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The Carbon Footprint of Protectionism: The Environmental Consequences of Brexit and Trump

Abrahamsson, Fanny LU (2025) NEKP01 20251
Department of Economics
Abstract
The objective of this paper is to investigate the effect of the Brexit referendum and the election of Donald Trump in 2016. These developments, while different in origin, share a rise of political populism, growing drawback from multilateralism and a reaction against globalization. When the United Kingdom left the European Union they also left the common frameworks governing trade, environment, and climate policy. The United States on the other hand, pursued a shift in direction through unilateral policy changes under the Trump administration, including a withdrawal from international agreements such as the Paris agreement and imposing protectionist trade measures. These political shifts raise questions regarding how politically driven... (More)
The objective of this paper is to investigate the effect of the Brexit referendum and the election of Donald Trump in 2016. These developments, while different in origin, share a rise of political populism, growing drawback from multilateralism and a reaction against globalization. When the United Kingdom left the European Union they also left the common frameworks governing trade, environment, and climate policy. The United States on the other hand, pursued a shift in direction through unilateral policy changes under the Trump administration, including a withdrawal from international agreements such as the Paris agreement and imposing protectionist trade measures. These political shifts raise questions regarding how politically driven changes in international cooperation affect global environmental outcomes, especially considering both the United Kingdom's and the United States impact on the global market. Through constructing counterfactual scenarios in the absence of the respective policy shifts with the use of the synthetic control method, the results show only marginal effects, in addition to that it is especially difficult to identify a clear effect for import emissions for the United States. After conducting two main robustness tests, and applying the research question on a second method, the results remain statistically insignificant, suggesting the sensitivity of the model specification. (Less)
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author
Abrahamsson, Fanny LU
supervisor
organization
course
NEKP01 20251
year
type
H2 - Master's Degree (Two Years)
subject
keywords
Brexit, Trump, Emissions in Trade, Climate Change, The Synthetic Control Method
language
English
id
9207715
date added to LUP
2025-09-12 10:50:49
date last changed
2025-09-12 10:50:49
@misc{9207715,
  abstract     = {{The objective of this paper is to investigate the effect of the Brexit referendum and the election of Donald Trump in 2016. These developments, while different in origin, share a rise of political populism, growing drawback from multilateralism and a reaction against globalization. When the United Kingdom left the European Union they also left the common frameworks governing trade, environment, and climate policy. The United States on the other hand, pursued a shift in direction through unilateral policy changes under the Trump administration, including a withdrawal from international agreements such as the Paris agreement and imposing protectionist trade measures. These political shifts raise questions regarding how politically driven changes in international cooperation affect global environmental outcomes, especially considering both the United Kingdom's and the United States impact on the global market. Through constructing counterfactual scenarios in the absence of the respective policy shifts with the use of the synthetic control method, the results show only marginal effects, in addition to that it is especially difficult to identify a clear effect for import emissions for the United States. After conducting two main robustness tests, and applying the research question on a second method, the results remain statistically insignificant, suggesting the sensitivity of the model specification.}},
  author       = {{Abrahamsson, Fanny}},
  language     = {{eng}},
  note         = {{Student Paper}},
  title        = {{The Carbon Footprint of Protectionism: The Environmental Consequences of Brexit and Trump}},
  year         = {{2025}},
}