The recently inaugurated U.S. President Joe Biden proclaimed that “America is back,” and this immediately sparked a debate about whether the new administration can effectively restore America’s global supremacy and maintain the liberal international order that Donald Trump’s administration has largely abandoned.
On the face of it, President Biden’s return to liberal internationalism is consistent with the basic foreign policy preferences of the American public. A recently released Pew Research poll found that 60 percent of Americans trust Biden’s foreign policy. Along with a similar January 2021 study commissioned by the Chicago Council on Foreign Relations, its findings show strong public support for maintaining the U.S. system of security alliances and U.S. participation in international institutions to solve world problems. In the Chicago Council study, most respondents (71 percent) – Democrats (82 percent), Republicans (57 percent), independents (72 percent) – when asked about alliances agreed that the United States should be more willing to make decisions with allies, even if it means that the United States will sometimes have to agree to policies that are not its preferred policy.
Regarding questions about commitment to the United Nations and international institutions, we also see generally general support, albeit with more pronounced cross-party differences. When asked whether the United Nations should be involved in the decision-making process of the United States and its allies, 62 percent of Americans (84 percent of Democrats and only 37 percent of Republicans) responded positively. Similarly, when asked whether leading international organizations should be involved in world affairs, 52 percent of respondents generally support the United Nations, 41 percent support the World Trade Organization (WTO) and 51 percent support the World Health Organization (WHO). Again, the cross-party divide is striking, with Democrats supporting each of these international institutions more than Republicans: 68 versus 39 percent for the United Nations, 53 versus 30 percent for the WTO, and 71 versus 32 percent for the WHO. As for overall world leadership, the Pew poll found that 78 percent agree that the United States should “participate in shared world leadership,” only 11 percent think the U.S. should be the “only” leader, and only 10 percent support “no leadership at all.”
It is important to note that these cross-party disagreements over international organizations are far from new. A 2004 study by the Chicago Council found similar divisions. The administration of George W. Bush, then in charge, was also openly skeptical of the role of international organizations, as most vividly demonstrated by the failure of the U.S. to secure U.N. support for its military action in Iraq in 2003.
Nevertheless, despite the similarities in the polls, there are four important reasons to suspect that the U.S. domestic environment will not be as favorable to Biden’s return to global supremacy and the liberal international order as in previous eras of U.S. foreign policy, when the domestic politics were markedly divisive.
First, although most Americans hold foreign policy beliefs that are generally consistent with liberal international principles, this is not a major issue for them. In other words, support for unions, free trade, and a more open migration regime is often strongly opposed by opponents who strongly oppose these “globalist” policies. For example, those who believe that their manufacturing jobs have been lost to international trade and outsourcing are likely to strongly oppose international trade agreements such as NAFTA or the Trans-Pacific Partnership. Those who see benefits for the country in an open trade regime, on the other hand, are less likely to vote as if it were a major issue for them. Moreover, about 75 percent of the American public prioritizes domestic issues over foreign policy, and dissatisfaction, both on the left and the right, with U.S. foreign military operations and “endless wars” continues to grow.
Second, unlike in previous eras, there are differences in perceptions of the most significant threat to U.S. security. During the Cold War, the superpower rivalry with the Soviet Union created a strong domestic consensus on the contours of defense and foreign policy. The 9/11 attacks provided bipartisan support for the global war on terrorism. In contrast, another recent study by the Chicago Council shows a sharp split over what constitutes the most serious security threat. Only 11 percent of respondents (10 percent of Democrats and 15 percent of Republicans) identify outside terrorist groups such as ISIS and al-Qaeda as the top threat to U.S. security. Democrats cite groups within the United States as the biggest threat: violent white nationalist groups in the United States (47 percent) and militant far-right extremist groups (46 percent). Among Republicans, 45 percent believe that China poses the greatest threat to U.S. security, while among Democrats, only 10 percent think so. In short, there is not only staggering disagreement over which organizations or states pose the greatest threat to U.S. security, but also disagreement over whether the greatest threat comes from domestic extremist groups or from foreign geopolitical rivals.
Third, broad bipartisan support for democracy and political liberalism in the United States is waning, broadly speaking. Republicans, especially at the state level, are increasingly turning into the anti-system opposition, rejecting the results of the 2020 presidential election. Those results have been challenged by 128 House Republicans and 18 state attorneys general from Republicans who have joined a lawsuit in support of President Trump, claiming that the 2020 election was “stolen” or improperly conducted. Moreover, the January 6 storming of the U.S. Capitol by pro-Trump demonstrators not only threatened U.S. lawmakers, but also delayed confirmation of the electoral college vote.
The stunned reactions from other countries clearly demonstrated that the U.S. political system is no longer perceived as operating within a consensus that requires both parties to accept the election results and agree to a peaceful and orderly transfer of power. Of course, the United States has always been accused of hypocrisy for supporting democratic values, both at home (especially during the Civil Rights Movement) and abroad, when it openly supported authoritarian regimes in the name of anti-communism or fighting militant Islamism. But now, in addition, President Trump’s skepticism about promoting democracy and liberal values abroad seems to be widespread among the American public, with only 20 percent of Americans supporting the promotion of democracy abroad as a top foreign policy priority.