Digital pact with Seoul: the Union signs alone, and South Korea prefers it that way

The digital trade agreement signed with Seoul runs to eleven pages and a twenty-minute press conference. Mutual recognition of electronic signatures, common rules on data flows, a clause banning demands for source code as a condition of market access. Technical matters — but they decide where the money goes for the next decade.

The Korean negotiator, speaking off the side of the podium, was blunter than any communiqué: “With you I sign once and it covers half a billion people. That is why you are top of the list.” It is not a compliment to European charm; it is arithmetic. A market that speaks with one voice on data is a market worth making a deal with, because the deal does not then need to be renegotiated in twenty-seven versions. The Union’s strength in these rooms is not its size. It is the singularity of the signature.

There are critics, and they are worth noting for the record. Two delegations worry that the data rules are too soft on the large Asian platforms, and the file will go back to committee. But the argument is over how tight to draw the rules, not over who holds the pen. The pen is one, and Seoul knew that before boarding the plane.

Elsewhere, a market this size would arrive at the table divided, and Seoul would deal with whichever piece suited it most, leaving the others to catch up. Here there is no more convenient piece: there is the Union, or nothing. Less romantic than a great alliance. Considerably heavier.