Heron, Tony orcid.org/0000-0002-1237-2624, Siles-Brügge, Gabriel and McDonald, Darrin (2025) Performing trade:‘Global Britain’ and the UK’s post-Brexit free trade agreements with Australia and New Zealand. REVIEW OF INTERNATIONAL POLITICAL ECONOMY. ISSN 0969-2290
Abstract
Why did the United Kingdom (UK) prioritise post-Brexit free trade agreements (FTAs) with Australia and New Zealand, despite the almost negligible economic benefits on offer? We address this puzzle by focusing on practices in trade policy, contributing to a broader agenda emphasising their role in International Political Economy (IPE). More specifically, we use the concept of performativity to argue that the UK’s pursuit of these agreements reflected a desire to repeatedly perform sovereignty and independence from the European Union (EU): The act of negotiating and signing agreements was more important than policy content or economic impact. This performance of trade policy independence relied on a series of Eurosceptic scripts related to the Anglosphere—an imagined community of English-speaking nations with which the UK purportedly shared neoliberal economic values. As the prospects of a trade agreement with the United States (US) receded, the UK Government improvised on these Anglosphere scripts. The FTAs with Australia and New Zealand were recast as contributions to a wider Asia-Pacific tilt in UK trade policy, a region equated with economic dynamism and commitment to free trade, albeit without the historic connection to the UK.
Metadata
Item Type: | Article |
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Authors/Creators: |
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Copyright, Publisher and Additional Information: | © 2025 the author(s) |
Keywords: | Anglosphere,Brexit,performativity,Practices,sovereignty,trade |
Dates: |
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Institution: | The University of York |
Academic Units: | The University of York > Faculty of Social Sciences (York) > Politics (York) |
Depositing User: | Pure (York) |
Date Deposited: | 08 May 2025 15:10 |
Last Modified: | 08 May 2025 15:10 |
Published Version: | https://doi.org/10.1080/09692290.2025.2489078 |
Status: | Published online |
Refereed: | Yes |
Identification Number: | 10.1080/09692290.2025.2489078 |
Related URLs: | |
Open Archives Initiative ID (OAI ID): | oai:eprints.whiterose.ac.uk:226453 |
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Description: Performing trade Global Britain and the UK s post-Brexit free trade agreements with Australia and New Zealand
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