Polanyi on crisis: The United States, fascism and ecological break‐down

Abstract This article uses Karl Polanyi's understanding of the crisis inherent in liberal economics to analyse a contemporary crisis—Trump's global tariff agenda. It argues that Trump's tariff agenda conforms to Polanyi's interpretation of how the crisis of liberal economics can disintegrate into more malignant forces. However, this article argues the Trump tariff agenda is a response to a larger crisis of contemporary liberal economics—climate breakdown. The slowing of capital accumulation due to the end of ‘Cheap Nature’ gives rise to increasingly regressive strategies to maintain profits by the global hegemon. Trump's tariff agenda marks a Polanyian shift from a neo‐liberal ‘disembedded’ strategy of capital accumulation, rhetorically based on market norms, to a politically ‘embedded’ strategy that Polanyi would likely see as fascist.