Police in riot gear stormed a rally on Friday, removing hundreds of protesters by truck.
Photographer: Victor J. Blue / Bloomberg
Photographer: Victor J. Blue / Bloomberg
American democracy survived the assault on the Capitol building. What has come to be known as American exceptionalism may not.
The idea that the United States for reasons of its history and seemingly rock-solid democratic institutions has an exclusive advantage has rested behind American claims of world leadership, as well as the expectation — at least among allies — that you should exercise it.
The concept is full of contradictions, sustained by a crude military and economic force and rejected by many, including Russian President Vladimir Putin and US leader Donald Trump, who led his supporters on Capitol Hill to protest against the certification of his electoral defeat: by 7 million votes. – in November.
While it has eroded over the years, the soft power of what former President Ronald Reagan liked to call “a bright city on a hill” has sometimes been powerful. He suffered a blow on Wednesday.
“Yes,” Howard Dean, a former chairman of the Democratic National Committee, said when asked on Bloomberg TV if Wednesday’s show marked the end of American exceptionalism. “It was probably during the day that Trump took office.”
Consequences could include a weakened ability to confront and compete with other comrades in the Chinese superpower, or summon Russian, Turkish, Saudi or other leaders for democratic and human rights violations, including the smaller economies of Africa and America. Latin.
“It won’t be long before we can credibly defend the rule of law,” Richard Haass, a former U.S. diplomat and chairman of the Foreign Relations Council, a New York-based think tank, said on Twitter. . . “It will also take a long time to persuade allies to trust us or give lectures to other people who are not stable enough to have nuclear weapons.”
China quickly used the events in Washington to bring home a narrative about U.S. hypocrisy, with Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Hua Chunying compared to the US endorsement of pro-democracy protesters who stormed the Hong Kong legislature in 2019. The United States under Trump has often linked trade to political action, penalizing Beijing for its repression in Hong Kong and its treatment of its Uighur Islamic minority in Xinjiang province.
Iranian President Hassan Rouhani, elected in a heavily managed electoral system that excludes opponents of Tehran’s Islamic regime, said in a statement on state television that Wednesday’s events “really show us the weak and flaccid Western democracy.” He added that Trump had damaged America’s reputation and “created so many problems for America’s relationship with the rest of the world.”
President-elect Joe Biden has said he plans to convene a summit of world democracies to restart the cause that led the West to the Cold War. Proponents say the initiative could also act as opposed to the China and Belt Initiative, creating a forum to launch common approaches to trade and technology standards in competition with Beijing.
China has also made use of Trump’s decision to withdraw from the Paris climate agreements to position itself as a global advocate for actions to tackle climate change, a mantle the U.S. hopes to regain under Biden, but which it requires strong leadership and collaboration from the United States.
It is unclear how the image of U.S. lawmakers protecting themselves from protesters will help this effort. Nor is Biden’s commitment to reviving U.S.-led alliances weakened by four years of Trump’s skepticism, including the North Atlantic Treaty Organization.
Rep. Jason Crow consoled Rep. Susan Wild as she protected herself as protesters interrupted the joint session of Congress.
Photographer: Tom Williams / CQ-Roll Call, Inc.
But as the world watched as flag-waving protesters pushed the U.S. legislature, the shock was even greater because these scenes would normally be more familiar to the parliaments and presidential palaces of the weak, nascent or undemocratic. Former President George W. Bush even compared Wednesday’s events in the United States to a “banana republic.”
“Disturbing images”
“We all saw the disturbing images of the U.S. Congress storm last night, and those images made me angry and sad,” German Chancellor Angela Merkel said Thursday, blaming Trump’s refusal to concede. .
Europeans acknowledged the threat to American exceptionality (and in some cases theirs) in television footage they have seen before, said Jonathan Eyal, a Romanian-born foreign policy analyst at the Royal United Services Institute. a UK think tank.
“The driving force for this is the same as we saw in Eastern Europe after the fall of the Berlin Wall: the feeling that the transfer of power is illegitimate, that the rules of the game and the conviction that the loser loses everything, “Eyal said.” It’s also a deep shock that you have a large number of people in the U.S. who came to the same conclusion after 200 years of constitutional order. “
Protesters walk the U.S. Capitol after breaking barricades into the Washington, DC building
Photographer: Victor J. Blue / Bloomberg
Biden seemed well aware of the challenge he faced in a televised speech on Wednesday, asking Americans to “think about what the world looks like.” And even the final discredit of American exceptionalism may not inevitably lead to the weakening of alliances or the promotion of democracy, according to Eyal.
As long as Biden aggressively rejects false equivalence, such as between the excesses of those calling for a Democratic vote in Hong Kong and those trying to raise one in Washington, and as long as he can convince Trump’s 74 million voters, he won’t. they lose everything by losing the vote, a little more American humility could work in their favor.
Probably, Trump has not only burned his chances of running again in the 2024 election by inciting violence, but a skilled administration could take advantage of Wednesday’s events, taking a less “Olympic” and therefore more persuasive approach. of his criticisms of the failures of other countries, according to Eyal.
“Yes, the next few days will be pretty terrible for the American soft power, but in a year or so, not at all,” he said. “It’s not that bad to be part of the team.”
Faced with his own populist threat from the far right, similar to Trump, French President Emmanuel Macron on Wednesday night recalled the common history of nations as democratic republics in a televised speech, suggesting he would not lose the urge to work with the next administration.
“Definitely, what has happened today in Washington DC is not America,” said Macron, who switched to English toward the end of his statements. “We believe in the strength of our democracy. We believe in the strength of American democracy. “
– With the assistance of Tom Keene, Francine Lacqua, Golnar Motevalli and Michael Winfrey