The more things change

IN ONE thing Donald Trump is consistent: unpredictability.

Over the last four years, American foreign policy has reflected its commander-in-chief. What Mr Trump deemed making America great again, others saw as weakening America on the world stage and isolating it from its allies. What Mr Trump characterised as rolling back the evils of his predecessor, Barack Obama, others saw as chaos.

It was not so much policy as government by decree.

Yet the result of last week’s election is no guarantee US diplomacy will be any less unpredictable now.

Some things are clear enough. In seeking a mandate from US voters, Joe Biden and Kamala Harris presented their party’s positions on a range of key foreign-policy matters.

For example, Mr Biden has already assured that, come January 2021, the US will rejoin the Paris Climate Accord.

Undoubtedly, the fact that the US president-elect served in Mr Obama’s cabinet as vice president generates the expectation that Mr Biden’s approach will resemble Mr Obama’s.

The background of Mr Biden’s running mate Ms Harris, whose father is Jamaican and mother was Indian, further suggests it is not unreasonable to feel America will return to a more multilateral approach to global engagement and interconnection.

That approach for years allowed the US to fend off the exercise of soft power by rival states and preserved US economic interests, though Mr Trump and his supporters would say otherwise.

But just as Mr Trump’s “policy” was more concerned with maintaining support from his party’s isolationist electoral base, Mr Biden and Ms Harris now have similar issues to contend with.

Already there is concern within the Democratic party that losses in the US House of Representatives and the closer-than-anticipated race in the Senate suggest the party cannot afford to veer too far from the positions taken by Mr Trump.

What does this mean for us?

On immigration policy – so effectively used by autocrats the world over to stoke xenophobia and play to electoral bases – Mr Biden will have to rely on his executive powers. His more ambitious efforts could stall if the Democrats lose the Senate in run-offs next year.

The ceding of Florida to Mr Trump in last week’s election – an outcome made possible by a haemorrhaging of Democratic support among Hispanics – has implications for the US approaches to Venezuela and Cuba.

Ironically, Mr Trump’s portrayal of his Democratic opponent as “socialist,” coupled with a hard stance on Nicolás Maduro’s socialist regime, may well have been factors with Hispanics who fled oppression. Mr Biden will be under some pressure.

Meanwhile, in the lead-up to January’s handover of power, Mr Trump has more than enough time to seed more chaos. And the Democrats know he might well be waiting in the wings for 2024.

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"The more things change"

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