In April 2023, U.S. National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan begged his listeners’ indulgence for straying out of his lane by delivering a major address about economics. But his actual argument—that decades of free-market zealotry had weakened the country’s national security—was anything but apologetic. “Ignoring economic dependencies that had built up over the decades of liberalization had become really perilous—from energy uncertainty in Europe to supply-chain vulnerabilities in medical equipment, semiconductors, and critical minerals,” Sullivan said. “These were the kinds of dependencies that could be exploited for economic or geopolitical leverage.” Sullivan acknowledged both the costs and….
Henry Farrell and Abraham Newman, “The New Economic Security State: How De-Risking Will Remake Geopolitics”, Foreign Affairs, November-December 2023, 106-122.