Case study

This chapter presents a case study of Meso-level global value chains (GVC) analysis of Korean shipbuilding. This case illustrates how the Korean government may explore how to react to a trade barrier on its shipbuilding industry. Management of GVCs is a coordinated effort by the companies participating in the GVCs as well as by governments who impose trade policy instruments such as tariffs, quotas, antidumping or other barriers. Korean trade policymakers are concerned with increased talk about trade wars and the impact of trade barriers on one of the country’s major industries, shipbuilding. To get more actionable insights, Korean policymakers need to probe deeper to identify which other industries are directly affected if barriers are passed on or reciprocated. The follow-on pains by US farmers escalated further when Canada threatened retaliatory tariffs on US agricultural products to counter the tariffs on Canadian steel, causing US politicians to argue for trade quotas instead of tariffs.