The new Trump 2.0 era is radically redefining the global economic paradigm, definitively burying the neoliberal model that dominated recent decades. Far from a simple continuation of his first term, the current U.S. administration, backed by unprecedented institutional power (judicial, legislative, and executive) and legitimized by winning the popular vote, is deploying an aggressive neo-mercantilism that threatens to completely reconfigure international economic relations. Analysts who expected institutional moderation of his most disruptive proposals now face a much starker reality.

Nevertheless, the intention of this article is to confront this proposal and analysis with the theoretical framework of the Social and Solidarity Economy. SSE is not just another «way of doing business,» but also a proposal for analysing economic reality that moves away from orthodoxy to join other heterodox economic schools such as feminist economics or even Modern Monetary Theory. SSE has drawn from the proposal of a renowned moral economist, Karl Polanyi, who gained renewed fame following the 2008 financial crisis, when numerous writers brought up his work to explain the causes of that crisis. At the risk of oversimplification, the «disembedding» of the economy from social and moral relations was identified as an explanation for the two world wars, as pointed out by Polanyi, and its validity for analysing what happened prior to that financial crisis.

Along the same lines, we could note that from the perspective of the Social and Solidarity Economy, Trump’s economic plan represents another clear example of «disembedding» the economy from social and moral relations. At this point, we can focus on three key elements that identify potential structural flaws in the approach of Trump’s plan as explained by Varoufakis:

1. Reduction of economic relations to power relations: Trump’s plan, as described by Varoufakis, is based on a purely transactional vision where the economy is a zero-sum game. However, SSE recognizes that sustainable economies function as systems of cooperation and interdependence, not just competition.

2. Absence of the reciprocity factor: The bilateral «hub-and-spoke» model proposed by Trump lacks the principle of reciprocity that SSE identifies as fundamental to the stability of economic systems. Stable international economic relations are built on recognized mutual benefits, not on unilateral impositions.

3. Erroneous conception of value: Trump emphasizes the production of «masculine» goods such as steel, ignoring that economic value emerges from multiple sources, including care, services, and relational goods that SSE considers central not only to well-being but also to keeping competitive economies functioning. This is also a point where European response proposals articulated around the Draghi report err.

Apart from these elements, we find a proposal for the new economic paradigm, once the neoliberal model that sustained the globalization proposal of previous U.S. administrations, and which is also the sacred scripture by which the EU proposal is governed, seems more than buried. Thus, what some experts call neo-mercantilism would sustain the use of state power (whether military or through measures of economic aggression such as tariffs) to simultaneously set the new economic normativity. The new order sought by the administration would serve to «materialize» U.S. hegemony in a different way than the institutions of that country did (along with multilateral institutions such as the IMF or the now defunct WTO).

However, the question remains whether this risky intervention (tariff threat combined with bilateral negotiations to impose specific actions on the various central banks and other supervisory/regulatory authorities in the EU, Asia, and America) will be sufficient for market behavior to change with respect to what the dominant economic paradigm would predict so far. That is, with this Trump proposal, a kind of economic «squaring of the circle» would be achieved, thus overcoming what economists call the «trilemma» or the «impossible trinity» of international monetary policy. This principle establishes that a country cannot simultaneously maintain:

• A controlled exchange rate (or weak, as Trump desires)

• Free movement of capital (essential to maintain the dollar as a reserve currency)

• An independent monetary policy (low interest rates, as Trump wants)

The use of openly belligerent action (acknowledging that previous administrations were not blameless) may produce compliant behavior in the short and medium term, but often triggers counterproductive long-term responses (along the same lines of open use of force). This dynamic creates two problems: it can push targeted nations toward rival power blocs (China-Russia), and it erodes the identification of common interests with traditional allies. Even leaders historically aligned with the U.S. may develop divergent strategies when faced with an openly self-interested partner, regardless of their initial preferences.

Thus, and returning to an SSE analysis, Trump’s attempt to reconfigure the international economy through economic coercion should make more evident the need to generate what Polanyi called «protective countermovements»:

1. Acceleration of alternative systems: Instead of strengthening U.S. hegemony, the plan could accelerate the creation of alternative monetary systems (as Varoufakis suggests with the BRICS), weakening the U.S. position in the long term.

2. Fragilization of supply chains: The transactional approach ignores the complexity of global value chains, which cannot be easily reconfigured through unilateral decrees without generating significant social costs. This will fuel social and political movements eager to separate from the U.S. position. It could also be an opportunity to demonstrate the superiority of international SSE value chain models.

3. Disintegration of internal social cohesion: The tension identified by Varoufakis between satisfying Wall Street or the working class precisely reflects the problem of moral disembedding. When the economy disconnects from society, it generates tensions that eventually explode into social crises, both in the U.S. and in Europe if we are not aware that our response must respond to a different social and economic model, despite the growing role of the far right in both national governments and the proposals that seem to emanate from the new EU.

This is so because we cannot forget that the proposal for social and environmental transformation of the SSE is not a «woke» artifice. That a lie is repeated does not make it true, although it does make many people believe it. The SSE proposal responds to real changes and trends that will not disappear with a «new economic order,» but rather will be reinforced.

From the SSE perspective, the alternatives we build are more efficient precisely because they recognize the need for specific regulatory frameworks, not deregulation. The report on strengthening access to finance for Social and Solidarity Economy entities, soon to be published by the UN task force on SSE, and with which I have had the opportunity to collaborate with, documents how democratic financial models generate differential competitiveness based on minimizing negative externalities. While Trumpism proposes deregulating to compete, SSE demonstrates that adapted regulation and specific supervisory frameworks for cooperatives, mutual societies, and social enterprises drive social innovation and economic sustainability. Environmental and social accountability is not a burden but a competitive advantage in markets increasingly aware of global impacts. These concrete experiences show that real and lasting competitiveness does not arise from the elimination of rules, but from their intelligent adaptation to shared social and environmental objectives.

For decades we have been building economic systems with greater resilience and autonomy. Our theoretical proposal demonstrates its viability, even under adverse conditions, through the strengthening of social markets and local economic circuits; the development of ethical financial systems less dependent on global markets and capable of promoting technological innovation at the service of people; and the prioritization of shorter, more sustainable, and democratic supply chains. Fair trade, patient capital instruments, housing proposals in use transfer, and shared ownership companies represent concrete tools that must be multiplied to counteract vulnerability to the coercive manoeuvrers proposed by the neo-mercantilist model.

In this context, we must defend the SSE proposal not only as a «morally» more just proposal but as a proposal that, precisely because it includes the moral dimension in its assessments, results in analyses and recipes that are more successful in the medium and long term. We must therefore defend an alternative international economic policy, based on these heterodox approaches, which recognizes that:

1. Currency is fundamentally a social and political instrument, not merely a «good» to be strategically valued or devalued, disembedded from its effects on society and on the vast majority of the EU’s economic fabric.

2. Economic sustainability requires circular and reciprocal economic circuits, not unidirectional extractive relationships.

3. Genuine economic development must integrate social, environmental, and well-being objectives, not just metrics of industrial production or trade surplus. Without these objectives, we will cease to be competitive.

The current dilemma is not simply between neoliberalism and neo-mercantilism, but between an economy disembedded from society—whether in its globalist or nationalist version—and an economy reintegrated into the social, ecological, and moral fabric. The challenge in the face of the Trumpist revolution is not to nostalgically defend the previous neoliberal order, but to take advantage of this rupture to advance toward a genuinely different economic paradigm. SSE not only offers a well-founded critique of both models but also a coherent roadmap for navigating the turbulence ahead. If Europe wants to avoid being trapped between U.S. belligerence and authoritarian alternatives, it urgently needs to build its own path, its new competitiveness based on a socially and environmentally embedded proposal.