In his second term, U.S. President Donald Trump has led a sustained assault on the foundations of the global order. He has nakedly flouted international law, wrecked the system of global trade with unilateral tariffs on scores of countries, and withdrawn the United States from important multilateral bodies.
The United States hasn’t always been an ideal champion of international cooperation. It tended toward isolationism when it was a rising power and unilateralism when it became a superpower. But Trump’s approach to reshaping the world order offers a new and dangerous mix of isolationism and aggrandizement. He is contemptuous of multilateralism and fixated by the raw exercise of power. So are his supporters. This likely means that whatever happens in Washington, Trumpism will outlive a president who turns 80 this year.
Pundits and political scientists have long anticipated the end of the United States’ unipolar moment and the rise of a more multipolar order. Trump is often cited as an accelerant in this process. The reality is that he has given rise to something altogether different. The United States will remain the most economically and militarily powerful country in the world for several more years. But it will be absent from, if not actively hostile toward, the existing international order. This unique configuration is not multipolarity but rather the world minus one.
