China's Export Machine Is Pushing the World Toward Its Next Economic Crisis

Michael Froman, president of the Council on Foreign Relations and a former U.S. Trade Representative, argues in Foreign Affairs that the world's capacity to absorb China's export surplus is nearing its limit. China posted a $1.2 trillion trade surplus in 2025, the largest on record, and that surplus grew more than 20 percent again in early 2026 even as global GDP growth idles near 3.1 percent. Froman writes that Beijing cannot easily abandon export-led growth because the model is as much a political project as an economic strategy, tying local employment and state legitimacy to manufacturing output. As other countries start closing their markets to absorb the glut, he warns that a sudden loss of access to foreign buyers could accelerate the very crisis it is meant to avert, tipping China's slowdown into a global one. The piece lands as the IMF flags growth near multi-year lows and finance ministries from Washington to Brussels debate new tariff walls against Chinese goods. Froman's argument reframes the China question away from geopolitics and toward a more immediate fear: that the world's second-largest economy could export its next downturn along with its steel and solar panels.