The global trade landscape is undergoing profound changes, driven by the re-emergence of tariffs with Trump’s first administration in 2018 and the acceleration of the green transition. Among the industries affected is the electric vehicle (EV) sector, where traditional market leaders such as the US and EU face increasing competition from China. While economic blocs are resorting to tariffs in an attempt to reduce their dependency on China and strengthen their domestic industries, their broader economic and environmental consequences are unknown. This study investigates the economic and climate change consequences of increased tariffs imposed on EVs and their associated supply chains in the year 2022, using a Computable General Equilibrium (CGE) model to simulate trade scenarios involving the EU, US, and China.

The findings reveal while tariffs can reduce dependence on Chinese EVs and support domestic industries of countries imposing tariffs, they also slow EV adoption and undermine climate goals. In scenarios where all three regions impose 20% tariffs on EV imports, global EV adoption drops by 0.87%. This slowdown of shift to EVs from internal combustion engine (ICE) vehicles leads to over 1.85 Mt CO2-eq. of additional emissions over the lifetime of vehicles. Over half of these additional emissions are due to the 2.5% drop in EV adoption in EU. The trade diversion away from China leads to China’s market share in EU and US declining by over 70% and 18%, respectively. When tariffs are expanded to cover other inputs to the EV industry like batteries, critical minerals, and electronics, the EV sector is more adversely affected, resulting in a 1.2% decline in global EV adoption and a rise in associated emissions to 2.5 Mt CO₂-eq.

A complementary game-theoretic analysis of these scenarios helps explain the real-world tendencies of major economic blocs to impose tariffs. The results suggest that the United States is incentivized to impose tariffs as a means of strengthening its domestic EV industry while mitigating losses in EV sales. China, in turn, is motivated to retaliate in order to reduce the negative repercussions for its EV industry and to preserve its market share. By contrast, the European Union faces a more complex dilemma: although tariffs would support its domestic EV industry, they would also exacerbate the decline in EV adoption, making non-retaliation the more favourable strategy from a climate perspective.

This study offers policymakers critical insights into the economic and climate change impacts of tariffs on the EV industry and its supply chains. By quantitatively evaluating trade scenarios, it brings out the trade-offs between strengthening domestic industries and climate goals and helps anticipate its impact on other regions. The findings support more holistic decision-making by emphasizing the importance of integrating climate considerations into trade policy to ensure a balanced and effective EV transition.

Power dynamics play a crucial role in inhibiting and advancing various policies, from climate action to wage negotiations. However, current integrated models addressing socio-economic and environmental issues often fail to account for the underlying drivers of these power dynamics, thereby illuminating a significant literature gap. This omission limits the ability of the models to capture real-world complexities and may hinder effective policy design.

This paper addresses this gap by exploring how power dynamics can be incorporated within integrated models which deal with socio-economic and environmental problems. It begins with a proof of concept, demonstrating how a specific type of power dynamic, namely labour union bargaining power, can be included into the World Trade Model (WTM), a dynamic form of Input-Output Analysis. This integration is coupled with supplementary research that explains the drivers of said power dynamic in order to address the literature gap. Notably, this paper has made additional contributions by being the first instance of power dynamics included in the WTM, developing new code to convert the WTM into a Multi-Regional Input-Output format to advance the field of dynamic Input-Output Analysis, and clearly documenting this code which was previously missing.

Additionally, the paper outlines a future research strategy focused on two main areas: including power dynamics as inputs to integrated models with parallel research on the drivers of the power dynamics evaluated, and also contains ideas on how to take steps to model the power relationships between actors themselves. This approach holds promise for providing a deeper understanding of how power dynamics influence socio-economic and environmental outcomes. The author advocates for further research to ensure power dynamics are not overlooked in models in order to have a more comprehensive representation of systemic issues.

Over the last three decades, global economic structures have undergone massive transformations, with the gender aspect of these developments often being overlooked. This study addresses this research gap by exploring how these economic changes have affected men and women differently in terms of hours worked, and identifying the key drivers behind these trends. From 1995 to 2019, global working hours for men increased by 907 billion hours (30% rise), while women's working hours increased by 606 billion hours (33% rise). Nevertheless, the total hours gap between men and women has increased, though both genders experienced a decrease in weekly hours per employment, with men reducing their hours slightly more than women. Women’s participation rates increased slowly from 57% in 1995 to 64% in 2019, while men’s participation rates remained constant at 80%, significantly contributing to the observed trends. Regional disparities revealed that the Global North and China saw minimal increases in total working hours, with a narrowing weekly hours gap for women, while the Global South, especially India, experienced major gains in male working hours with very little change in female working hours, reflecting lower participation rates for women. A sectoral analysis shows that agriculture experienced a decline of 25% for both genders, mainly in China. This decline in agricultural hours was offset globally for men primarily in Construction, Retail, Manufacturing, and Transportation, and for women in Retail, Service, Education, and Manufacturing, with increases mostly occurring in sectors where each gender was already predominant. The decomposition analysis showed that technological advances in agriculture, the most dominant sector, offset rising consumption levels for both genders, leading to a decrease in hours worked, while no other industrial sector experienced the same offsetting effect. Furthermore, it indicates that efficiencies in technology saved hours worked for both genders in all regions, but these savings were consumed by rising final demand. The primary drivers influencing changes in working hours have been similar for both men and women, with men slightly benefiting more from production technology advances This research provides a comprehensive understanding of regional disparities and gender inequalities in the context of global economic development over the last three decades for various industry sectors and countries. By bridging the research gap and offering detailed insights into the differential impacts of global economic changes on men and women, this study contributes to a more nuanced understanding of labor developments.

Human activities have increasingly affected Earth’s natural systems, threatening ecological balance and sustainability. Social-Ecological Systems (SESs) are complex structures where human and environmental processes interact. Within these systems exists the concept of “tipping points” thresholds where small changes can trigger non-linear, irreversible shifts towards a new state. This concept has been widely studied in the natural sciences and has recently become popular within the social sciences, as research on Social Tipping Points (STPs) looks to uncover the tipping mechanisms at play within societal systems.
Discourse and narratives, as key linguistic practices, play a crucial role in how humans perceive, understand, and disseminate information across all levels of society. This makes them particularly interesting for the study of STPs, as they may act as key tools for triggering feedback mechanisms within SESs. Such feedback mechanisms are identified as complex contagion and cascading effects. Social actors within SESs create and share discourses and narratives between them, which in turn influence these feedback mechanisms and shape social behaviours towards positive change.
The study introduces the Discourse and Narratives-Social Tipping Points (DN-STP) framework, integrating six societal spheres (Politics, Industry, Society, Media, Science and Culture) which house actors at institutional and individual levels. These actors, through discourse and narratives, interact within and across spheres to trigger feedback mechanisms and shape behaviours towards the management of an ecological system. The ozone layer issue, where damages to the stratosphere were reversed through global coordinated action, serves as an ideal case study for the DN-STP framework and highlights the role of discourse and narratives in guiding positive change.
The study finds that discourses and narratives are indeed powerful avenues for understanding societal change within an SES. Integrating them within the study of STPs showcases the vital role of actor spheres within a socio-ecological issue and aids in explaining its developments and dynamics. While the study establishes the relevance of including discourse and narratives within STP research, further studies are needed to credibly establish the specific role of narratives in influencing social behaviours at the system level. Further expansions of the DN-STP framework can look to integrate other relevant societal mechanisms that may be central to triggering positive feedback effects towards STPs.