Early on Friday morning, August 1, 2025 – notably Switzerland’s National Day – there was a rude awakening for the Federal Council, Parliament, and the public. President Trump imposed a new punitive tariff of 39% on Swiss exports to the United States, citing allegedly massive export surpluses. For now, pharmaceutical products – which account for roughly half the value of Swiss exports to the U.S. – are still exempt from this draconian measure. The outcry across the country was loud and unmistakable. Business leaders, politicians from across the spectrum, major newspapers, online media, and Swiss radio and television all expressed outrage and offered analyses of the possible motives behind this unfair decision by the U.S. president.
What went entirely unmentioned in the debate was the fact that our small neighbour on the eastern bank of the Rhine – Liechtenstein – was “rewarded” with a mere 15% tariff on its exports to the U.S. This despite the fact that Liechtenstein, a country of just 40,000 people, exports significantly more goods to the United States than it imports. According to census.gov, in 2024 the U.S. imported goods worth USD 267.4 million from Liechtenstein, while U.S. exports to Liechtenstein amounted to only USD 81.1 million. This results in an import-export ratio of 3.3:1 – even higher than Switzerland’s ratio of 2.8:1 (approximately USD 70 billion in imports from Switzerland versus USD 25 billion in U.S. exports).
Why, then, was Liechtenstein spared from Trump’s punitive tariffs while Switzerland faced a 39% levy? The answer lies in Liechtenstein’s membership in the European Economic Area (EEA). As such, the two other EEA members – Iceland and Norway – also received the same 15% tariff rate.
This is exactly the rate the EU recently negotiated for its 27 member states. Liechtenstein thus benefits directly from its integration into the EU’s internal market – a path Switzerland has deliberately chosen not to follow.
In a fiercely contested referendum on December 6, 1992, the Swiss electorate narrowly voted against joining the EEA, with 50.3% opposed.
Since then, this rejection has often been celebrated as a great triumph for Christoph Blocher and the Swiss People’s Party (SVP) – even mythologized. Less well known is that the Green Party also supported the opposition, arguing that EEA accession might weaken Switzerland’s progressive environmental legislation. The irony is that today the EU is a global leader in environmental policy, while Switzerland now “autonomously adopts” many of the same regulations.
Back to Liechtenstein: just seven days after the Swiss referendum, the Liechtenstein electorate remained undeterred and voted on December 13, 1992, with 55.8% in favour of joining the EEA – and a remarkable turnout of 87.8%. The principality officially joined the EEA on May 1, 1995.
In retrospect, one might ask: Did the people of Liechtenstein already understand in 1992 that a microstate in Europe can only safeguard its independence and sovereignty against the arbitrariness of global powers through integration with the EU and the EEA? Did Christoph Blocher lead Switzerland down the wrong geopolitical path in 1992? And is the Swiss public now left to pay the price for that strategic misjudgment?
Now to Guyana, which learned on August 1, 2025, that it too faces punitive tariffs of 15% on its exports to the United States. These tariffs are 5% higher than those imposed on most of its Caribbean neighbours, with the exception of Trinidad and Tobago. The U.S. provided no official explanation for this discrepancy, leaving Guyana’s government and private sector scrambling to interpret the geopolitical signals behind the decision.
Like Liechtenstein, Guyana is a small country with limited leverage on the global stage. And like Switzerland in the 1990s, Guyana currently maintains a high degree of independence in its external economic policy, relying on bilateral diplomacy rather than deeper regional or multilateral integration.
This moment raises an urgent question: Can Guyana afford to remain on the margins of international economic frameworks when larger powers act unilaterally? Liechtenstein’s example suggests that strategic alignment with broader economic blocs – in its case, the European Economic Area – can offer small nations predictability, legal protection, and leverage in international trade negotiations.
As Guyana considers its future trade strategy, it may wish to study how Liechtenstein used institutional integration not as a surrender of sovereignty, but as a means of safeguarding it. In a world increasingly marked by economic nationalism and transactional diplomacy, such foresight may be critical to shielding national interests from arbitrary external shocks.
Sincerely,
Prof. Dr. André Brändli
Ludwig Maximilian University of
Munich
Germany
