WATCH: Financial markets take a beating from Trump’s win
(CNN Philippines) — Donald Trump, the businessman, rode the wave of globalization over the past few decades to expand his multi-billion dollar business empire.
But analysts say Trump, the President-elect of the United States, can steer his country toward a more inward-looking perspective.
During the campaign season, Trump said if elected president, he would not approve the Tans-Pacific Partnership (TPP), a trade agreement among 12 Pacific Rim countries, including the U.S.
“It’s a terrible deal for the United States,” he said.
He also said the U.S. should be prepared to let its North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO) allies “defend themselves” if they are not spending enough for their common defense.
The NATO is a military alliance among countries committed to defend one another in an armed attack.
De-globalization?
“His (Trump’s) message on the U.S. focusing on internal issues will totally change the foreign policy direction. He campaigned based on anti-trade, anti-globalization (platforms),” political analyst Dindo Manhit told CNN Philippines.
For political analyst Leloy Claudio, Trump’s “isolationist” paradigm stands in contrast to the “internationalist” perspective of U.S. President Barack Obama.
“What we have here is not just a repudiation of the TPP but a repudiation of the kind of globalism of the 90s,” Claudio said on CNN Philippines’ Global Newsroom.
Claudio added that president-elect’s stance could affect the current U.S. administration’s so-called pivot to Asia.
“I’m not even sure that Donald Trump will want to invest in military operations in Southeast Asia the way Obama and Hillary (Clinton) did,” he said.
The good and the bad
For political analyst Gilbert Remulla, an isolationist U.S. can be both beneficial and detrimental to the Philippines.
“The isolationist attitude that America might take up just might jibe with what President (Rodrigo) Duterte is saying that he wants U.S. troops out. If that happens, definitely there will be less tension in the South China Sea and I think that’s a good thing for the Philippines at one point,” Remulla explained.
However, he said current and potential U.S. investments in the Philippines could also be at risk: “Will there still be incentive for them to outsource their businesses if there’s this shift in the policy of the United States?”
For Philippine Stock Exchange COO Roel Refran, the local stock market is part of an Asian market where there are certain “risk mitigates” in place to cushion any potential blow in terms of policies from a Trump administration.
“Our macroeconomic fundamentals remain very competitive relative to Asian markets,” he added.
Rise of the populists?
Claudio said Trump’s victory reflects a “global resurgence” of populism as seen in the Philippines and “various places in Europe.”
“This [is a] message that an outsider — who is fundamentally different from the persons inside and is more similar to the working classes or the masses or whoever — can come up, shake things up, and completely turn the world upside down,” he said.
Claudio added: “For some reason, in this period in world history, that message is extremely appealing and people are willing to throw caution into the wind in order to have change.”
CNN Philippines’ JC Gotinga contributed to this report.
