The TTC’s first four meetings were focused on launching the forum, setting its agenda, and establishing political alignment and convergence of views. These steps paved the way for some concrete results. Observers agree that since Russia’s war on Ukraine, the forum has become increasingly geopolitical and strategic, reflecting the acute need to develop a common position on pressing challenges. This has been underlined by its pivotal role in facilitating export controls and sanctions coordination in the context of the war. The fifth meeting, held in January 2024 in Washington DC, was considered a lower-key ‘working’ event, serving as a stock-taking exercise that laid the foundations for the sixth ministerial meeting.
Many experts argue that a major outcome of the TTC is the creation of a quasi-permanent (without an official secretariat) transatlantic community of experts focused on EU-US cooperation. This community is ready to tackle upcoming issues, share information and engage in dialogue – a remarkable change compared to the past when cooperation was more ad-hoc and the results were mixed. The US Congressional Research Service highlights that the TTC has become a prominent forum for transatlantic cooperation, as both parties share economic and geopolitical concerns. It emphasises that ‘through the TTC, the partners largely have avoided rehashing long-standing differences, opting instead to work to update the rules of the road for the 21st century’, particularly in regulatory cooperation on new technologies. This focus on new tech areas, rather than entrenched issues, has led some experts to note that the digital pillar of the TTC has made more advances than the trade pillar. Ministerial meetings have consistently produced tangible outcomes in digital and technology policies.
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