Like cats in popular folk wisdom, globalisation appears to have many lives. The integration of markets in goods, services and capital that accelerated in the 1990s with the fall of communism and the rise of China has been written off many times, notably during the global financial crisis. Yet it has survived.

This past year, its obituarists have had more material to work with than usual. The stalling of a number of high-profile trade deals has had the pre-emptive mourners out in force arguing that the engine of liberalisation has failed. Feeble growth in worldwide goods trade relative to the expansion of the global economy has raised fears that protectionism has taken its toll. And the election of Donald Trump, with his tirades against Chinese imports stealing jobs, and the appointment of China trade hawks like Peter Navarro to his administration, suggests that the era of liberalised trade is over.

Of these worries, only the last is convincing. Even allowing for the fact that rhetoric on the US presidential campaign trail tends to be far more blood-curdling than subsequent actions when in office, Mr Trump’s zero-sum worldview is deeply troubling.