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A NUCLEAR state with a huge population and army falling to extremists has been America’s nightmare about Pakistan for long. Ironically, it becomes a reality this week, not in Pakistan but in the US itself as Donald Trump takes oath given the many persons with extremist views he has named for senior roles in his team.
Jeff Sessions, nominated as attorney general to prosecute racial bias, has a history of making racial remarks. Michael Flynn, incoming national security adviser, considers not just Muslims terrorists but the Muslim faith itself as a cancer. Scott Pruitt, nominated head of the Environmental Protection Agency, recently sued the latter to undo key rules to curb climate change. Gen James Mattis, nominated defence secretary, is popularly called Mad Dog Mattis.
His education secretary nominee supports undermining the US public school system by allowing rich students to use public funds to attend private schools. The nominated ambassador to Israel supports the annexation of the West Bank and East Jerusalem. Finally, there is Trump himself who supports banning the entry of Muslims, calls Mexicans rapists and considers women easy picks for sexual exploits. There are others whose views lie far beyond the pale of even moderate conservatism.
True, none of them believe in the retrogressive actions that IS-type extremists undertake routinely, eg killing minorities mercilessly. Loathsome and deplorable though it is, IS-style extremism largely causes widespread miseries locally and occasional bomb attacks globally. But the extremist views of the Trump team threaten to restructure global economic, political and social norms fundamentally. This restructuring could unleash silent and indirect violence that dwarfs the visible IS atrocities.
Trump’s extremist views could alter global norms.
Not that this is the first time this is happening in recent US history. After nearly 40 years of moderate rule since the Second World War by both Democrats and Republicans, US politics took a more radical turn in the 1980s. The period since then has been marked by a series of radical Republican eras — Reagan, Bush-2 and now Trump.
The Reagan era enforced neoliberal economics globally, unleashing increasing economic inequality. It and the Bush-2 era unleashed neo-conservatism to restructure the global political order in favour of the US, in the process fuelling Islamist militancy. These radical eras were interrupted by Democratic eras which by US politics norms pass as left-wing eras but actually represent moderate conservatism economically and politically.
What horrors will the third radically conservative US era unleash, the world waits nervously to discover. This third era differs from the earlier two in that it lacks heavyweights carrying clear and strong neoconservative or neoliberalism ideologies. This absence and dire financial straits may limit major foreign military adventures by the US. Yet, there is talk of increasing defence spending greatly.
The target will likely be China and policy towards it (perhaps even its close allies) may be more hawkish. Already there is talk of an anti-US alliance emerging resultantly including Pakistan, Russia, Iran and China — a political PRIC to match the economic BRICS. Given this line-up of anti-US states, Korea (North) seems a natural fit in it and would make the acronym, which would translate into a thorn in the US flesh, more complete. Perhaps, the warmth Trump is showing towards Putin is an attempt to pre-empt the emergence of such an alliance.
Economically, Trump is unlikely to fully follow neoliberalism either. In fact, he may hasten its demise given his anti-globalisation rhetoric and threat to use US government power to force US companies to stay homebound. But the move away from neoliberalism may not be leftward. It may include neo-imperialism where weaker states are expected to open their economies for US interests while the US itself erects protections.
Still, the absence of ideologues makes the Team Trump threat largely unclear. So, not only is it unclear what its foreign policies will be, it is also unclear who will control it since all key persons in the team have little foreign experience. Ideological leaders may emerge eventually. But even if they don’t, Team Trump could still cause much damage through blunderbuss — lacking clear ideas and intellect but possessing enormous powers like a low-IQ gorilla flexing its muscles wildly.
Such prognosis on the politics of the most powerful state globally sends shudders around globally. More than its military power, America’s unregulated financial system and its loads of carbon emissions every second pose bigger threats to global security. That its political system still regularly produces leadership which intensifies rather than resolves these problems creates a problem of global proportions. Will saner nations unite to checkmate the Team Trump threat is the crucial question.
The writer is a political economist and a Senior Fellow with UC Berkeley.
Published in Dawn, January 17th, 2017
