ECB's Lagarde pitches euro alternative to dollar in 'fracturing' world
BERLIN - European Central Bank President Christine Lagarde on Monday said the global economic order backed by the US dollar was "fracturing" and made a pitch for the euro as a global reserve currency.
"The global economy thrived on a foundation of openness and multilateralism underpinned by US leadership," Lagarde said in a speech at the Hertie School in Berlin.
Washington's support for a rules-based international system and the dollar as a reserve currency had "set the stage for trade to flourish and finance to expand".
The persistence of that US-led economic order over the past 80 years had "proved immensely beneficial to the European Union".
"But today it is fracturing," she said in an apparent reference to global trade tensions fuelled by US President Donald Trump's threat to impose sweeping tariffs on key partners.
"Multilateral cooperation is being replaced by zero-sum thinking and bilateral power plays. Openness is giving way to protectionism."
The recent upheaval was also threatening "the dominant role of the US dollar", she said.
The disintegration of the global economic order would "pose risks for Europe", Lagarde said.
"Any change in the international order that leads to lower world trade or fragmentation into economic blocs will be detrimental to our economy," she said.
But the retreat of the US dollar could also "open the door for the euro to play a greater international role".
Increasing the international role of the euro would lower borrowing costs for EU member states, insulate the bloc from exchange rate fluctuations and would "allow Europe to better control its own destiny", Lagarde said.
For that to happen, the European Union would need a "steadfast commitment to open trade" and to underpin its position with sufficient security capabilities.
It would also need to strengthen its economy and defend the rule of law, she said.
"This is not a privilege that will simply be given to us. We have to earn it."
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Whereas the likes of Bolsonaro, Milei, Orban and Meloni in power are largely ineffective because of their lacklustre governance and irrelevance, and their lack of global reach and influence, and the failure of Weidel, Le Pen, Wilders, Farage and others to do so, it is the second coming of Donald Trump, erroneously but flatteringly regarded as the 'Leader of the Free World' that has emboldened this nefarious alliance seeded and nurtured in the US, seeking out and picking fights with resource rich countries elsewhere under the veil of white victimhood, as in the case of the white Afrikaners in South Africa, and the spectre of corrupt largesse as in the case of DCR and its enormous booty of critical minerals. Video Player is loading. Play Video Play Unmute Current Time 0:00 / Duration -:- Loaded : 0% Stream Type LIVE Seek to live, currently behind live LIVE Remaining Time - 0:00 This is a modal window. Beginning of dialog window. Escape will cancel and close the window. 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Next Stay Close ✕ Not surprisingly, they and their ilk are the ones who are hailing Trump for calling out the appalling crime rate, the state of corruption and the entirely legitimate policy of affirmative action in South Africa, instead of castigating him for peddling a litany of fake news, misrepresentation and half-truths, courtesy of the American Alt Right, about Afrikaner 'genocide', white victimhood and marginalisation. Others in our midst albeit less extreme but still beholden to a neo-liberal dispensation for the post-apartheid South Africa, revel in the pastime of ANC-baiting, at least in the policy, delivery and outcomes failures of the Zuma and Ramaphosa administrations. Not all Afrikaners nor White South Africans, like their Black and Brown compatriots, of course are racists or bigoted. Many on all sides were eminently involved in the liberation struggle directly or indirectly, several of whom made the ultimate sacrifice in the notorious apartheid prisons. 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