tobias Gehrke is a senior policy fellow at the European Council on Foreign Relations. He covers geoeconomics, focusing on economic security, European economic strategy, and great power competition in the global economy.
Before joining ECFR, Gehrke was a research fellow with the Egmont Royal Institute in Brussels where he covered geoeconomics. He is a non-resident fellow with the American German Institute, Washington DC.
He holds a PhD in political science from Ghent University.
Understanding the EU’s new economic security playbook
The EU’s new economic security communication is a step in the right direction. If Europe wants to be a geoeconomic actor instead of a mere geoeconomic battleground, it must evolve from being a risk manager and become a power broker
How China could crash Europe’s energy grid and what the EU can do about it
Europe’s solar boom has quietly handed Beijing remote access to hundreds of gigawatts of its power capacity. Without a 5G-type toolbox banning untrustworthy suppliers of inverters and other grid technologies, Europe risks another energy security crisis
Escalate to negotiate: How Europe should respond to Chinese export restrictions
Beijing is turning its rare earth monopoly into a weapon. The EU needs to treat this as the emergency that it is and unleash its anti-coercion shield to bring China to the negotiating table
Tariff tensions: Avoiding an EU-US trade war
Mark Leonard welcomes Tobias Gehrke to unpack the escalating EU-US trade war and Europe’s next moves
What went wrong in Europe’s trade gamble with Trump
The EU’s burgeoning deal with the Trump administration seems to escape the harshest US tariff threats. But there is a sense that the bloc has fumbled its hand, despite holding decent cards. The EU needs to examine what went wrong and how it can better secure its future interests against great powers
20
May
European Power
Poker Face: Europe’s Strategic Cards in the Geoeconomic Game with the United States
La temporanea sospensione dei dazi imposti dagli Stati Uniti nei confronti dell’Unione Europea non consente all’Europa di abbassare la guardia. Al contrario, è questo il momento di riflettere sia sulla strategia negoziale da adottare, sia sul più ampio contesto delle relazioni economiche transatlantiche. Dalle politiche commerciali e digitali alle leve finanziarie e infrastrutturali strategiche, sono…
Cards on the table: Why the EU should negotiate Trump’s tariffs in three phases
Trump’s tariff suspension gives the EU space to create clear negotiating terms, covering not only the next 90 days but also the next 90 weeks and 90 months. Only by establishing firm mid- and long-term targets can Europe hope to make the right calls in the short term
Europe vs. Trump: Deterrence or escalation?
Mark Leonard welcomes Tobias Gehrke and José Ignacio Torreblanca to explore Europe’s leverage against Donald Trump’s economic and technological coercion
Brussels hold’em: European cards against Trumpian coercion
Faced with an aggressive United States, Europe has more leverage than it realises. Across trade, technology, infrastructure, finance and people-to-people relations it has ways of retaliating
Publications
Brussels hold’em: European cards against Trumpian coercion
Faced with an aggressive United States, Europe has more leverage than it realises. Across trade, technology, infrastructure, finance and people-to-people relations it has ways of retaliating
Fortune favours the bold: Upgrading the EU’s geoeconomic strategy
The EU has started to join the dots between its economic and security policies. But as other powers reshape the geoeconomic landscape, it needs to upgrade its strategy beyond risk mitigation and competitiveness
The power of control: How the EU can shape the new era of strategic export restrictions
Amid the US-China strategic competition, the EU must develop a new strategic technology doctrine and upgrade its export control policy
Articles
Understanding the EU’s new economic security playbook
The EU’s new economic security communication is a step in the right direction. If Europe wants to be a geoeconomic actor instead of a mere geoeconomic battleground, it must evolve from being a risk manager and become a power broker
How China could crash Europe’s energy grid and what the EU can do about it
Europe’s solar boom has quietly handed Beijing remote access to hundreds of gigawatts of its power capacity. Without a 5G-type toolbox banning untrustworthy suppliers of inverters and other grid technologies, Europe risks another energy security crisis
Escalate to negotiate: How Europe should respond to Chinese export restrictions
Beijing is turning its rare earth monopoly into a weapon. The EU needs to treat this as the emergency that it is and unleash its anti-coercion shield to bring China to the negotiating table
What went wrong in Europe’s trade gamble with Trump
The EU’s burgeoning deal with the Trump administration seems to escape the harshest US tariff threats. But there is a sense that the bloc has fumbled its hand, despite holding decent cards. The EU needs to examine what went wrong and how it can better secure its future interests against great powers
Cards on the table: Why the EU should negotiate Trump’s tariffs in three phases
Trump’s tariff suspension gives the EU space to create clear negotiating terms, covering not only the next 90 days but also the next 90 weeks and 90 months. Only by establishing firm mid- and long-term targets can Europe hope to make the right calls in the short term
What Europe can learn from Trump’s trade manoeuvres against Canada and Mexico
Donald Trump announced that the US was imposing high trade tariffs against Canada and Mexico—only to pause them a few hours later. Europeans should monitor Trump’s playbook and learn from the countries’ response
Recharge or regret: Why the EU must act decisively to secure Europe’s struggling battery industry
Northvolt’s near-collapse demonstrates why the EU needs an economic security doctrine to identify where in the battery supply chain Europe can create winners – and then go all-in for success. If Europe continues down the same path, its battery industry will hit a wall
Missing money: Why Europe’s economic security requires a critical technology investment plan
The EU needs to complement defensive economic security measures with a focus on boosting its technological and industrial capacities. For this it needs a bold, security-driven investment plan
High-voltage trade: How Europe should fight the electric vehicle wars
The electric vehicle industry demonstrates the challenges of de-risking in practice. The EU needs more than tariffs if it wants to prevent a looming over-dependence on Chinese electric vehicles without strangling its own green ambitions
A maker, not a taker: Why Europe needs an economic security mechanism
Europe risks becoming a taker, not a maker, of economic security norms. To prevent this, the EU should develop a European economic security mechanism
Podcasts
Made in China: How Europe can tackle economic coercion
Mark Leonard welcomes Tobias Gehrke and Andrew Small to discuss how Europeans can combat varieties of Chinese economic coercion
Tariff tensions: Avoiding an EU-US trade war
Mark Leonard welcomes Tobias Gehrke to unpack the escalating EU-US trade war and Europe’s next moves
Europe vs. Trump: Deterrence or escalation?
Mark Leonard welcomes Tobias Gehrke and José Ignacio Torreblanca to explore Europe’s leverage against Donald Trump’s economic and technological coercion
Trump and tariffs: Stick or carrot?
With President Donald Trump and his threat of sweeping tariffs looming large over the German election campaign, co-hosts Jeremy Cliffe and Jana Puglierin discuss the…
Events
20
May
European Power
Poker Face: Europe’s Strategic Cards in the Geoeconomic Game with the United States
La temporanea sospensione dei dazi imposti dagli Stati Uniti nei confronti dell’Unione Europea non consente all’Europa di abbassare la guardia. Al contrario, è questo il momento di riflettere sia sulla strategia negoziale da adottare, sia sul più ampio contesto delle relazioni economiche transatlantiche. Dalle politiche commerciali e digitali alle leve finanziarie e infrastrutturali strategiche, sono…
European Power
Economic Security 2.0: What is the EU’s next geoeconomics game plan?
As the European Union sets its new agenda, this webinar will delve into geoeconomics-related priorities for the incoming European Commission. Drawing on two new ECFR reports – “It just makes cents: Why the EU needs to step up its geoeconomics game” and “Fortune favours the bold: Upgrading the EU’s geoeconomic strategy” – this…
In the media
Tobias Gehrke on Europe’s dependency on US tech companies
Tobias Gehrke on the implications of Europe using US debt as a financial weapon against Washington
Tobias Gehrke on the use and impact of the EU’s anti-coercion tool in response to Trump’s tariff threats
Tobias Gehrke on the China’s dominance in critical minerals and the potential geopolitical response from the West
Tobias Gehrke on the historic European economic-security crisis