Making “Enemies”: Industry‐State Subterfuge and US Fair Trade Practices Towards Non‐Market Economies Since 1960

Abstract Studies on US “non‐market economy” (NME) antidumping (AD) policy frame its origins as either an ideological relic of the Cold War or as a case of regulatory capture informed by strategic filing patterns. While these insights are invaluable, they do not address the underlying social processes which inform the creation of economic concepts in the first instance. NME policy evolved out of the legal‐discursive tactics employed by the US steel industry hoping to receive relief from imports, and a US state which had to simultaneously provide a form of protection to the steel industry and maintain an international commitment to free trade. Steel and the state used legal subterfuge to achieve these goals. Accordingly, NME policy developed from the institutional struggle between two stakeholders in a strategic action field.