**(A) Five assumptions and conventional wisdom**

**Assumption 1.** *In an increasingly protectionist world, a domestic mindset is the way to go.*

According to some respected scholars, globalization died after the GFC (Rugman 2012). As a result and since 2016, both the UK (Brexit vote) and the US (America First foreign policy) have implemented domestically-oriented policies to protect domestic jobs, especially by imposing tariffs on steel and

<sup>6</sup> The author obtained his NASD Commodity Futures (Series 3) trading license in 2003. He is trilingual and well-traveled. He has visited the BRICS at least once, except for Brazil and has lived and worked in four different developed countries. He has been teaching economics and business courses to undergraduate and graduate students since 2002 (e.g., principles of macro- and micro economics, strategic management, international marketing, global strategy) in the US and in Europe. He has published his expertise in several academic journals, as well as in the specialized press (e.g., *Les Echos* and the *Financial Times*). He is the recipient of several corporate, teaching, and service awards. Whereas his international business background is quite extensive, it must be noted that the researcher has natural biases.

<sup>7</sup> https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/conventional%20wisdom.

aluminum for the latter (Galbraith 2018). Other protectionist measures have included anti-immigration rhetoric and a re-focus on nationalism and patriotism in these countries and in others (e.g., Hungary, Italy, and Austria). In essence, globalization, once the notion that called for integration and collaboration in business and lifted hundreds of millions of people out of poverty (Ahlstrom 2010), has now become defunct for some and the enemy for others, even if the latter do not fully grasp the benefits that they have been deriving from it (Betts 2016).
