The emerging conflict between democratic legitimacy and the EU's Common Commercial Policy. Risks for the EU as a civilian power and for the multilateral order

The European Common Commercial Policy is both a raison d'être of the EC/EU since the Treaty of Rome and the way to become in 60 years a global civilian power. However, the highly problematic development of the TTIP and CETA trade arrangements may represent a turning point. Not only do domestic pressures and decentralized democratic demands for legitimacy challenge the capacity of the EU institutions to maintain exclusive competence in trade negotiations, but the role of Europe as champion of the global multilateral order established under the hegemony of the USA in 1944-47 is in trouble. Simultaneously, a different but convergent destabilizing process is occurring in US trade policy after the election of a protectionist and anti-multilateralist president. The paper invites the reader to take serious account of the risks of a dramatic change as far as global trade and the world order are concerned.