World order and US role will endure, for now
The Trump administration is critical of the world order and is changing the emphasis of US foreign policy
Later today, US President Donald Trump will speak before the UN General Assembly, the second time he has done so, and tomorrow chairs the UN Security Council (UNSC) in New York. Trump’s vision of world order challenges the post-war consensus of US leadership across the post-1945 multilateral global institutions, of which the UN is one. Trump favours more limited multilateralism and greater nation state-based sovereignty, with a preference for bilateralism.
What next
Trump’s presidency will not cause the demise of the post-1945 multilateral order, but international institutions will try to mitigate the US president's 'America First' agenda, perhaps by making reforms (such as to world trade) just sufficient for Trump’s acceptance. If Trump stays in office after 2020, his influence on world order will have greater longevity. Whether looking to 2021 or 2025, US partners and foes will be better placed by seeking to adapt to America First rather than gambling on its absolute rollback.
Subsidiary Impacts
- Partnerships with Washington will be transactional and warmer in some policy areas than others at any given time.
- America First will not affect all international bodies equally; Trump has been less critical of world financial bodies.
- America First thinking will determine US preparedness to intervene globally, such as over environmental controls.
Analysis
The chair of the UNSC rotates among its members. The meeting will cover limiting the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction.
This will likely include discussions on nuclear weapons and North Korea; Trump wants North Korean denuclearisation and a dialogue with Pyongyang (see NORTH KOREA: Peace process may hit sanctions roadblock - September 21, 2018).
Iran is likely to feature for the same reason: Trump pulled out of the 2015 nuclear deal with Tehran and now wants to isolate the country economically and strategically to persuade it to negotiate a new deal that in his view is more sustainable. (On September 21, Trump referred to the UNSC "meeting on Iran".)
The meeting may show up US-Russia and US-China tensions, albeit veiled in diplomatic language: Russia has shielded Iran from US pressure in the UN. Beijing and Washington are locked in a multifaceted trade dispute, with billions of dollars of tariffs imposed, and have disagreements over the South China Sea and other areas (see ASIA/US: Indo-Pacific strategy will be slow starter - August 8, 2018).
An order reimagined
The US ambassador to the UN, Nikki Haley, says the meeting is not expected to produce a formal resolution. Nonetheless, the meeting will be significant as a measure of Trump's approach to world order.
Trump's post-1945 predecessors tended to emphasise an outward-looking United States, active in the post-war multilateral bodies. In contrast, Trump is critical both of these institutions and of previous US administrations (Republican and Democratic) whose brand of multilateralism he says undermined US citizens' welfare, for example by letting jobs go overseas.
Trump explains America First as meaning the prioritisation and safeguarding of US interests, although at Davos in January he said America First did not mean "America alone".
Under Trump, the US government wants a global order, but one conducive to US aims. Enforcing that order, and international norms and laws, is configured behind this aim.
Trade aspects
For Trump, one factor behind America First is his argument that the United States lost out through unfavourable trade deals under past administrations. He wants to erase or at least greatly diminish the US worldwide trade deficit, hoping thereby to drive economic growth and secure domestic industry's resurgence.
This approach led him to leave the Trans-Pacific Partnership trade bloc talks in 2017; he has not joined the successor bloc. Trump has also initiated widespread trade renegotiations including of NAFTA and US bilateral trading relationships, for instance South Korea, which yesterday completed renegotiating its free trade agreement with the United States.
Other countries and blocs have been less willing to finalise a new deal: China and the EU are resisting US tariffs with retaliatory tariffs, though both sides are also in intermittent trade renegotiation talks.
Security factors
Like the world order, America First is not confined to trade. Trump is critical of NATO, arguing that the United States is paying too much into the organisation and many NATO members are contributing too little. NATO members agreed in 2014 each to spend the equivalent of 2% of their GDP on defence by 2024.
At the NATO summit in July, Trump took NATO members to task, subsequently claiming he had reinvigorated the alliance by securing a renewed commitment to contribute (see NATO: Summit is likely to be fractious - June 27, 2018).
US foreign policy under Trump is also emphasising great power politics, for instance describing China and Russia as rivals in its national defence strategy documentation (see UNITED STATES: Contradictions weaken new security plan - January 23, 2018). In many ways, this reflects the thinking of earlier Republican administrations.
Trump's foreign and defence policy has some consistency with past Republican administrations
Wanted and unwanted dynamism
In this context, US international relations under Trump are gaining a new dynamism: US partnerships in many areas are subject to change, depending on the issue, and are determined pragmatically around the issue's urgency.
This could be beneficial to some US partners. For instance, a post-Brexit United Kingdom could gain a free trade deal quickly with the United States (assuming post-Brexit trade and legal arrangements allow this) partly because Trump's foreign policy emphasises speedy trade expansion and bilateralism.
The new dynamic is more problematic for others. For example, the same Trump emphasis on trade is destabilising US-EU relations. Similarly, while Trump refers to his friendship with China's President Xi Jinping and Chinese support in managing Pyongyang, the US-China trade dispute is worsening.
Re-ordering the re-order?
Re-ordering the world under America First faces challenges. For one thing, as the US administration reconfigures the emphasis of US foreign policy, opportunities for other countries to fill the void -- be it in trade, investment, diplomacy, aid or security -- will arise.
Trump also faces domestic constraints: as larger economies implement retaliatory tariffs, they are challenging his ability to weaponise trade tariffs to promote his vision of today's economic world order.
Furthermore, the United States holds midterm elections in November. Currently, it seems probable that the Democrats will gain the House of Representatives and possibly (but less likely) the Senate.
Control of one or both chambers would increase the Democrats' policy leverage, for instance over federal budgets. That would be used to try to advance their aims.
One casualty of Democratic calls for greater social spending could be Trump's military build-up plans, or his initiative to warm ties with Russia's President Vladimir Putin. America First thinking would have to be moderated to avoid total government gridlock.
If Republicans hold Congress, Trump will ideally need increased majorities: if Republican majorities are lost or diminished, Trump's political capital will decline, too, affecting his America First campaign platform (the Republican core supports Trump and America First).
America First thinking will be tested at the ballot box on November 6
In that eventuality, Trump would still be unwilling to sign laws that curtail the presidency's trade or foreign policy powers, unless manoeuvred into such a situation. Yet he would have to heed congressional Republicans to avoid rebellion, and that could mean moderating America First, for instance to avoid further retaliatory tariffs hitting Republican heartlands.
Trump could also face resistance from within the executive. Some officials, such as in the Defense and State Departments, are more favourable towards international institutions. There will still be limitations to such resistance: Trump is reshuffling his White House staff to reflect his views more closely (see US/INT: ICC sanctions are unlikely but spats will come - September 20, 2018 and see UNITED STATES: Foreign policy faces domestic pressures - September 19, 2018).
