The Trade Trap

Across the globe, democracy is losing ground.

Freedom House reports that democracy is in decline: Just 20% of humans live in nations that the think tank describes as “free,” while 40% dwell in states defined as “not free.” This trend has been heading in the wrong direction for years. Freedom House says the number of global democracies has declined for 17 years in a row, and it says the world has fallen into a “long freedom recession.”

The most obvious harbingers of democracy’s reversal are Russia and China. For a time, Westerners sincerely believed that by increasing economic ties with Moscow and Beijing, rulers there would embrace democratic values. Instead, both nations have grown more autocratic. The liberal world order is teetering, and autocrats sense weakness and press their advantage: Russia invaded Ukraine, and China has imprisoned Uyghurs in camps.

The West was wrong to deepen its ties with China.

The United States and Europe welcomed China into the World Trade Organization (WTO) in 2001, a move that has backfired spectacularly. In the two decades after China joined the WTO, its economic output as a share of global GDP soared...