Digital Trade Restrictions in Manufacturing Production Networks: A Systems Robustness Assessment

In this study, we ask whether digital trade restrictions are associated with manufacturing participation through cross-border production network exposure and whether any association varies with structural position. We combine the OECD Digital Services Trade Restrictiveness Index with value-added participation data for 35 countries and 14 manufacturing sectors from 2014 to 2021. Because the DSTRI changes in only 47 of 245 possible annual country transitions and country-year fixed effects absorb national main effects, every estimate is interpreted as a conditional association rather than a causal policy effect. Average domestic and partner exposure estimates are imprecise. The exploratory top-position interaction is negative in 82 of 84 multiverse specifications, but only 14 confidence intervals exclude zero. A pooled equality test confirms period heterogeneity: the 2018–2021 minus 2014–2017 interaction difference is 0.2644 (95% CI [0.0215, 0.5073]; wild p = 0.036). The common lagged sample, including the required main effect for outcome-derived annual position, yields a null annual position interaction (−0.0027; 95% CI [−0.0405, 0.0351]); its formal difference from the static interaction is 0.0886 (95% CI [0.0365, 0.1406]). Partner concentration and broad digital intensity do not validate the proposed mechanism. Fixed links map regulatory exposure, but no cascade, supplier substitution, or adaptation is observed. Therefore, the evidence supports a bounded systems robustness assessment and diagnostic policy use, not a general, causal, or time-invariant restriction effect.