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On 24 April 2026, in Washington, the European Union and the United States signed a Memorandum of Understanding on a strategic partnership in the critical minerals sector, accompanied by a joint action plan on supply chain resilience. The formal details are well known. What deserves attention is the structural significance of this agreement: not a trade deal, but a shift in the Western conception of economic security.
The official documents are explicit on a point that until a few years ago would have been politically controversial: critical minerals are now ‘strategic assets’ directly linked to national security, industrial competitiveness and geopolitical balances. This statement, contained in the Memorandum, represents a conceptual break with the post-Cold War globalisation paradigm, in which raw materials were considered neutral inputs within integrated global markets.
The paradigm shift is evident in the very structure of the agreement. The agreement does not merely facilitate trade, but builds a coordination framework across the entire value chain: exploration, extraction, refining and recycling. Added to this are instruments typical of an economic policy that has abandoned market neutrality as an absolute principle: border-adjusted pricing mechanisms, subsidies to bridge competitive gaps, long-term supply agreements and shared industrial standards.
In analytical terms, we are witnessing a transformation of trade policy into security policy.
This evolution must be understood in the light of the vulnerabilities that have emerged in recent years. The joint action plan explicitly recognises that supply chains for critical minerals are exposed to distortions arising from non-market practices and to risks of systemic disruption. In other words, the global market is no longer considered a reliable environment for ensuring stable access to essential resources. The consequence is that resilience becomes a deliberate policy objective, not a by-product of liberalisation.
It is in this context that the agreement should be interpreted as an indirect but unequivocal response to China’s dominant position in numerous segments of the critical minerals supply chains. Although the documents maintain institutional language, the reference to ‘shared geopolitical challenges’ and the need to counter non-market practices clearly indicates the strategic direction. Parallel initiatives promoted by Washington to build an international coalition on these matters further reinforce this interpretation.
From this perspective, the EU–US partnership is not an isolated episode, but a piece in a broader reorganisation of the international economy around blocs of selective cooperation. The most significant element, from a geopolitical perspective, is the explicit openness to the creation of a plurilateral trade initiative among ‘like-minded’ partners. This introduces a logic of membership that overlaps with — and partly replaces — the universalistic principle of the World Trade Organisation.
From this perspective, globalisation does not disappear, but changes in nature. From an open and essentially undifferentiated system, it evolves towards a segmented structure, in which access to strategic supply chains is governed by political as well as economic criteria. This is what might be termed a form of ‘selective interdependence’, in which cooperation is reserved for partners deemed reliable from an institutional and strategic standpoint.
For Europe, this shift has particularly profound implications. For over two decades, the Union has built its economic identity around the primacy of regulation and trade openness. The Washington agreement signals a rebalancing: the dimension of economic security is firmly entering the scope of European action. This is not a retreat into protectionism, but an attempt to reconcile openness with the defence of strategic interests.
This development is consistent with a conservative vision of economic policy, which recognises the value of the market but rejects an abstract interpretation of it that is detached from the geopolitical context. From this perspective, sovereignty is not incompatible with international integration, but requires that interdependencies be managed and, if necessary, recalibrated. The agreement on critical minerals fits precisely into this logic: strengthening autonomy without pursuing self-sufficiency.
It remains, however, an open question, one that the agreement’s key players themselves do not shy away from. European Commissioner Maroš Šefčovič has emphasised that the real challenge will be to translate the agreement into concrete projects. This is a crucial point. The European Union has, over time, demonstrated a remarkable capacity for regulatory definition, but less incisiveness when it comes to industrial implementation. Should this dynamic repeat itself, the risk would be a misalignment between strategic ambition and operational capacity.
Ultimately, the EU–US agreement on critical minerals should be seen as a leading indicator of a broader transformation. The international economy is gradually taking on the characteristics of a system in which security, industry and geopolitics are once again intertwined. In this scenario, the availability of strategic resources is no longer a technical variable, but a condition of power.
For Europe, the stakes are high. The ability to integrate effectively into this new architecture will determine not only the continent’s industrial competitiveness, but also its degree of strategic autonomy within the Western alliance.