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In an article published in Foreign Policy’s Fall 2024 issue, I quoted historians and political experts as suggesting that Donald Trump could transform the global system beyond recognition if he returns to the presidency.
The fear is that he’ll discard or ignore U.S. allies and pull out of NATO and possibly even the United Nations. As Joseph Ellis, a Pulitzer Prize-winning presidential historian, argued, the “Again” in Trump’s Make America Great Again movement means a return to the past. In this case, Ellis said, it suggests “going back sometime before 1940,” when isolationism dominated U.S. policy.
But others argued that the forces of inertia—or the status quo ante—may prove stronger than people think. Kiron Skinner, the former head of policy planning under Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, noted that in his first term, Trump did not orchestrate “a pull away from the broad-based liberal international order.” In his second term, Skinner said, Trump would only seek to “right-size America’s role in the world” by demanding that U.S. allies step up more on defense.
Yes, Trump has altered the terms of the political debate more than any president since Ronald Reagan and, before him, Franklin D. Roosevelt. He has upended the postwar and post-Cold War consensus and transformed what Americans talk about, whether international economics, trade, alliances, or immigration.
But other than swearing by tariffs, he still lacks a coherent vision or program. Thus, it is also possible that when he passes from the scene, the 78-year-old Trump could eventually be seen as more of a historical blip than a world-altering figure. “Betting on inertia in U.S. foreign policy is a very good bet,” said Stephen Wertheim, a political scientist at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. “It’s really, really hard to change U.S. foreign policy in a big way.”
Read it here: Is 2024 Really the Most Important Election in History?
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