For the past few years, prominent world leaders and diplomats, for example President Emmanuel Macron of France, President Vladimir Putin of Russia and External Affairs Minister Dr. S. Jaishankar of India, have been arguing that the world we live in is a multipolar world. Many nations, particularly second tier powers like France and India, have been recalibrating their foreign policies in accordance with this assumption and talking about the opportunity to exercise their “strategic autonomy”. Multipolarity gives greater freedom to lesser powers.
The second coming of Donald Trump and his aggressive foreign policy moves have forced us to rethink and conclude that the world is still unipolar.
Emperor Trump and his Global Durbar
In the first month of his second term, President Trump has taken steps and made pronouncements that not only reversed US foreign policy but also completely gutted the very international liberal order that the US, and its European allies, so meticulously constructed and maintained for over seven decades. His foreign policy is also alienating friends and developing a new loosely constructed axis with nations not as invested in the current order as are America’s NATO partners.
This new reality was dramatically highlighted by a recent US vote at the UN on the territorial integrity of Ukraine that aligned with Belarus, Hungary, Israel and Russia and against Ukraine and most of the EU. Trump’s most impactful foreign policy action so far has been the complete reversal of America’s Ukraine policy. Pausing military aid to Ukraine is his way of not only showing Ukraine who is the boss but also to Europe. The move upends the global order as we know it.
His other major policy change which has the potential to undermine the very essence of the global economy and American liberalism is a return to protectionism with a vengeance. His pronouncements are also having an impact. His threats against Panama prompted the country to end its participation in China’s Belt and Road Initiative and renegotiate terms of use of the Panama Canal with the US. His consistent mention of India as a big abuser of tariffs and promise to levy heavy reciprocal tariffs resulted in India preemptively reducing tariffs and promising to increase imports from the US to reduce the trade deficit before India’s PM Narendra Modi met Trump in the White House. This was delivery before demand.
But the spectacle of world leaders making the pilgrimage to the Durbar (court) of Trump is telling. It started with the Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu, followed by King Abdullah of Jordan, PM Shigeru Ishiba of Japan, PM Modi of India, President Macron and PM Keir Starmer of the UK. Every one was effusive about their personal equation with the President. Trump is acting like a global emperor holding court while leaders of other nations present themselves humbly in his court to pay tribute.
Trump’s meeting with Ukrainian President Volodymir Zelenskyy and the way he and Vice President J D Vance berated him has shocked the world. It also highlights how unilateral and dismissive Trump has become.
Is this multipolarity?
There are some who argue that we have a multipolar world if we consider Europe as a unified power. First, Europe is not unified despite NATO and the EU. The rise of the right in Europe has divided nations and shattered national and regional consensus. While Europe has an economy that is in size comparable to China’s, it is getting squeezed by the manufacturing capacity of China and the protectionism of the US. When it comes to defense, the continent’s dependence on the American security umbrella has diminished their capacity. Forget about projecting power, without the US they are incapable of standing up to Russia whose economy is smaller than that of Germany, UK, France and Italy.
Trump has succeeded in sidelining Europe from the Russia-Ukraine peace process exposing the limits of European power. If Europe can truly step up and replace US aid for Ukraine that includes money, weapons, logistics, training and satellite-based intelligence, then one could argue at that stage that we are in a multipolar world.
