Ambassador Matt Murray, U.S. senior official for Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC), will speak as part of a roundtable on “International Trade at a Crossroads” from 3-4:30 p.m. Nov 1 in 106 O’Brian Hall, North Campus.

Murray, who will participate via Zoom, will be joined at the roundtable by Pasha Hsieh, professor of law and Jean Monnet Chair in EU-ASEAN Law and Relations, Singapore Management University School of Law, and Inu Manak, fellow for trade policy, Council on Foreign Relations. Hsieh and Manak will speak in person at UB.

The roundtable will be co-chaired by Jessie Poon, professor of geography, and Meredith Kolsky Lewis, professor of law and vice dean for international and graduate programs in the School of Law, who are co-directors of UB’s APEC Study Center.

Poon and Lewis also serve as co-chairs of the U.S. APEC Study Centers Consortium. In that role, they co-chaired the November 2023 APEC Study Centers Consortium Conference at the University of Calilfornia-Berkeley, held in conjunction with APEC Leaders Week in San Francisco.

Themes to be addressed in the roundtable include:

• Recent challenges to international trade policy, from disruptions in global production networks and supply chains, the climate crisis and the COVID-19 pandemic, to globalization’s discontents.
• The United States’ recent turn toward industrial policy that mirrors East Asian industrial policy but also includes more progressive goals, such as worker rights, inclusion of Indigenous populations, environmental protection and decarbonization in energy transition.
• The Indo-Pacific Economic Framework (IPEF), the U.S.-led regional arrangement that prioritizes national security and friendshoring.

The invited panelists will address these emerging trends and their significant implications for international trade models and norms. Following their presentations, they will engage with each other and the audience in Q&A and discussion.

The International Trade at a Crossroads roundtable is co-sponsored by the UB Asia Research Institute, APEC Study Center, Asian Studies Program and Nila T. Gnamm Faculty Research Fund.

This will be the fourth Asia Policy Roundtable presented by the Asia Research Institute. Previous roundtables have examined Asia in global supply chains (March 2023), Karen refugees from Myanmar in the context of Southeast Asian diaspora (October 2023) and demographic and economic trends in China (April 2024).

For more information about the International Trade at a Crossroads roundtable or other initiatives of the Asia Research Institute, email asiainstitute@buffalo.edu or call (716) 645-2580.