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Holger Hestermeyer Profile picture
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29 Oct, 4 tweets, 2 min read
An academic comment on this: journalists are trying to have a high-level generalized debate on this topic. "The NHS can benefit from competition" (US politics) versus "The NHS is not on the table" (UK politics). This has nothing to do with actual Free Trade Agreements (/1)
The reality of FTAs is detail. And that detail is complex. Intellectual property is one of the core areas of debate when it comes to access to medicines and drug pricing. And IP has been part of trade agreements since TRIPS in the WTO. (/2)
The provisions the US asks for (and generally gets) in FTAs are of the utmost relevance to the pharmaceutical industry (Trump actually in this regard arguably differed from normal US positions), but can hardly be described by sentences such as "the NHS is on / off the table".(/3)
Any proposals on how to improve the public debate welcome - in exasperation I often think "Just come to @Ortino_Federico and my WTO law class". But that's precisely the point. We cannot expect the public to learn the details of trade law. (/4)

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More from @hhesterm

Holger Hestermeyer Profile picture
30 Oct
An important reminder that concepts of democracy differ in detail (though the last sentence fails to acknowledge this). Some examples (thread)
The UK has a monarch and a House of Lords. Not viewed as democratic in some other countries. But unproblematic in the UK system.
The Swiss system is often viewed as a model for democracy because people think of referendums. Not necessarily my ideal - but preferences differ there. One element nobody outside of Switzerlands understands is the Zauberformel.
Read 6 tweets
Holger Hestermeyer Profile picture
26 Oct
The personal politics of a US-UK FTA are seriously overestimated, the real poltics on the ground ignored. (Thread)
1) Free Trade Agreements are massively, massively about interests. POTUS and PM might like each other, that's good'n all, but that doesn't change POTUS' approach to trade. And that is America First.
That is, of course, not a description or a reading between the line approach. POTUS is absolutely explicit about it. The US expects a win. For the US. What does that mean?
Read 9 tweets
Holger Hestermeyer Profile picture
26 Oct
Apparently the US elections and Brexit combined lead to rather particular takes on the UK, alliances and foreign relations. Allow me to make three points in this regard. My main point is at the end. Bear with me (thread)
1) The UK is and remains an important country. It is a P5 nation. It is a significant economic and military power. It is an important ally. Yes,...
... some of the statements made in the Brexit context will worry partners, as decision-makers claim increasingly that UK law allows disregarding international law. They regard Brexit as special, but many of these statements are now made as describing a general UK position.
Read 9 tweets
Holger Hestermeyer Profile picture
23 Oct
A prime example of our incapacity to understand exponential growth today in @derspiegel 's live feed on the coronavirus: hospitalized patients in the State of NRW are up from 950 to 1420 within a week. (short thread)
The article continues that this is "far" from filling the capacity. 1320 ICU beds with ventilators are unfilled (the article is somewhat unclear on correlations of numbers). What is clear is that hospitalization numbers doubled twice within a month.
In light of that and of lag time - the development is deeply uncomfortable. Even if the 1320 free beds correlate to the currently only 148 patients on ventilators.
Read 4 tweets
Holger Hestermeyer Profile picture
22 Oct
That's not what the government or the EU are doing. Allow me to give you a very short primer in three tweets: what is a Customs Union, the Single Market, a Free Trade Agreement. Bonus tweet: what is the UK negotiating. (Thread)
What is a Customs Union? A CU abolishes internal tariffs and introduces a common external tariff, so that all members have the same external tariffs (The WTO lists 18 CUs, 4 concern the EU. Others are, e.g. SACU)
What is the single merket, also referred to as the internal market or the common market? It allows free movement of goods, services and workers. To do that it provides for some harmonization and, vitally, for mutual recognition of rules (the EU, to some extent NZ-Australia)
Read 5 tweets
Holger Hestermeyer Profile picture
22 Oct
Es ist an der Zeit, dass wir erkennen, dass @markuspreiss zwar nicht unrecht hat, aber dass das, was er beschreibt, nicht EU-spezifisich ist - es beschreibt eine geradezu notwendige Eigenschaft der Politik an sich (thread)
Politiker verfolgen ein Ideal und werben dafür. Sie erklären eine große Idee, ehrgeizige Ziele. Dann aber müssen sie Mehrheiten bilden. Dafür müssen sie Vertreter anderer (ebenso großer) Ideale überzeugen. Kompromisse machen. Mehrheiten bilden.
Und so wird aus der großen Idee ein kleiner Schritt. Oder Stillstand, weil sich Mehrheiten nicht finden lassen, das angestrebte Ziel schlicht nicht asreichend populär ist oder mal wieder niemand die Konsequenzen tragen will.
Read 4 tweets

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