Interstate competition and Chinese ascendancy: The political construction of the global cotton market,1973–2012

Abstract

This article argues that interstate competition over the organization of the world economy shapes the spatial configuration of commodity chains. This departs from much of the literature that emphasizes firm- and sector-level dynamics. To illustrate this argument, we use formal network methods in conjunction with a historical analysis to examine the evolution of the global cotton trade between 1973 and 2012. Through this analysis, we demonstrate that changes in the spatial configuration of the cotton market were shaped by changes in the nature of competition among the most powerful states in the world economy. While the cotton trade was once characterized by a bipolar network reflecting the nature of interstate competition under the Cold War, by the early 2000s China’s accession to the World Trade Organization and the end of the Multi-Fiber Arrangement had dramatically reshaped the global cotton market. The result was a binodal network in which trade flows were increasingly concentrated between China and the United States.